I encourage you to continue with our 30-Day Meditation Challenge, which is tracking through the same themes and concepts. You’ll get a deeper sweep of both yoga and meditation concepts via the Yamas and Niyamas.

For those of you who’ve been participating, to keep the practice momentum high - I encourage you to continue developing your self-practice by completing at least 3 Sun As each day, and one or two other poses that will twist and rinse your spine.

You are also welcome to come practice in person!

You are welcome to attend my classes online or in-person at Karma Yoga for no cost for the remainder of the challenge until February 9th. The online classes are listed as free, and for the in-person classes, please sign yourself in on the paper sign in sheet and write “30 Days” for the Payment Method. (see my classes here)

Thank you for practicing, happy new year - and hope to see you on the airwaves with the Meditation Challenge or on the mat!

Today, our focus will be on truthfulness of our breath. How do we practice our asanas - our poses - in ways that are in integrity with the truth of our breath? What does our breath mean during practice?

Breath is one of the only functions in the body that is a two-way street. We can both control breath, through pranayama or such as by holding your breath while swimming, etc. - and our breath continues in our most unconscious states, in our deepest sleep.

Few other body systems operate this way. We cannot make our skin grow, we cannot stop our stomachs, we cannot will our hearts to stop beating. On the other end, our muscles need input to act. Other systems have some two-way elements, that through yoga or other deep mind-body practice, can be mastered with practice - but breath is the major one that most everyone masters, otherwise you wouldn’t be listening!

Our lungs are innervated by the vagus nerve, connecting our deepest most reptilian brain, the brain stem - with our most vital organs: heart, lungs, stomach and others.

Unless you’re James Bond or a monk in deep meditation training, the breath is the only two-way street in the vagus system. For all of us, the natural breath is a mirror to our state of mind. When we notice natural breath at the beginning of class, we are tuning in to watch the “State of the Union” of Mind and Body.

The natural breath does not always feel good. If you’re having a panic attack, or even mildly stressed, you may notice that the breath becomes constricted or shallow in certain areas. You may feel headaches or tight shoulders. Sometimes, we don’t even notice - such as the classic case of someone shouting, “I’m not angry!”

During yoga practice, our breath is both an anchor and a first line cue to the state of our nervous system. During challenging poses, we return to the breath. We also notice the breath, as a cue that it is time to amplify or dial down a pose.

Today, our focus will be on truthfulness of our alignment. How do we practice our asanas - our poses - in ways that are in integrity with the truth of our bodies?

After practicing for nearly a decade, I realized that I was cheating in some of the poses. I was so eager to get the deep bends and binds, that I relied on my natural flexibility to get into poses without having strong anchors to the floor, or keeping my muscles activated. After a decade of practice, I realized that my hips were weak and tight from lack of use - yes, even after all that yoga! - I somehow managed to practice for years, while avoiding activating my hips and core!

When I started grounding my feet, squaring hips, activating muscles - I was unable to get close to basic poses I thought I’d mastered.

But with time, practicing in integrity with my body, things slowly began to blossom and connect. I’d entered a new era of my personal practice.

For this reason, as a teacher, I aim to teach the intention of the pose. And help students figure out for themselves, which shapes are right for their body.

So let's get started with a short flow focusing on Warrior 1's.

As we are the observers in this yoga experiment, it is important to learn about the lens through which we see. In today’s meditation challenge, we focus on mapping the grooves of our samskars, learning to read the story of us.

In our yoga challenge, we’re going to work through a physical aspect of this, with a short flow focusing on a deep heart opener, camel. As we discussed earlier, samskars are not just grooved into our minds, but in our bodies as well.

So, let’s get started - and see what’s in store for us in camel pose today.

As we are the observers in this yoga experiment, it is important to learn about the lens through which we see. In today’s meditation challenge, we focus on unraveling the narrative of the story of us, casting our story on to the big screen.

In our yoga challenge, we’re going to work through the physical aspect of this, with a short flow focusing on a deep hip opener, pigeon pose. It is often said that our emotions are stored in your hips. I tend to believe that emotions can be stored in any area of the body, and yes, hip openers can certainly bring up a lot of feelings.

So, let’s get started - and see what stories are stored in pigeon pose today.

We’ll start by rinsing through our hips, then sinking into some hip openers. Giving ample time to tune in and listen to what our bodies are saying.

Take a moment to notice your space. Yoga mats are nice, because they are portable space definers. You can roll it out anywhere, even in a crowded room, and that's your practice space. It's also nice to take a look at your room. Noticing if the floor is clean or picked up, if there are piles, laundry or unmade beds around you. Notice how your environment impacts your state of mind and your practice. Would you feel better cleaning or re-arranging? Are there any scents or smells you might like to add or remove, closing or opening of windows - or would you like to move somewhere else? Feel free to pause here, and take a couple moments to re-adjust.

In developing a regular self-practice, it is helpful to set aside a space for practice. This space begins to build the energy and association with yoga practice, making it a little easier each time to practice. Yoga schools or studios can be helpful, because they are spaces dedicated to yoga practice - there are no other distractions and nothing else to do - but practice yoga!

Next, notice what you are bringing into your practice space. What thoughts, intentions, emotion or energy are coming with you onto the mat? Know that there is no wrong way or right way to be, just noticing. Take a moment to reflect on your intention for this 30-day challenge. How would you like to feel differently? Maybe pause here and jot down in your phone or journal your intentions.

Each time you set up your space, take a moment to notice what you're bringing into your space - noticing your physical environment, your thoughts, energy and intentions. Take a moment to set a small intention for your practice, something to bring your attention to - a thread for each practice.

For today, let's set the intention to "take off the shoulds" before stepping onto our mats. Notice if you're bringing judgments onto the mat, such as "I should be able to touch my toes" - notice if you're tracking "shoulds" into your thoughts, and see if you can gently remove your "shoulds" during your practice.

So, what are we cleaning? Each day, we generate "sankaras" or little knots of craving and aversion. When we want something we don't have, or don't want something we do have - we generate a little knot that lives between the mind and body. Each night, when we dream, we also generate "sankaras" - each moment of life and experience, generates some sankara. When these sankaras build, we might feel intense emotions or pains in our bodies. We can address these sankaras from two ways - from the mind, through meditation - or from the body, through yoga. Eventually both practices lead to the same place, to the very subtle space, between mind and body - where are sankaras are stored.

Let's learn one of the basic series - combining Asana (postures) with Pranayama (breath) called the Sun Salutations.

Once you master this series, it becomes an opportunity for moving meditation - a chance to go into that subtle space where mind and body meet.

This means that practicing cleanliness, such as removing your shoes before entering the practice area, or even the cleanliness of your speech - are parts of our yoga practice.

Today we will look our yoga practice as a daily shower for the inside of the body, activating and pumping our lymphatic system to cleanse and drain our bodies of waste and support the healthy functioning of our immune systems.

Our lymphatic systems live in our network of connective tissues, with hubs of lymph nodes in our necks armpits, abdomen and groin. Today's flow will focus on these four areas. We'll keep this flow gentle, so you can notice the inner work.

For the next 30-days, we'll learn a little bit about yoga through a 15-minute sequence and mini-dharma talk each day.

Yoga is an ancient practice with a long history, so we'll be using the Yamas and Niyamas as a framework for our 30 day challenge.

The Yamas and Niyamas are two of the 8 Limbs of Yoga, compiled and written by a sage in India by the name of Patanjali about 3000 years ago. His works have been used as foundational frameworks for many spiritual teachers and schools after.

So, why are we studying this? The goal of yoga is freedom and unity; "moksha" and "yoga". Moksha means liberation from suffering, or enlightenment. Yoga means "to yoke" or union, union with the divine, or all that is. Yoga is not the only path to liberation and unity, of course, but it is a well-trodden one.

In our 30-day yoga challenge, we will be focusing on the Asana and Pranayama limbs, the physical postures and breath exercises, commonly combined as vinyasa; movement with breath. If you've been curious to start or join a vinyasa or flow yoga class at your local studio, then this challenge is for you!

Through the lenses of the Yamas and Niyamas - or, the vows and duties of a yoga student - we'll spend 3 days learning related postures and flows, before moving onto the next. By the end of our 30 day yoga challenge, you'll hopefully come away with a few nuggets of knowledge and some fun ways to move your body.

Thank you for listening, and hope to see you on the mat!