Prescriptions for Pranayama

YJ profiles the pranayama practices of six yoga traditions and finds differences ranging from the subtle to the profound.

By Claudia Cummins

Only at more advanced levels do students learn to incorporate retention, or breath holding, into pranayama. At this point Jalandhara Bandha, the chin lock, is introduced. Retention is said to be important because "it super-injects prana into the system," says Karunananda, and "builds up tremendous vitality." Students are also sometimes invited to incorporate healing visualizations into this practice. "As you inhale you can visualize that you're drawing into yourself unlimited quantities of prana--pure, healing, cosmic, divine energy," Karunananda says. "You can picture any form of natural energy that appeals to you. Then on the exhalation, visualize all the toxins, all the impurities, all the problems leaving with the breath."

KRIPALU
Cultivating Sensitivity and Awareness
Pranayama is also introduced from the very beginning in the Kripalu tradition. Here, however, breathing exercises are just as likely to be offered before asana practice as after. "I always begin my classes with 10 to 15 minutes of pranayama," says Yoganand, director of advanced yoga teacher training at the Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health in Lenox, Massachusetts. "I have folks sit down and do pranayama until they're quiet, they're sensitive. If we can feel more when we go into our postures, we're more likely to be aware of our limits and be respectful of the body." Pranayama is almost always taught in a seated position in the Kripalu tradition, with eyes closed and with little emphasis on particular bandhas, or energy locks, until intermediate stages of practice. Students are counseled to follow a slow and gentle approach. Teachers may stop and ask students to note sensations, emotions, and thoughts that come up for them, in order to help them taste more subtle aspects of the practice.

"In Kripalu Yoga, one of the premises is that through developing sensitivity to the body we can learn a lot more about the unconscious drives," Yoganand says. "Breathing is a really integral part of that because unconsciously we choose how much we're going to feel by how much we breathe. When we breathe more deeply, we feel more. So when I'm leading pranayama, I'm primarily encouraging folks to slow down, to release constrictions in breathing and focus on what they feel."

Attention is also paid to the breath during the practice of postures. In beginning asana classes, students are instructed when to inhale and exhale as they enter and release postures, and to simply pay attention to their breath at other times. In more advanced classes, students are encouraged to observe how different postures change their breathing patterns and what feelings arise with these changes. In addition, seasoned students are encouraged to employ a gentle version of Ujjayi Pranayama (Victorious Breath), a practice in which the throat is slightly constricted and the breath made softly audible.

In the pranayama portion of the class, beginners usually start with a three-part deep breathing pattern similar to that of Integral Yoga. Beginners are also introduced to the Ujjayi breath during seated pranayama, as well as to Nadi Sodhana, Kripalu's term for alternate nostril breathing. In addition, Kapalabhati is taught in a particularly slow and steady fashion. "When I teach this," says Yoganand, "I usually have folks visualize that they're blowing out a candle, and then I have them exhale in the same way but through the nose." Students learn to extend this practice gradually, starting with 30 to 40 breaths and adding repetitions as well as speed as they grow more adept.

Only at more advanced levels do students move on to additional pranayama practices, Yoganand says. At this level, students use a centuries-old yoga manual called the Hatha Yoga Pradipika as a guide, mastering the subtleties of the eight formal pranayama practices detailed in this text. "The pranayama is to make you more sensitive," says Yoganand. "As folks become more aware of sensations and feelings, there's a real possibility for personal growth and integration."

ASHTANGA
Unifying Action, Breath, and Attention
Join a workshop with students from different yoga traditions and you can pick out Ashtanga practitioners with your eyes closed. They're the ones who sound like Star Wars's Darth Vader even when they're standing in Tadasana. That's because they're practicing Ujjayi breathing, which is carried all the way through the vigorous series of postures in this tradition.

Ashtanga teachers say the deep and rhythmic breath fuels the inner energetic flames, heating and healing the body. Just as importantly, Ujjayi breathing keeps the mind focused. By returning again and again to the subtle sound of this breath, the mind is forced to concentrate and become quiet. "Since the Ashtanga practice is very breath-oriented, in a sense you're doing a kind of pranayama from the moment you begin the practice," says Tim Miller, who has been teaching this approach to yoga for more than two decades.

In the Ashtanga tradition Ujjayi breathing is taught in concert with both Mula Bandha (Root Lock) and Uddiyana Bandha (Abdominal Lock). This means that while breathing, the pelvic floor and the belly are gently drawn inward and upward so that the breath is directed into the upper chest. When inhaling, students are instructed to expand the lower chest first, then the middle rib cage, and finally the upper chest.

Seated pranayama practices are also a part of this tradition, although Miller says that Pattabhi Jois, the father of Ashtanga Yoga, hasn't taught it to groups since 1992. Today only a handful of teachers regularly teach this series, which is comprised of six different pranayama techniques. These practices are learned progressively, each one building upon the previous, and are practiced in a seated position with the eyes open. Typically, they are only introduced after students have practiced yoga for three to five years, Miller says, and have mastered at least the Primary Series of Ashtanga postures.

"As Patanjali says in the Yoga Sutra, one should have reasonable mastery of asana first, which means for sitting pranayama practice you need to have a comfortable seat," he says. "Not that people necessarily need to be able to sit in Padmasana [Lotus Pose] for 45 minutes, but at least they have to be able to sit in an upright position where they can be relatively still." In the first pranayama technique, students practice Ujjayi breathing while adding a pause at the end of the exhalation, a pattern called Bahya Kumbhaka. Then they reverse that pattern and pause at the end of the inhalation, a pattern called Antara Kumbhaka. Once mastered, these practices are integrated into a single sequence: three Ujjayi breaths with no breath holding, three Ujjayi breaths with exhalation retention, and then three Ujjayi breaths with inhalation retention. Mula Bandha and Uddiyana Bandha are engaged throughout, and Jalandhara Bandha, the Chin Lock, is added only during the inhalation retention.

The second practice in the Ashtanga sequence combines the retentions learned in the first sequence into each breath cycle, so that the breath is held after both the inhalation and the exhalation. The third sequence builds on the second, this time adding alternate nostril breathing, and the fourth incorporates Bhastrika (Bellows Breath), a rapid, forceful, diaphragmatic breathing that's similar to the practice Integral Yoga calls Kapalabhati. The more advanced practices build upon the first four in ever more complicated and demanding patterns.

"I think a lot of people are scared off by pranayama, and yet personally I think it's the most important part of yoga," Miller says. "People spend all those years making a 'good seat' with asana practice. At some point I hope they're going to use it."

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