by | Aug 30, 2017 | Five Element Yoga®, Mudras
These three mudras offer you an easy way to help you to feel into an inner sense of spaciousness, inviting you into your Infinite Possibilities! You may like to practice these mudras in a flow one after the other, or as individual mudras.
HOW TO: Hold each Mudra for 5-10 natural breaths to start, and increasing the length of time after a week of daily practice if you like. State the affirmations three times out loud, then silently.
Bhairava – Spontaneous Bliss Mudra
“I Rest in the Ocean of Bliss.”
Bhairava Mudra invokes the spirit of effortless surrender and feeling bliss as it induces calm and peace. This Mudra is good for fear, anxiety, immune imbalance, and heart disease. *Note: Left hand is underneath Right hand.
Uttarabodhi – Highest Wisdom Mudra
“I Release the Illusion of Limitation and Open to Infinite Possibilities.”
This mudra helps to clear and settle emotions, balance the mind, and expand one’s energy as well as increase a positive outlook. Activates breath and energy throughout entire torso and spine. Good for respiratory conditions and improving circulatory system. *Note: press hands against sternum.
Garuda – Eagle Mudra
“Freedom is My True Nature.”
Garuda Mudra can bring ease when feeling constriction in life, and opens one to feel unlimited boundaries. Expands breath and energy into the back of the heart center, and helps to balance the sides of body including pairs of organs.
Mudras and information used by permission and modified from Mudras for Healing and Transformation by Joseph and Lilian LePage.
by | Aug 2, 2017 | Mudras
This mudra flow invites you to stop and feel your inner potency!
Practice in seated meditation position and begin each mudra with 5-10 natural breaths (increasing the number of breaths weekly if desired and it feels good). Repeat the statements aloud, then silently to feel the inner experience of the qualities of each mudra.
Prithivi Mudra: Physical Strength
“Fully embodied, my physical strength grounds me.”
Prithivi means Earth in Sanskrit and this mudra helps you to feel fully present in your body. Feeling the sense of support of the Earth and your body, allows you to feel the strength that is already here inside you. No cautions.
- Good for supporting optimal posture
- Can reduce stress and lower high blood pressure
- Invites a sense of safety and security
Dhyana Mudra: Mental Strength
“Effortlessly my mind rests with focus.”
Dhyana actually means meditation and is one of the 8-Limbs of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. Practicing this mudra allows all aspects of your being to come into harmony which creates an effortless field for mind to easily meditate. Left hand is underneath the Right. No cautions.
- Supports effortless meditation
- Creates sense of space between thoughts to feel inner silence
- Cultivates calm, clear, strong mind
Uttarabodhi Mudra: Emotional Strength
“As I cultivate strength on all levels, I am freed from limitations.”
Uttarabodhi means highest wisdom and helps to direct breath and energy upward into chest, enhancing circulation to the heart, lungs and thymus gland. As we face challenges on our journey, practicing Uttarabodhi supports us with ease to live in authentic being rather than focusing so much on the likes/dislikes, personality, and emotions. No cautions.
- Good for remaining aligned with one’s True Self
- Expands breath throughout the rib cage, sternum and side ribs
- Enhances immunity
Mudras and information provided are modified from Mudras for Healing and Transformation by Joseph and Lilian LePage, Integrative Yoga Therapy.
by | Aug 2, 2017 | Yoga Wisdom & Inspiration
We are each imbued with a fountain of inner strength. In trying times it may feel like strength is beyond reach or inaccessibly bound up in tension. Acknowledging that you have an unending source of inner strength is the first step to rediscovering it! And getting in touch with your inner strength can feel great.
Physical, Mental, and Emotional strength weave together synergistically to bring potency to the other. Let’s take a deeper look at prana – vital life energy – to see how our forces may inadvertently be leaking out, in order to harness them and to live fully from a place of grounded strength.
*To Cultivate your Inner Strength view this special Mudra Flow
Physical Strength
Think of physical strength as a golden doorway to your inner strength. When you keep the physical body strong, you are building and fortifying your ‘container’ that holds energy. When the muscles are weak, energy leaks out like a sieve.
Can you dip into a deeper well and find power in yourself that is already abundant within?
This may first require throwing off the shackles of stress and tension that can keeps one bound up and fatigued, with practices like yoga nidra, massage, breathing and yoga posture practice. When you reach your deeper resource, the fountain of energy is always flowing, and filling us abundantly.
Strengthen your physical body, and you will be have more energy accessible for your life.
It feels good to strengthen and is easy to do with free weights or weight bearing exercise like yoga postures. It is not necessary for us to push, force, or exercise for hours on end — doing a little everyday will accumulate results. Think of doing about 15 mins/day. Here are some other benefits of strengthening:
- Circulates lymph flow to carry toxins out of the body.
- Tones muscles and soft tissues to keep them healthy.
- Keeps pressure off the joints when muscles are strong and doing their job.
- Assists in lubricating soft tissues to stay mobile and fluid so soft tissue does not adhere together.
If you don’t use it you lose it! Around age 45, muscle mass begins to decline at a rate of about 1 percent per year. This gradual loss has been tied to lack of exercise and contributes to increased frailty among the elderly.
Mental Strength
Mental strength is the ability to focus the mind.
The mind is another ‘container’ for our energy. Focusing on one point for a sustained period of minutes is meditation and this strengthens the mind.
In our era of multitasking and navigating gadgetry, it can be difficult to focus when life temps us and often requires us to do the opposite. When mind is scattered, thoughts jump all over the place like ‘a drunken monkey swinging from tree to tree’. One’s energy follows the mind, and subsequently leaks out through our scattered thoughts.
The way to strengthen the mind is to meditate, just like pumping iron or holding Goddess pose strengthens our muscles.
When you strengthen your mind, you are able to contain more energy/prana, therefore you have more energy. This increase of energy by strengthening mind is one of the many benefits of a meditation practice like Divine Sleep yoga nidra.
Emotional Strength
Emotional strength is being able to both feel and observe your emotions.
This means without sweeping them under the rug or reacting! Not easy. ‘Sitting’ with emotions to witness them with loving-kindness is the yogic practice/meditation that brings freedom.
When you are present with an emotion, even though it can feel uncomfortable, it is then able to integrate into the ocean of your whole being, which can feel like it just disappears.
When we suppress or react we are actually pushing the emotion away, we keep an important part of ourselves separate from our whole being (pushing away is called dvesha and is one of the five kleshas – or causes of suffering – from the Yoga Sutras). Get that?
Pushing emotions away causes suffering.
And we were trying to avoid suffering by pushing, but that actually backfires. Just think how much energy is tied up in one’s emotional life(!) It takes a ton of energy to react, and even more to repress and keep it there. But if we can learn how to be aware and, through awareness, witness each emotion separate from the story of “he said – she said” or whatever story is about that emotion, we can develop emotional strength and maturity.
This is probably the most difficult thing to do and that is why it is called a ‘practice’ and not a ‘perfect’.
We practice again and again, and with a strong body and mind it becomes easier and easier to witness emotions.
The important thing is to recognize that there is a power within you greater than the limited concept of yourself.
Be aware of armoring the mind and body and let your breath open the soft channels that lead to your power sources. Learn to flow with the dance of prana/energy. Form an intention to bring awareness of your strength as you move through your day today.
Jennifer Reis, E-RYT 500 Yoga Teacher Trainer, C-Yoga Therapist, LMT has been leading yoga and teacher trainings for over 20 years in the US and Canada, and at Kripalu Center for Yoga and Health for over 16 years.
