and yoga pre- and post-surgery

Jenny-May teaching at Here Girls Can Teacher Conference 2023. Image by capturedbygabi.com

It’s another one of those stories. We’re hearing more of them these days as women find their voice around menstrual health. Years of heavy, painful periods. Dismissal by medical professionals. Useless prescriptions. You know how it goes. (If you don’t want to read another personal account, skip the italics).

I thought my periods were probably heavier and more painful than many other women I knew, but it’s hard to know, right? It’s not like we compare flow. So I did some research. Over 35 mg of blood loss during a period on a regular basis is defined as menorrhagia, or clinically heavy menstrual bleeding. I measured, using a menstrual cup. They have little markers like a measuring jug; 7.5 mg is a full cup. Over several cycles, I was averaging in excess of 180 mg blood loss per period. Each usually lasted more than 7 days on a 23-day cycle. I was bleeding a lot, a lot of the time. The pain was debilitating, like a feeling of being scraped out from the inside along with cramping and excruciating lower back ache. In between, I’d have days of flu-like symptoms (shivering, fever, aching joints, diarrhoea). This continued through my late twenties and thirties, into my forties. Every month, just a few days of feeling well. I treasured those days, but they were always lined with dread of what was coming. When I described the symptoms to my GP, I was told ‘a lot of women have heavy periods. You can try tranexamic acid, that might help reduce the bleeding’.

Tranexamic acid is a blood-clotting drug used to stop trauma patients bleeding out. I should have asked, ‘If a prescription for trauma is required, wouldn’t it be a good idea to find out what’s causing the traumatic symptoms?’ I didn’t ask that, because I’d just been told by a doctor that this was normal. I felt that I was being told not make a fuss. This is just being a woman- get on with it. TA did help, a little, for a few months, but then the periods were back with a vengeance. On my next visit I was advised to have a Mirena coil fitted. Still no investigation into the cause of the symptoms. Still no physical examination. The coil made no difference and everything got worse. I had to plan my whole life around my periods.

Finally, in 2023, I found a large lump in my abdomen. I was put on the ‘fast-track’ and had scans to check for some form of abdominal cancer. Lucky for me, no cancer. A simple ultrasound scan found multiple very large fibroids. Once cancer was eliminated I was told to go away. ‘Lots of women have fibroids. They will shrink once you’ve been through menopause’. So I was back to struggling with increasingly debilitating symptoms. I couldn’t sleep, it hurt to walk, the discomfort was constant, I was anaemic and exhausted, the pain was like being in labour and the bleeding was off the scale- my bathroom looked like a scene from a horror movie and I’d spend some of many wakeful nights mopping up blood. The impact on my relationships and my work was tangible and horrible. Why was it so difficult to get someone to listen? I said to my (male) partner ‘If you turned up at the doctor’s in this much pain and losing this much blood, you’d be rushed straight to hospital for diagnosis and treatment. But because it’s coming out of my vagina, it doesn’t count?’  I ended up in tears in the gynaecologist’s consultation room, begging for a hysterectomy. I didn’t want a womb. I wanted a life. 

I definitely consider myself one of the lucky ones. During surgery I was diagnosed with endometriosis in addition to the fibroids, but so far the hysterectomy seems to have cleared up all symptoms. Since surgery, my life is inexpressibly better. I can be present for my family, work and friends in a way that hasn’t been possible for over a decade. I wake up every day grateful for the freedom I’ve been given. 

Jenny-May presenting at the HGC Teacher conference 2023. Image: capturedbygabi.com

When the condition was progressing over all those years, I had recourse to a wonderful toolkit in the form of the ‘menstrual’ Iyengar yoga practice. This concentrates on creating space around the abdomen, pelvis and lower back and resting the head. I found it immensely helpful- it was a huge comfort and brought me relief from the suffering. It helped me to rest and to function. But I think as practitioners and teachers of yoga we need to be careful that the practices we engage with and promote are not used as a sticking plaster. Would I have sought medical attention sooner if I hadn’t had the menstrual practice to help me to cope? Quite possibly. This does not detract from the benefits it brought, and turning up to the doctor sooner doesn’t mean that they would have taken any more notice. But it has certainly made me consider how we can and should use the therapeutic application of yoga to relieve symptoms and aid recovery but not as a crutch that could lead to delayed diagnosis. 

I took care to make the time and space to allow my body to heal, and it’s been an astounding and inspiring process.

After hysterectomy I was conscientious about the post-surgery recovery period. I took care to make the time and space to allow my body to heal, and it’s been an astounding and inspiring process. These many trillions of cells that collaborate at every moment to form a human life- they want to function well. They want the connections to be working. There’s a kind of self-healing that is available to all of us if we’re able to create the conditions in which it can flourish. For me, that meant surgery followed by calm, quiet, rest and yoga. Post-surgery, I continued to practise every day; at first just a few conscious breaths, then gradually evolving gentle routines that let me find out what was happening, what was possible. It’s an ongoing process. Without doubt, the Iyengar yoga practice I’d established over years was a great help in aiding my recovery; I was able to observe and adapt in response to my changing conditions. This is the magic of the method. 

What I’m sharing here in the videos is based on the practises that I found so helpful after laparoscopic hysterectomy. I hope they might help someone else find that path to health and freedom from pain that is so precious. Everyone’s recovery is subjective and personal, so if you’re using these suggestions you must do so with a view to adapting to your own conditions and of course following the advice of your medical team.

In conclusion, I’m very grateful to be free from pain, and am continuing to process the anger I feel around being ignored for so long. I am angry on behalf of all women who have their pain dismissed. Who are routinely gas-lit into believing they don’t deserve proper investigation into their symptoms. A 2023 study found that of over 6.2 million women in the UK who suffer severe menstrual pain, over half found that their healthcare professionals failed to take the problem seriously*. We know that Black and minority ethnic women are more likely to be ignored than white women. All of this has to change, and I welcome the increased media attention this topic is currently demanding. Let’s not allow it to fade. If you are a woman living with pain, it’s unlikely that you will find the energy to raise your voice and shout about it. It’s a head-down, get-on-with-it situation and is how silencing works so effectively. As part of a growing number of women who have experienced this discrimination but are no longer in pain, I’m shouting loudly and energetically for systemic change that ensures equitable access to diagnosis and treatment routes, so that our sisters (and daughters) will not suffer as we have done.

*https://www.theguardian.com/society/2023/sep/14/millions-of-women-in-uk-face-severe-period-pain-but-symptoms-dismissed-survey-finds

https://www.wellbeingofwomen.org.uk/news/over-half-of-uk-women-feel-their-pain-is-ignored-or-dismissed-new-report-shows/

Sequence for Menstruation – Iyengar Yoga Practice

Why should Iyengar yoga be available for patients on prescription?

The UK is in the grip of a mental health epidemic, with 1 in 6 people having experienced a common mental health problem (such as depression, anxiety and stress) in the last week and at an estimated annual cost of around £105 billion [1] to the UK economy. When people visit their GP with problems including mild to severe depression and anxiety, chronic pain and complex symptoms associated with isolation and loneliness, many are offered SSRI anti-depressants, opioid painkillers, or a combination of both. The prescription of antidepressants has risen by 35% in the last 6 years [2] . These medications have their place, and when used responsibly can offer some short-term relief en route to more sustainable healing processes. But long-term use is proven to produce, in some cases severely life-altering, side-effects and to be addictive [3]. And for many people, they don’t even work.

Yoga is formally recommended by the NHS, and by the WHO as ‘a valuable tool to increase physical activity and decrease noncommunicable disease’[4]. It feels obvious to those of us who have direct experience of the transformative effects of a regular practice that yoga should be on the table as a powerful and cost-effective method for both preventing and treating a range of conditions. But there is a big gap between our experience as yoga practitioners and the understanding of the medical establishment that devises how healthcare is formulated and distributed. This is partly because yoga is a completely unregulated sector; so GPs are often unable to differentiate between practices that offer patients a truly self-educative experience, and those that sell unsubstantiated images and concepts, often for financial profit. Iyengar yoga practitioners can help with that, because we know that what we do is the real deal.

The NHS is on its knees, and as usual it is those with least who are losing most- we know that ‘50% of people in the most deprived areas report poor health by age 55–59, over two decades earlier than those in the least deprived areas’.

The vast majority of GPs are of course doing a super job. But surgeries are fire-fighting; desperate to help their patients with increasingly scant resources. The NHS is on its knees, and as usual it is those with least who are losing most- we know that ‘50% of people in the most deprived areas report poor health by age 55–59, over two decades earlier than those in the least deprived areas’[5]. So why add an extra option for doctors and patients in a system that is already struggling? Because yoga, taught in groups and open to everyone, is a brilliantly effective way of empowering patients to improve and maintain their own health and wellbeing, and of reducing health inequalities. Yoga presented as a prescription by a trusted health practitioner gives those who have previously been excluded the opportunity to try it out. If it suits them, they are likely to experience some transformative changes in outlook and lifestyle that will have sometimes dramatically positive implications for their future health and happiness and reduce stress on statutory health and care services. It’s win-win; the individual and the system working together so that more people are more healthy, and precious medical resources can be redirected to the major interventions they are really needed for.

Iyengar Yoga on Prescription- a case study

In Hereford, we piloted a project offering Iyengar yoga on prescription in partnership with 3 local GP surgeries. We wanted to demonstrate how attendance in classes would both benefit patients and reduce stress on primary care services. As a CIC (community-focused non-profit) we raised £21500 to cover costs, from a range of national and local charitable funders. The funding covered project management and administration, the production of x2 educational/orientation videos (one for prescribers, one for patients), communications, 70 prescriptions of 10 Iyengar yoga classes and project evaluation/reporting. Our team of volunteer company directors helped with a range of tasks including high-level project planning, financial reporting and graphic design. Patients received a prescription from their doctor for 10 classes. Our social prescribing administrator took health details and booked them in for a first class. Patients were asked to complete a standardised wellbeing self-assessment before starting classes. They were also offered the support of a ‘buddy’; an existing student to meet, greet and help them with orientation.  An important aspect of the project was that patients integrated into existing classes; we did not run patient-specific classes, but do have a range of classes on offer including for those with reduced mobility and single-gender sessions. Once the 10 classes were complete, patients filled in a wellbeing self-assessment and feedback form. Due to over-subscription to the project, we were unable to offer repeat prescriptions, but patients were offered £5 off classes to post-prescription. Unused classes (from those who dropped out) were recycled into the programme.

Introduction and information given to patients prescribers ahead of their participation: 

Here are some highlights from the outcomes (view the full report HERE or scroll to the bottom for an illustrated overview):

• 98 prescriptions taken up
• 611 classes completed
• 6.2 classes per patient average
• Those who dropped out cited reasons including work and family pressures and acute health problems 
• 38 courses of 10 classes completed
• 66.7% of patients who completed continued classes post-subscription- others reported using free home-learning tools
• 83.3% women, 16.7% men
• 100% who completed said they would benefit from a repeat prescription
• 100% who completed reported increase in wellbeing (average scores ‘before’ 42.8, ‘after’ 51.7. National average is 51.0)
• 100% of respondents reported improvement in both physical and mental health
• 33% of respondents reported, unasked, a reduction in medication (in consultation with their doctor) and attributed this directly to participation in yoga classes
• Several respondents reported a reduction in GP visits, but this project did not have the scope to make calculations based on their primary care history and projection

Qualitative feedback demonstrated a range of benefits experienced, including:

• Significant improvements in mental health including reduced need for medication
• Significant pain reduction including reduced need for medication
• Significant improvements in mobility including reduced reliance on mobility aids
• Increased confidence
• Reduction in symptoms of specific conditions including fibromyalgia and plantir fasciitis
• Better sleep
• A sense of community and feeling supported
• An expression of developing choices for a healthier lifestyle
• A significant appreciation of clarity of instruction, personalised adjustments and sense of care given

View  a video of our Patient Feedback HERE

What now?

In Hereford, we are looking for further funding to roll the project out so that access would be available via all surgeries across the city. But it’s difficult. There is a lot of talk about early intervention and prevention in health and social care, but very little cash to back it up. However, if we agree and can demonstrate, as an IY community, that the benefits of regular Iyengar yoga practice are real and tangible, and that everybody deserves a chance to try it for themselves, then why not place access to classes at the heart of integrated care systems across the country? It’s a bold and ambitious suggestion, but one that I believe is possible. 

Developing partnerships with health services and community organisations, learning how to present the positive outcomes of regular Iyengar yoga practice for individuals and communities in ways that are relatable and replicable, and lobbying local statutory service providers to invest in Iyengar yoga is one way of beginning to make our yoga communities more meaningfully inclusive. We are hopeful here that this project is the start of something- a small seedling in the forest of radical change that is so urgently necessary to enable a socially and environmentally sustainable future, which still has a slim but real chance of emerging. 

View our proposal for Phase 2 HERE 

[1] https://www.mentalhealth.org.uk/explore-mental-health/mental-health-statistics/cost-diagnosed-mental-health-conditions-statistics

[2] https://pharmaceutical-journal.com/article/news/antidepressant-prescribing-increases-by-35-in-six-years#:~:text=According%20to%20the%20latest%20population,antidepressant%20drugs%20in%202021%2F2022.

[3] https://www.bristol.ac.uk/primaryhealthcare/news/2022/adverse-health-outcomes-associated-with-long-term-antidepressant-use.html

[4] https://www.who.int/southeastasia/news/detail/20-06-2018-yoga-is-a-valuable-tool-to-increase-physical-activity-and-decrease-noncommunicable-disease

[5] https://www.health.org.uk/evidence-hub/health-inequalities

I HATED PE at school. I really loathed it. It was a routine humiliation of nylon knickers and enforced communal showers, of feeling clumsy and inadequate next to the ‘PE girls’, who were usually also the ‘popular girls’; powerful, enviable, desirable. PE, for me, meant shivering on a vast field, waiting for the inevitable hockey stick in the shins or ball in the face. I was usually picked for teams second to last. It was an all-round painful experience and every chance I could, I would bunk off.

Fast-forward 30 years and here I am, delivering a ‘yoga for periods’ lecture-demo at an education conference at the University of Worcester. After the introductions, I realise that the audience is entirely made up of ‘PE girls’, now PE professionals. Granted, there are some guys present, but all of these people are just so into sport! I have nothing against sport. After an unfortunate start I have come to really appreciate its importance and its beauty. But it has nothing to do with my experience- so how did I get here? It’s so ironic that I nearly burst out laughing, then glance around awkwardly, waiting for that ball to the face. And collect myself. These people are amazingly committed. They care deeply about their tribes (their sports, and their teams, their schools), and also about education, about helping young people stay active and healthy, and about closing the gender gap. This is where our interests intersect.

Since the inception of Hereford Yoga CIC (Community Interest Company) in 2014, I have worked closely with local statutory and voluntary services whose interest is in increasing activity, especially in girls, who are over 50% more likely to become inactive than boys of the same age. Girls, only 2% of who describe themselves as ‘strong’ as opposed to 49% of boys. This has usually meant collaborating with PE departments.

I practise yoga as an art and a philosophy, so bringing yoga to schools via PE departments has always felt like a strange fit. It’s just been the ‘way in’ due to the widely accepted misconception of yoga as a purely physical activity. And yet, how wonderful that these sporty teachers are identifying the needs of those, like me all those decades ago, for whom traditional PE activities just aren’t resonating. Who care about girls’ experience of the menstrual cycle enough to take a day out of their busy schedules to learn some approaches to opening the conversations and expanding the offers at their schools.

Iyengar yoga, thanks to the lifetime’s work of Geeta S Iyengar and her colleagues, has a wealth of knowledge to offer around staying active throughout the whole menstrual cycle. The idea that a meaningful asana (postural) practice can be adapted to work with (not against), not just menstruation, but all phases of the menstrual cycle and indeed all phases of a woman’s life, was radical when Ms. Iyengar started her research into it. Postural yoga was having its hey-day in the 1970s and 80s, spreading worldwide via students of the guru Krishnamacharya, with each of these (almost exclusively male) students developing his own style and methodology. The physicality was strong and dynamic, evolving as it did out of the Mysore tradition that was designed for active boys and young men. BKS Iyengar’s dedication to making the practice of yoga accessible to all bodies no doubt inspired his daughter Geeta’s mission of bringing the female experience to the forefront of contemporary yoga practices.

2 out of 3 girls are still opting out of PE during their period. But the Iyengars’ method does not stipulate that a girl or woman should stop practising when she is menstruating. On the contrary, the poses and sequences are adapted according to the individual’s needs, with special care taken for rest and release in the abdomen, lower back and head, and towards promoting hormonal balance. Props are used to engender a feeling of being supported. As someone who has suffered chronic menstrual problems, I advocate this as one of the greatest gifts arising from the phenomenon that is transnational postural yoga. I believe that girls should be taught these techniques in schools. It will help them to feel listened to and cared for; to feel equipped and capable; to acknowledge and respect the inherent strength of their own womanhood, rather than perceiving it as a weakness.

We learn through the body and the senses; imagine the impact throughout the rest of the education system, and on the rest of their lives, if in PE lessons kids were routinely given opportunities to improve posture, increase confidence and develop an understanding of body-mind integration. I learned last week that, unlike my experience in the 1990s, this is what many departments are beginning to implement. So I thank the organisers for the invites to the Worcester and Hereford conferences. I salute the teachers who are serious about shifting the culture of PE from primarily or exclusively sports education to a meaningfully inclusive and holistic physical education. And I know that yoga has an important part to play in enabling that evolution.

Images: Gabriella http://capturedbygabi.com/

https://strideactive.org/

https://www.activehw.co.uk/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geeta_Iyengar

I was hoping to be among many thousands of people marching in London this weekend to demand truth and immediate collective action in response to the climate crisis. I can’t go, in the end, but I wish all who can very well. Perhaps naively, I wish them success.  I live in hope, because it’s not possible to live without it. I have teenaged children one of whom particularly, after a few years of engagement with climate action, has become utterly disengaged and fatalistic about the future of humanity. I don’t blame them. Sometimes, even allowing for adolescent hormones, it seems like the only logical and realistic response as we slide over the precipice and into the catastrophe. And yet, somehow, hope persists. Without hope, action will disintegrate, and vice versa.

I find hope in my practice of yoga. I’m aware of what a cliché that is, and yet it doesn’t make it any less true. I have noticed how publications of environmental organisations now regularly recommend yoga- both as a way of managing anxiety (which is an altogether natural response to the reality of the situation) and of connecting with nature. They are onto something. Yogic practices were originally developed by people and through cultures that were deeply integrated with the natural world. These practices offer a framework for an exploration of our place, not only on this earth but as part of the entire universal complex. Some texts describe the body as a microcosmic reflection of the universe. The experience of ‘prkrti’, ‘nature’, the yogis discovered, is at the very core of being human. We are it, it is us. Logically then, any violation of the natural world is also a self-violation.

This is my very simple experience- that a daily practice of yoga connects me to nature. It reminds me of my humble existence as an organism within an ecosystem upon which I am completely reliant for survival. Every organism is a collection of living cells in symbiotic relationship. By studying this interdependence within the field of our own body-mind-breath, it’s possible to cultivate valuable knowledge and intuition about how we, as a species, exist in relationship to each other, to other species and to our environments. It’s about balance, and it’s about alignment.

Think of vrksasana (tree pose); this is an iconic symbol of balance. It is also a lens through which to dive deeply into an exploration of balance as a practice in general. Balance of the weight of one’s body on one leg requires a careful distribution of resources, of energy versus time, of breath and nutrition and effort and will and poise and concentration. Try it. If one side over-does, draining resources, then the pose will soon be over. For sustainability on any scale we require an informed, practised, I’d venture an embodied, understanding of balance.

Jenny-May adjusting Utthita Trikonasana

It’s the same with alignment. Iyengar yoga is particularly associated, within the field of modern postural yoga, with an almost fanatical preoccupation with alignment. The alignment of the back body in Utthita Trikonasana (triangle pose) is a good illustration of this, where one may spend years working on getting the back of the left heal, the tailbone and the back of the head to line up on one plane. Why bother, when the world is burning? It’s a good question. For me, it’s partly because by studying alignment in the particular we are cultivating it as a practice in general. If, for example, policies were developed with alignment at their core there would be an end to the use of fossil fuels and a transition to green tech ensuring the protection of livelihoods, landscapes and biomes.

I was interested to read in a recent open letter from concerned scientists and engineers demanding a pause to the precipitate and dangerous development of AI, a call for measures to ensure that this technology is ‘more accurate, safe, interpretable, transparent, robust, aligned, trustworthy, and loyal’. Alignment matters. We can take our understanding, our embodiment of it, from Utthita Trikonasana, to our personal choices, to the demands we make of our governments and institutions.

For me, practising and teaching yoga is a way of maintaining hope and stability in these very distressing and uncertain times. It is a small act of resistance to the status quo of measuring everything by economic profit.It is a tiny contribution towards greater balance and alignment of people and planet. It is a daily reminder to tread lightly.

‘It’s in childhood that most people have their first spiritual experience; that of an innate and natural link to the sacred. The joy, the clarity of mind and the curiosity that we’ve known can become the starting point of a marvellous rediscovery. If our relationship with our parents is imbued with love and respect, it will serve as a model and a foundation, and all of our other relationships will also be founded on trust and respect.’- Jack Cornfield

I love this quote from Jack Cornfield. Those who haven’t had the benefits of a stable start in life of the kind he describes may have different experiences from those who have; but the ‘innate and natural link to the sacred’ is available to everybody. The cultivation of this link develops a particular quality of self-respect which can be used as a foundation for healthy relationships. 

A few weeks ago I came across some striking research about the effect of shared spirituality on children’s mental health. By spirituality I mean a conscious and deliberate examination of one’s inner life and the cultivation of its connection to and place within universal patterns. It is well documented that maternal mental ill-health puts children at 50% higher risk of depression in their own lives. HOWEVER this robust, peer-reviewed study led by Lisa Miller shows that if a child shares a spiritual life with their primary care-giver, they are 80% LESS likely to develop depression, whether they were high- or low-risk to start with*. This means that parents, whether they suffer with their own mental health or not, are providing a proven antidote to depression in their children just by sharing their experience of a spiritual sensibility. And this can be done in so many ways! Maybe there is a faith tradition that the family belongs to, or perhaps not. It doesn’t matter; this has been factored into the research and has no bearing at all on the outcomes. What does matter is a sense for the child of their inner self being held, loved, and existing as part of a larger community and universal pattern. This can be experienced by, for example, connecting with nature, by appreciating beauty, by talking about priorities and what we base our choices on, by practices that develop empathy, joy and compassion.  

As adults we have to accept that we cannot provide a life for our children that is free from pain. What we can do is provide a framework that helps them to build resilience, to be as well prepared as possible for the difficulties they are bound to face. This research has given me heart. It is easy to become disillusioned when faced with suffering, especially of the young, especially of the young people that we love and care for intimately. And there is so much of it about, this suffering, and it’s so unfair. But we have a choice to educate children and young people, at home and, importantly, in schools, about the importance of exercising what starts in infancy as Cornfield’s ‘innate and natural link to the sacred’; the ’being’ part of human. If we can show them lots of ways that this can be done, and if we can continue to learn from them how to stay in touch with our own initial innocent wonder in life, that seems like a good start.

*Miller, Lisa: ‘The Awakened Brain: The Psychology of Spirituality’, Penguin 2022

Our Beginners Class in action

Nadia Gilani’s opinion piece on yoga is an important contribution to this January’s ‘get-well’ fetish.

As the NHS crumbles and health inequalities widen, universal access to high-quality yoga services should become a priority for all local authorities interested in creating high-functioning integrated care systems. Because firstly, regular yoga practice is known to work as a path to sustainable integrated health.

Secondly, it’s relatively cheap for the public purse. It’s taught in groups (in which good teachers differentiate for individuals’ needs) so for the return in health and wellbeing, spend-per-person is peanuts compared to costs associated with long-term health issues that yoga is proven to both treat and prevent. It also provides experiences of belonging and connection that reduce loneliness and isolation, identified as a major stress-factor on primary care.

Gilani’s article is a call-to-action for all yoga teachers to make community outreach a priority. I agree, but would go further; everybody should have access to the benefits of studio learning. In Hereford, we are conducting a pilot in partnership with 3 NHS surgeries, providing free yoga on prescription. It’s been the surest way to both diversify our yoga community and to dismantle social and financial barriers to practice.

As a long-term practitioner I’m not at all surprised by the transformative benefits reported by patients. Patients themselves, and their health practitioners, are surprised. They are also impressed and enthusiastic, telling us there is a big need and please can we do more? Our answer is, we know, and we hope so.

It should be remembered that physiotherapy was long regarded by the establishment as a fringe ‘alternative health’ practice. Now, quite rightly and thanks to targeted research, there is a physiotherapist attached to every surgery and hospital in the country. I’m not suggesting that yoga replace physio- it meets a different need- and the yoga industry is currently too unregulated for blanket integration into the NHS; as Gilani suggests there’s work to do, to differentiate between practices that offer a truly self-educative experience and those that sell unsubstantiated images and concepts for financial profit. But as we’re developing, as a species, our understanding of health as balance between body, mind and connected consciousness, yoga is poised, ready to deliver its very tangible benefits to masses of people regardless of age, gender, ethnicity, income or ability.

“We live in the most part in closed rooms. These form the environment from which our culture grows. Our culture is to a certain extent a product of our architecture. If we want our culture to rise to a higher level, we are obliged, for better or worse, to change our architecture. And this only becomes possible if we take away the closed character from the rooms in which we live.”

– Paul Scheerbourt, 1914

 

EXPLORATION OF SPACE

Yoga is an exploration of space; the spaces we live in; the body-mind-environment spaces. Have you noticed, there are lots of closed rooms…

Did you ever have one of those dreams where you discover a new room in the house that you’ve lived in for years? You thought you knew the place inside out, but here it is right in front of you, a door, and inside the door a completely new space. What’s in there?

With a sustained practice of yoga, we sometimes get those moments in waking life- when a particular experience, perhaps an adjustment in an asana (posture), makes you go ‘Aha! This space was always here, but I never knew!’. In fact, the exploration of consciousness through diligent training of body-mind processes can open out an infinite number of new ‘rooms’ for us to experience. Yet we tend to exist on a day to day level in a small, cramped abode, without questioning the limitations this puts on our potential for growth.

There are certain aspects of our body-mind architecture that we have no choice about. But we usually have more agency than we believe possible. Let’s take a simple example. As we age, the thoracic dorsal vertebrae, especially T6-9, begin a process of protruding outwards, or cyphosis. This can occur very slowly over many years, or in some cases more rapidly. In any case, as the spine ages that’s what happens. It is also exacerbated by how we live, for example working on screens, driving, caring….everything that gives us the ‘hunch’ of the middle-upper back.

THE THORACIC DORSAL

The thoracic dorsal spine is proximal to the back of the chest. So when the spine in this region withdraws, it’s like closing a room in your house; shutting it off with a door that will eventually become so rusty and fixed that no amount of pushing and pulling will open it again. The implications of closing the back door to your chest are potentially serious. It’s where your heart and lungs live. In yogic terms the chest space also houses the seat of the spiritual heart or intuitive intelligence, which brings light and vitality and uplifts our everyday experiences. It’s the place in which we feel love most acutely and tangibly. I’d say it’s worth keeping it open for business.

SOMETHING TO TRY…

If we make a repeated small daily effort to move the thoracic dorsal in, to maintain its function as a support and gateway to everything in front of it, then we can reduce the pace at which the door becomes rusted shut; possibly even avoid that happening all together. This can be done through various asana, with or without props (see the pictures for some ideas).

Urdvha Baddhanguliyasana

Paschima Baddhanguliyasana (without belt, fingers interlocked)

Gohmukasana (arms)

Purvottasana (using the chair)

Supta Urdvha Hastasana (with brick in the back)

Try one or two of these poses every day for two weeks and see if you feel a difference. As Paul Scheerbourt suggests, change your architecture. Change your culture. Do this with the intention of acknowledging and cultivating the intimacy between the back and the chest. Allow them to collaborate. This will frame how we experience and inhabit the space between them. That space where love happens.

Aah, savasana. That lovely bit at the end. Or, that bit when I’m supposed to completely relax but my mind is running in circles. How is it for you? Sometimes we experience a flip between these feelings around savasana on a daily basis. Nevertheless, I cannot advocate strongly enough for savasana as a daily practice. I entreat you not to dismiss or neglect it and not to underestimate its transformational powers over a lifetime.

1. ‘Classical’- flat on the back with a blanket supporting the back of the head and neck

It’s important to finish each and every practice of yogasana and pranayama with savasana for a number of reasons:

7 Good Reasons to practise Savasana

1. It marks the end of the practice, giving a sense of completion and contentment.
2. It allows the benefits of the practice, both physical and psychological, to embed and consolidate.
3. Even a short savasana is like plugging a device in to re-charge. It’s immensely restorative.
4. It is soothing for the nervous system, so reduces symptoms of stress and anxiety.
5. It allows the senses to completely rest from their habitual activity, reducing their attachment to external objects.
6. It is a bridge between the ‘outer’ aspects of the yoga practice and the ‘inner’ aspects; it allows us to dive deeply inside that inner experience in a safe and secure way.
7. It is one of the best preparations for a good death.

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