Episode 11 - The Significance of Breath - Pranayama featuring Lisa Walford
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Please enjoy this excerpt featuring Lisa Walford discussing the benefits of pranayama.
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IN THIS EPISODE:
Lisa Walford is an extraordinary yoga teacher who holds a Level III Iyengar teaching certificate and has been teaching yoga in Los Angeles since 1982. She studies annually with the Iyengars and teaches worldwide. She was a co-creator of the YogaWorks teacher training program that started in 1990 with Maty Ezraty and Chuck Miller. Join us as she shares more about the power of breath through pranayama.
We discuss the different kinds of pranayama breath
· 3-part breath
· Kapalabhati
· Alternate Nostril Breath
· Linking breath with movement
The significance of breath and movement
How can one learn to practice pranayama
Recommendations for practicing pranayama at different times of the day
The power of breath to cultivate kindness.
LINKS & ABOUT
Find Lisa Walford online:
Lisa Walford’s intensive pranayama series is available on iTunes and from her website so you can learn to practice from anywhere.
TRANSCRIPT
Note: Please excuse any errors in the transcription.
Monica Phillips (00:46):
Welcome to Yoga Philosophy for Everyday Living. And I am so glad to be here today with Lisa Walford. Welcome to the show.
Lisa Walford (01:30):
Thank you. It's a pleasure being here. I really appreciate that you're doing this.
Monica Phillips (01:35):
It was a huge honor to meet you through my YogaWorks teacher training, which has just been an incredible journey. You presented at a workshop recently and I'm taking your classes online and it's incredible to learn about your practice.
Lisa Walford (01:47):
Well, thank you for that. It's so interesting. I've been practicing yoga for close to 40 years. So I've seen kind of the arc of its public appeal and how mainstream has come to embrace it. But when I first started practicing and teaching yoga, I would tell people that I teach yoga and they would say, Oh, you mean you burn incense and chant? And I'd say, well, not really. And now when I say I teach yoga, they say, Oh, you mean all sweat and get a good workout. Well, not really. So it's just interesting to see what the stereotype is, and I'm just grateful to be a part of it at this point.
Monica Phillips (02:25):
I love those stories. You're an extraordinary yoga teacher and you hold a level three Iyengar teaching certificate. Like you said, you've been teaching in LA since 1982. You study annually with the Iyengars in Pune, India, and you teach worldwide. You were one of the co-creators of the YogaWorks teacher training program that started in 1990 with Maty Ezrati and Chuck Miller, who were the founders of YogaWorks. And you studied at UCLA and are the coauthor of The Longevity Det and The Anti-Aging Plan, both of those you co-wrote with your father, is that correct?
Lisa Walford (02:58):
Yes.
Monica Phillips (02:58):
So your experience and expansiveness is vast and your awareness of the body and breath and all these things we're going to talk about are come from a really beautiful perspective. I'm excited to have you talk about pranayama, which is what we're going to talk about today. I wanted to say one thing before, which is that I took your class on Inauguration Day, and I love this quote so much that I shared it with others. You said, "beneath the fluttering is an inner stillness that brings us revolutions."
Lisa Walford (03:25):
It was such an auspicious and dare I use the word pregnant pause the morning of inauguration day, that apprehension. And I knew that so many of my students, their anxiety was tangible in a way. And so much of life is being reactive. And that morning, the morning of Inauguration Day was so different than the evening of Inauguration Day. But that morning people's thoughts were all over the board. So I think that when we can go from kind of that surface reactivity and breath and meditation and our yoga practice in particular postures, no are such key kind of tools, techniques that we can use to adjust the nervous system and to be able to bring our mind back to a place of equanimity. So first through the body to a place of equilibrium and then the mind to a place of equanimity. And when we can go from that surface level - a level of the mind fluttering into that kind of deep inner stillness. Then the reason I use resolution, there's a sense of resolution because all of the "yes, but, maybes" dissolve and we can come to a state of deep rest. From that state we kind of know what's appropriate.
Monica Phillips (04:39):
It's kind of like what you said about "what is yoga?" When we get to that inner calm, we stop the chatter in our head. We get out of our way, and then we allow ourselves to become more of who we are. So isn't that also what pranayama is all about is the breath that allows us to gain stillness.
Lisa Walford (04:56):
There's so much about the breath now, from how maybe your mother told you when you were little, before you get angry, take three breaths - superficial ways that we recognize the impact of the breath. And now as it's again, becoming more mainstream and people acknowledge it, that there's a very deep, physiological change that happens when we are afflicted by whatever it is, a real threat or a perceived threat or an imaginary threat. It affects the breath that affects the entire nervous system. Conversely, the breath can change the nervous system. It can change the chemical balance inside the body. And with that, we then change the state of mind. So such a powerful, it can be both a mirror. What is the quality of my breath? Is it agitated? Is my breath smooth? Is it soft? Is it harsh? So it can be a mirror and it can also be a bridge. Take us from one state to another.
Monica Phillips (05:53):
You did a kapalabati breath in class, on Inauguration Day. And I know that breath to be cleansing. Could that be used as a way to help people who've had COVID recover?
Lisa Walford (06:03):
No, no. I actually very rarely teach Kapalabati. I taught it that day because in a way it's like, if somebody is really anxious and you say, okay, just calm down that doesn't help. Just chill, you know? But so the kapalabati, I spent a lot of time, as you know, focusing on the posture, how we position the body, creating that skillful means gave the mind something to focus on. And conversely, I talked a lot about the diaphragm and the abdomen, you know, how can we sit in such a way that we saw in the diaphragm, the solar plexus, which is the seat of fire. How can we sit in such a way to be upright, still, quiet and only then did I introduce - it wasn't even kapalabati. It was bhastrika where there's a strong emphasis on the exhalation. My reason for doing that in the sense of purging that anxiety to exhale and exhale and exhale, throw that inner chaos out in the very, what skillfully created container of the body.
Monica Phillips (07:06):
What do you call it?
Lisa Walford (07:08):
Bhatrika.
Monica Phillips (07:09):
You had us put a block between our shoulder blades at the base of our shoulders and it felt so good. I actually loved feeling my shoulder blades connected with the block.
Lisa Walford (07:19):
And first we started laying down with the shoulder blades on the block. So much of how we orient ourselves in life is what's in front of me through our eyes, the relationship with what I see right now. We spend a lot of time on camera. And so in that class, I really wanted to bring, and in a mini pranayama class, I really wanted to bring the kind of outward going orientation or the back of thought. And that when we soften this, we turn our outward looking gaze inward. And so by starting lying down on the block, a sensitivity then was what is the shape of my shoulder blades on the block? So the block then gave us feedback and sensitivity to the back of the body. With that sensitivity - and that really is the foundation for pranayama becoming more sensitive and in the Iyengar system, because the body is the vehicle through which we cultivate sensitivity, bringing that sensitivity to the back of the body, to the skin. Then the shoulder blades on the back of the body would take this overactive front grain into a more reflective state. So that, that was my reason for doing that.
Monica Phillips (08:27):
I use breath in my coaching a lot as a way to calm and center the mind. And it seems like, Oh, we all breathe. But how many of us actually pay attention to our breath? And so there's this fourth of the eight limbs of yoga as Patanjali outlines is important about noticing the breath. And then what happens when we link the breath with movement?
Lisa Walford (08:47):
Yes, since you mentioned Patanjali, what I think is really helpful is to give context for that fourth stage. In reading the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, which is one of many texts, one that adopted and have found great, great insights through, all of the limbs are kind of practiced simultaneously with one exception. And that is from asana to pranayama. And those particular - there's many sutras, but there's only three on Asana that lead into pranayama. And the first one, you know, it says, well, asana, the seat, it's not even talking about down dog or any of those. It just says the seat. And I kind of, in a way I interpret that as being, or one way to interpret it is "where's the seat of my intelligence" as opposed to "how are my buttock bones" or whatever. May the seat be stable and still, stable and content.
Lisa Walford (09:46):
And then the next Sutra says that we release the effort and come to a state of effortlessness. And from that state, and then the third Sutra says, then we're no longer in a state of confliction between yes, no. In a state of duality, in the state of kind of polar opposites. Then starts pranayama. It's the only place in the sutras where they say there is a particular way to do this. And what that tells me is that we need a certain inner equilibrium. And so the practice of pranayama in its transformative sense, as opposed to being an everyday skill that we can use to get us through a difficult moment. So the practice of pranayama as a transformative practice in and of itself begins from a state of inner equilibrium and equanimity, because what the Hatha Yoga Pradipika goes on to say - another one of the classic texts - is whatever quality you already have in your psyche pranayama practice will create more of that. Pranayama practice won't necessarily make everything beautiful. It will give you more of whatever is already there. So if you're already all bound up inside and you may not have the skills to recognize, well, how can I bring myself to this place of inner equilibrium and then go deeper into Pranayama. The yoga sutras specifically say to start from a place of effortlessness where you call. And that's why we start with Savasana.
Monica Phillips (11:14):
It reminds me of this. Like you said, if someone comes into a yoga class with a lot of energy, a lot of Rajasic energy, you can't take them to Savasana. And they probably shouldn't be in a yin yoga class. They might need to a Vinyasa flow to come to arrive in Savasana so that they now feel calm because you can't just tell someone to get there. Especially in this world, we live in with so much busy-ness I don't think everyone has the same access to that inner calm.
Lisa Walford (11:44):
And again, that's why on that Inauguration Day class, I chose a more rajasic pranayama. So that then afterwards we had a long progressive Savasana. And if I may then follow up on your question about linking the breath with movement in the Iyengar system, that, which is what I practice, one of many, but a Pranayama practice is done separately from the Asana practice. What I call pranayama begins with Savasana. So linking breath with movement is linking breath with movement. It's not pranayama. There are other systems who will say no, ujjayi. We're doing pranayama. So linking breath with movement is helpful for many reasons. There's a fluidity of what the inhalation, when we're resisting gravity, we inhale. And when we move in with gravity, we exhale kind of mirroring the natural rhythms of the universe. You inhale and you expand and you exhale and you contract.
Lisa Walford (12:43):
It helps people find a calm, abiding nature while they're beginning to build up heat through the Vinyasa, through the movement. It's I think a good way when somebody is linking breath with movement to use the sound of the breath, to gauge whether the movement is particularly aggressive or harsh, or whether they're able to move in and out of the asanas in a, in a conscientious way. So linking breath was movement for many people, I think is a very organic marriage and it can bring them to a place where they just feel more expansive. And in alignment with the rhythms of nature.
Monica Phillips (13:28):
I'm really glad you said that. So in asana practice, we focus on the breath and it's still quite separate from any pranayama practice that we would do that would come after.
Lisa Walford (13:38):
Yes.
Monica Phillips (13:38):
There are a lot of different kinds of pranayama and they all have different effects from cleansing to calming, to energizing. Can you tell us a little bit more about the different kinds and when we might practice certain pranayama, maybe at different times of the day, or like you said, with different moods in the atmosphere.
Lisa Walford (13:58):
It's always helpful to start with an exhalation. And this is true as many meditation techniques as well to just sit quietly and observe the breath. In a good pranayama practice I think it's helpful to start with breath awareness. We're such control freaks, and that's understandable in the world where we don't feel that we have much control would hope for some predictability so that we can prepare ourselves. But in reality, letting go of needing to be in control is how we're able to cultivate that inner resolution that we mentioned in the very, very first part of our discussion, where we're resilient and adaptable. So that rather than trying to hold on, I'm going to inhale for four breaths and I'm going to exhale for four breaths - to the count of four, and then inhale to the count of four and exhale to the count of eight. We start with breath awareness, observing the nature of the breath and that in itself, taking the control out of it, is incredibly potent.
Lisa Walford (14:58):
Whether one is sitting or whether one is lying down to become more sensitive to all of the parts of the body that engage with breath. For instance, the jaw and the sinus cavities, we often carry so much tension in the jaw. So when we become really quiet and just observe the breath and we become sensitive enough to feel tension in different parts of the body, for some people, it may be the shoulders, maybe the solar plexus. So becoming aware of what already there and beginning to let go of that is a huge way to start. And that takes patience, just something that many people want kind of an instant fix, but a deep transformation and yoga is not an instant fix. It's something that takes devotion and dedication and passion, the passion to cultivate as you mentioned before, a deep sense of who we as individuals are. Who do we think we should be, or who we think we were, but underneath all those layers of masks that we wear, what is underneath. With the breath awareness, we can start to shed all of those layers.
Lisa Walford (16:15):
And that can take - when we start lying down it's helpful because there are physiological changes that happen when we lie down, it's automatically psychologically we think I'm going to rest. I'm lying down, but there's also things that happen with the blood pressure when we lie down that changes the respiratory rate, respiratory rate changes, it changes blood pressure. So lying down is helpful. And there's other things in our yoga practice that we can do that will help us to become more quiet like that. And then after the breath awareness, then we start to explore, where do I breathe? Where can I breathe? And this is where there's quite a bit of variation in pranayama teaching techniques. I don't think that there's any right way. So wonderful about diversity. Some breathing techniques focus on in and the out in the abdomen. And in Iyengar we focus more on the auxiliary breathing muscles, the intercostal muscles, how they can expand. One begins with breath awareness, and then with observing where and how the breath can move. And I love that because it feels like every breath has its own unique characteristic. Every breath has a beginning. It has a birth. Every breath has a full moon. Then every breath has its waning moon, and every breath has the pause at the end before you start again. So when I look at it that way, it's just a beautiful song that is punctuated with silence. Now, with the pause before the beginning and the pause at the top before the exhalation and those transitions are equally potent.
Monica Phillips (17:58):
There's so much power in the teacher naming the body part. The first time someone said to me, breathe into your big toe. Of course, we don't actually breathe into our big toe, but that naming process allows us to notice where we experience it. And so I loved how you said, like the intercostal muscles versus the abdomen. Where are you breathing? How does it feel in your body? What is the spaciousness and for anyone watching or listening that can allow your mind to shift where you notice the breath.
Lisa Walford (18:28):
Awareness is everything. There's a difference between attention and awareness. What my teacher would say is that attention is vertical. It's very focused. Whereas awareness is, it spread. It's more peripheral. If I look at one thing that focal point has, and that is certainly a meditation technique, too. But if I soften my gaze and I start to view peripherally and I listened, so what Mr. Iyengar says my, when he was alive, what my teacher would say is that in the pranayama practice, it's not what we see, it's how we listen. As we listen it's a very, very deep awareness because listening happens in the element of space. And so when we listen inside the body awareness, like you said, no, we'll shift and we'll go into a particular body part and awareness changes. Again. I think it takes a lot of patience because it's very subjective. It's only now. And it's really quite remarkable that science in many ways is starting to corroborate what so many of the yogis experienced in their practice.
Monica Phillips (19:38):
I've had so many different points in my yoga journey where I've noticed a major shift in my life. At 21, I went to my first studio class in Paris, and then I started practicing regularly because I was hooked. And then I had various changes in my practice throughout the next now 26 years. Actually just three years ago, I went to an ashram for a week and I thought, I knew how to let go. And it was in that week that I actually learned how to let go. And that's when I decided maybe I do want to become a teacher. And my practice became so different in that moment and how I experienced yoga. Was there a moment like that for you where you felt this shift? And then also talk to us about what your own pranayama practice is.
Lisa Walford (20:19):
That's so interesting. There are times in life when we kind of pivot and we all went into quarantine, you know, there was a pivot. And then there are times when you kind of know that something has shifted to use your words. I started my yoga practice in 1982. I flirted with meditation for the next 10 years. And I'm going to say flirted with the pranayama practice starting probably in 86, 1986. And when I say flirted, what I mean is that I'd say I'm going to get up in the morning and I'm going to do my practice. And I would sit for five, six minutes and go, I'm too restless, then I'd leave. But I did that regularly with both my meditation and my pranayama practice for 15 years. And I think it was in 1998 or 2000, I forget. And I was in Puna and studying with the Iyengars and there, as you said, when you went to the ashram, you were on retreat.
Lisa Walford (21:16):
Well, in, Puna I'd go for one or two months. I mean, when I was young, then I'd save up enough money to go. And then I take my credit card and I'd come back and have to pay off my credit card and kind of go through that cycle again and I'm past that. But I remember it. So it was you know when I had that time away from all of the responsibilities. So I think that's really helpful for people to take. And I did the same with my meditation, 10 day vapasana retreat, where no talking to experience what's possible. And that happens with many people when they go on retreat. And I think that a daily pranayama practice can be a little mini-retreat. It helps to set up your promps the night before, have the intention of what you're going to do the night before. I do that to this day.
Lisa Walford (22:03):
And I have my pranayama pillow and all of those things. So in 2000, I'm not sure how it shifted or why it shifted, but I decided to take a particular pranayama sequence and to practice that sequence every day for a month. And I think there was something about that regularity that helped me go deeper. So first the breath awareness, well do that every day. Maybe it's five minutes, maybe it's 10, maybe your mind drifts off, or you go, Oh, we'll come back to the breath. Here I am. All of that is natural. It's acceptable. It's just what happens. And then at a certain point that shift happens. I literally have these kind of waves, Savasana waves you could call them, you know, that would kind of go through the body, but in the pranayama practice, it can be more directive, more tangible. So after I had that established, then I started working with my teachers, different kinds of, of pranayama practice.
Lisa Walford (23:02):
What is the difference between a staggered inhalation of Viloma 1, inhale, pause, inhale, pause, inhale, exhale. For most people that's a good way to start because the inhale is affirming. The exhale, we always start with a natural exhalation like that letting go. But for many people, the depth of pranayama, if we started focusing on the exhale, it's kind of scary because that last exhale is symbolic. So in the beginning, it's helpful to do these gradual inhalations. And then when we stagger the breath like that, inhale, pause, inhale, pause. It's a very seamless way to extend the inhalation. And by introducing that pause, it's not that we're holding the breath. It's a moment of silence. So introducing that silent state, that deep rest that happens naturally at the bottom of the exhalation or the top of the inhalation where there's nothing is happening. And then I would say that starting to teach pranayama is what really then took my practice to yet another level, having to find a way to articulate it. Then I had to kind of go deeper into my own practice.
Monica Phillips (24:18):
Is there a way for people to practice pranayama within a few minutes and I'm thinking in Judith Lasiter's book, she gives us an example of this woman who said, "Oh yes, I just started a five minute a day meditation practice" and Judith kind of laughs it off, "Oh, what can you get in five minutes a day?" And then she realized, actually that's really wise because that's what she has, she's going to give to and it's going to be sustainable. I wonder, is there something like that for pranayama as well?
Lisa Walford (24:45):
That's what I recommend. Start with something that's easily digestible and five minutes, seven minutes. It generally takes, I think a minimum of three minutes for the parasympathetic nervous system, a minimum to start to calm down. And there's different ways that one can facilitate that. I suggest starting lying down one way to facilitate that is to take just a very thin blanket or a towel that you can put underneath your spine so that there is some lift to the chest, but then take another blanket or a towel and place it on top of the diaphragm. So that, that solar plexus area, you think of children or animals, when they protect themselves, they protect the diaphragm. They protect the throat. So if you just put a blanket on top of the diaphragm, that kind of helps to settle the nervous system. Starting that way. So start with just quiet and one can watch again, breath awareness, or watch the exhalation, watch the inhalation, watch the thoughts come, watch the thoughts go, watch the theme evolve and fade. And then slowly begin to invite the breath, not control, but invite. Better for somebody to stop after five minutes when they're still a little thirsty then to say, okay, I have to sit here for 15 minutes and then struggle with wondering whether the timer is going to go off or not.
Monica Phillips (26:09):
Such a good point and so true. I was kind of laughing to myself because I have a 12 year old and I invite him in to practice yoga with me and he loves all my props. He'll come in and he'll get really comfortable. And then I'll ask him to notice his breath and then he's in Savasana. And it's so much fun to watch this in kids who have less attachment to certain things. I think that adults learn how to attach themselves to things that just don't matter. I love your newsletter. I really, really love it. And in this last one you shared about the Dalai Lama and kindness and compassion. Tell me about the power of breath to cultivate kindness.
Lisa Walford (26:41):
I mentioned earlier that the breath could be both a mirror and a bridge. Mettā is the Pali word, the Buddhist word for kindness, maitrī is in the yoga sutras. When we have a discussion about kindness, we're so practiced random acts of, small random acts of kindness. We're so attuned to being kind to another, to being really kind to oneself. How do we support well-being? And kindness can be taking 30 seconds to relax the jaw or taking 30 seconds to move away from the computer screen. It's not necessarily that piece of carrot cake or something like that.
Monica Phillips (27:23):
That sounds pretty. (laughter).
Monica Phillips (27:26):
That could be the carrot cake.
Lisa Walford (27:27):
Yes, absolutely. So as was awareness that the breath is a vehicle for awareness and awareness rides on the vehicle of the breath, we can take qualities and let them infuse the breath. I think of incense. You see the incense when you first burn it, and then it's everywhere in the air. You know it's everywhere in the air, but you don't see it. So that thought of kindness. At first, it's a thought, but it can ride on the breath as it permeates the body. I think when we, it's often hardest to cultivate that for yourself. It may be easier in the beginning of the end of one's five-minute or seven-minute pranayama practice to envision sending kindness to somebody who you know needs that. And so to start with somebody else, and then after that know that somebody out there maybe doing it for you too.
Monica Phillips (28:19):
So beautiful. I think of our hearts. We radiate more energy from our hearts than from our brain. And we have so many more, so much power in our heart center. I think of this heart center as the love, the kindness and the self-love compassion and empathy to others. And it's contagious. When you walk into a room with joy, others feel it. And so self-kindness is actually kindness to others. You allow people, you give them permission to also feel joy.
Lisa Walford (28:49):
And again, science, those oxytoxins, those neuro-transmitters are in there. I'm sure that that translates over the computer screen to you.
Monica Phillips (29:01):
I feel it with you. Yeah.
Lisa Walford (29:01):
When the poet at the inauguration, Amanda Gorman. I mean, even now the day after I have goosebumps, just through that empathy was so strong in the pranayama practice to practice kindness and know that it infuses your body and enables healing. So health and healing, people who were living with chronic conditions when we do impact the parasympathetic nervous system - rest and digest - the relaxation response through this kind of neural chemistry. So kindness is not a throw away. It's very profound. I mean, it's.
Monica Phillips (29:42):
What a great way to end. Thank you for so many great insights you gave us and you have graciously recorded your pranayama series, which is available on your website, "walford.com" and on iTunes. So all the links will be on this episode so that people can listen and then find you.
Lisa Walford (29:57):
Thanks, Monica, the website, I think is just Walford.com. Thank you for this series and I'll see you soon.
Monica Phillips (30:03):
Thanks.