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Yoga
As you may have gathered bringing mindfulness to any activity transforms it into a kind of meditation. Mindfulness dramatically amplifies the probability that any activity in which you are engaged will result in an expansion of your perspective and of your understanding of who you are. Much of the practice is simply a remembering, a reminding yourself to be fully awake, not lost in waking sleep. Yoga aims to unifying body and mind, which really means penetrating into the experience of them not being separate in the first place. You can also think of it as experiencing the unity or connectedness between the individual and the universe as a whole. We have already seen that posture is very important in the sitting meditation and that positioning your body in certain ways can have immediate effects on your mental and emotional state.
An introduction to Yoga
Here you can find a short introduction to the third major formal meditation technique used in MBSR, mindful hatha yoga. There are also two half an hour videos for you to follow while you do yoga. An audio version of these videos is also available at the bottom of the page, where you can also find a shorter 20 minute yoga session and ten mindful movements by Thich Nhat Hanh.
Being aware of your body language and what it reveals about your attitudes and feelings can help you to change your attitudes and feelings just by changing your physical posture. When you practice the yoga, you should be on the lookout for the many ways, some quite subtle, in which your perspective on your body, your thoughts, and your whole sense of self can change when you adopt different postures on purpose and stay in them for a time, paying full attention from moment to moment.
Guidance is based on excerpts from Jon Kabat-Zinn (1990), Full Catastrophe Living, Bantam Doubleday Dell Publishing Group, Inc.
NOTE: If you have physical limitations that are so serious that it would be difficult or damaging for you to even begin one or more of the practices, it is sufficient to simply vividly imagine doing the movements and/ or postures. Neurologists tell us that vividly imagining physical movement involves the same motor neurons that come into play as when we actually physically move.
Practicing in this way enriches the inner work enormously and takes it far beyond the physical benefits that come naturally with the stretching and strengthening. This is a far cry from most exercise and aerobic classes and even many yoga classes, which only focus on what the body is doing. These approaches tend to emphasize progress. While not much attention is paid to the art of non-doing and non-striving in exercise classes. Work at or within your body’s limits at all times, with the intention of observing and exploring the boundary between what your body can do and where it says, “Stop for now.” Never stretch beyond this limit to the point of pain.
Eventhough some discomfort is inevitable when you are working at your limits, you will need to learn how to enter this healthy “stretching zone” slowly and mindfully so that you are nourishing your body, not damaging it as you explore your limits. Every individual has to consciously take responsibility for reading his or her own body’s signals while doing the yoga. This means listening carefully to what your body is telling you and honoring its messages, erring on the side of being conservative. No one can listen to your body for you.
A 20 minute yoga session
Ten Mindful Movements - Thich Nhat Hanh
Yoga sessions 1 and 2
Once you are confident in how to carry out the poses you can follow this audio instead of the video if you prefer
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