Yoga is Deep Medicine

“The miracle is not to fly in the air, or walk on the water, but to walk on the earth.”

- Chinese proverb

On June 19, 2010, my wife Susy, a skilled and experienced yoga teacher in the tradition of B.K.S. Iyengar, and I facilitated a workshop at the Piedmont Yoga Studio in Oakland, California called “Yoga is Deep Medicine.”  This curriculum was first presented at the Turtle Island Yoga Studio in San Anselmo (Marin County), California, earlier this year.

Our bridging of yoga and medicine has come about after many years living and learning together.  Both yoga and medicine are ancient wisdom practices and both require self-study, as well as expert guidance. What we have done is integrate the scientific, the yogic, and the metaphoric in a holistic experience supportive of one’s well-being and healing.

As in my book, Deep Medicine: Harnessing the Source of Your Healing Power, scientific knowledge and metaphor come together to support one’s external and internal equilibrium and equanimity during “Yoga is Deep Medicine”.  The asana practices are suitable for all levels. Emphasis is directed to three areas: (1) the thoracic spine, chest cavity, shoulder girdle and upper extremities; (2) the sacrum, abdominal cavity, pelvic girdle and lower extremities; and (3) restorative poses.

 For example, teachings include the science of the heart (serving as a pump carrying oxygenated blood to distant bodily sites and waste products toward the core for elimination), and the metaphor of the heart as a reservoir for courage, compassion and love. The upper extremities function not only in physical survival and livelihood but also as extenders of friendship (shaking hands, waving), acknowledgement (pat on the back), respect (saluting) and love (hugging). The lifted, aligned spine and the rib cage are seen in their roles in supporting and protecting the heart and lungs, and metaphorically in the cycles of inspiration (taking in) and expiration (letting go). The breath connects us to life and the unseen. It is noteworthy that every thought and every emotion are linked to a pattern of breathing – from deep and quiet to shallow and rapid.

Questions such as how are we supported, what do we stand for, and how we move in the world informed the asana practice for the pelvic girdle and lower extremities.  The abdominal cavity houses the functions and organs which assimilate what he eat, eliminate what we no longer need, as they also maintain the “fire in the belly”, provide our valued “gut feelings”,  and play an important role in the functioning of our immune system. In the pelvis, are our organs of reproduction – where our species is literally recreated one being at a time.

The third set of asana is a series of restorative poses. Here we slow down, get quiet, and go inward as we relax, restore,  revitalize and heal. “Stress reduction” comes alive as ancient postures support the understanding of contemporary physiology. Our mental and physical activities in the world need to be integrated with rest, sleep, and contemplative and meditative practices. For complete health/wholeness our “inner house” of meaning, metaphor, and what matters must be bridged with our “outer house” of what we do and how we do it in our daily lives. This integration is deep medicine.