Yoga and the Heart Mind Connection - Ayurveda Style
Many are curious about the mind-body connection. They have an experience of it for themselves and, yet, can’t really explain it. I believe Ayurveda has the most elegant explanation for this phenomenon.
Ayurveda describes the human being as a series of channels: channels for nourishment, for the elimination of wastes, for the creation and maintenance of tissues and for the mind. There’s a channel for every function of the human being.
In this channel system (known in sanskrit as srotas), three of them permeate the entire being — they go everywhere!
Ayurveda describes the human being as a series of channels: channels for nourishment, for the elimination of wastes, for the creation and maintenance of tissues and for the mind. There’s a channel for every function of the human being.
In this channel system (known in sanskrit as srotas), three of them permeate the entire being — they go everywhere!
These are the channels of nourishment (rasa vaha srotas), breath/prana (prana vaha srotas) and the mind (mano vaha srotas). The Ayurvedis understood that every cell needs nourishment, oxygen/ prana and consciousness, so the channels that deliver these must permeate the entire body.
The channels of nourishment build the body — without food and water, there are no building blocks to support and maintain our physical selves.
The channels of breath and prana circulate, support and maintain the energy in our body and mind. This might sound like a strange example; it comes from my days as First Aid/Ski Patrol. |
It is believed that the difference between a corpse, being artificially respirated (being given CPR and AR), and someone who is alive is that the person who is alive has prana — the vital life energy which animates us. Without breath and prana, we lack aliveness
The channels of the mind circulate, maintain and support the functions of mind — processing sensory information, memory and consciousness. Without mind, we cannot navigate in the external or internal world.
Ayurveda describes each channel as having a root (a starting place), a pathway (the channel itself) and an opening (a way to get things in and out). The part that fascinates me about these three channels that permeate everywhere is that they share a root. All three of these channels — nourishment, breath and mind — are described as being rooted in the heart. This shows us that Ayurveda believes not only in a body-mind connection, but in a body-breath-mind-heart connection!
Where channel systems intersect, these channels influence each other. Knowing that the channels of nourishment, breath and mind root in the same location (the heart) means that each of these is going to affect the others. What we eat affects our prana-energy levels and the function of our mind. How we breathe affects our sense of nourishment and thought patterns. How we think affects body and breath… The body, breath, mind and heart are all connected, which means that when something shifts in one area, it will likely shift in another.
As with any channel system, it is possible to get clogs in the pipes. In Ayurveda, we call the substance that clogs the pipes ama, which in English translates loosely to “metabolic waste”. Ama is actually undigested material — undigested food, undigested emotions, undigested experiences. When we experience something on any level that we cannot digest, it leaves behind a residue. This residue is ama. As ama builds up, it inhibits the healthy flow through our channels and eventually clogs the pipes.
Ama is not the only way the flow through our channels gets impaired. Our pipes can get constricted from stress and fear, inflamed through anger or obstructed with ama.
Through my Ayurvedic training I now see Yoga as a set of techniques that promotes healthy flow through our channels by reducing constriction, inflammation and obstruction (ama). Let’s explore some ways that Yoga helps to prevent and remove the gunk from our channel system:
- Yama — the restraints: By practicing non-violence, honesty, non-coveting, celibacy (not only of the loins, but of all the sense organs!) and non-possessiveness, we create a context where we reduce and eventually prevent our own actions from creating ama within the mind channels. We are training the mind by practicing restraint of the actions that tend to create the most ama. They say that prevention is the best medicine J
- Niyama — the observances: Here we deepen our consciousness of our own body-mind through self-care and self-inquiry practices. This limb increases our capacity to digest our experiences through self-knowledge and understanding (saucha & svadhyaya). It also creates the opportunity to recognize when our channels are getting clogs and how to dissolve these (tapas).
- Asana -- cultivating stability and ease in our bodies: This limb uses postures and movement to work with and unclog the channels. It also teaches us how stability, in any scenario, allows for easefulness to be cultivated, and this combination creates the context for optimal flow through our channels. In a way, we could say that the opposite of sukha (good space, easefulness) is dukkha (negative space), which manifests in the channels as constriction, inflammation or obstruction. Asana uses the body as the doorway to this work and, yet, because the body, breath and mind all root in the heart, it affects the entire being!
- Pranayama — restraint and, when ready, expansion of the vital life energy: This limb uses breath as the doorway to promote flow through the channels. This one is super fascinating because the results can be almost immediate — after all, the more subtle the realm (prana) the stronger the influence on the obvious (body). We have pranayama that are relaxing to reduce constriction, cooling to reduce inflammation and warming/melting to reduce obstruction. We definitely notice how the channel of breath affects the body and mind through their roots in the heart.
- Pratyahara -- sensory withdrawal: The mukha, or openings, of the channel of the mind includes the sense organs — eyes, ears, nostrils, skin and mouth. By inviting our attention inward and allowing the sense organs an opportunity to relax, the tendency towards over-stimulation is reduced and, therefore, their function is improved through less constriction–inflammation–obstruction. I also believe this limb invites our inner sensory apparatus to awaken, which allows us to engage in a deeper self-knowing. All of these pieces set the context for better function through the channel of the mind and, therefore, breath and body too.
- Dharana, Dhyana, Samadhi — concentration, meditation and absorption: The refinement of the mind and, therefore, its channels, continues as we move into the higher limbs of the path. As the mind refines, our ability to take care of the body (vehicle of nourishment) improves, and the flow of breath and prana is also affected.
Each of the eight limbs uses one of these channels systems as its main access point and, yet, because the channels of nourishment (the body), breath & prana and the mind all root in the heart, any doorway will affect the flow through all three of these all pervading channel systems. As a yoga teacher and practitioner, I’m always asking the question, which doorway can I use to support this individual to greater health — is it the body, the breath or the mind? And, I recognize through my personal practice and working with others, that it doesn’t matter which doorway we use, it gets us into the heart and the changes ripple outward through all the channels from there.
Mona Warner