COURAGE + CLARITY: Yin Yoga for the Lungs and Heart
Anatomically, your lungs and heart are inseparable. A matrix of intelligent fascia enmeshes both organs, so that if your heart were lifted from your chest cavity, your lungs, attached, would ascend alongside it.
When you breathe, your lungs and your heart together circulate and propel blood throughout the organism. Like an infinity sign, the lung space and the chambers
of the heart create a continuum to cycle smooth Qi through the system. I call this circling of fascia around these two organs the “Upper Prana pond.”
In the emotional body, your lungs and heart are also interwoven as the hosts of certain qualities of a radiant Self. Lungs process grief and loss and are the mech- anisms by which we process imperma- nence and find the ever-stable, fixed vital point of the practitioner — what I like to call our “Buddha Nature.” Healthy Lung Qi
gives us the courage to withstand change and find the unchanging nature of the spirit, which governs our life streams. The heart holds compassion for the
collective, so it has a dimensional capacity to empathize with suering. Rather than clouding the heart space, this actually clears it; the acknowledgement of di- culty for ourselves and for others creates a template of the inner body that can be wide open, spacious like the sky — room for all the textures and the tones of this vibrant, unpredictable life. The blissful ... and the bitter.
The lungs and the heart are the centers for sentiments of tenderness and love. In Sanskrit, this is called bhava: the coura- geous stance of an insight seeker who chooses to lean into feelings of empathy and kindness.
Courage and power from the lungs are coupled by the tender fragility of its delicate tissue, impressionable enough to permit gas exchange from the capillaries into the bloodstream. Particular poses which pull
on the connective tissue around the lungs helps to clear the spongy tender lung space, alongside any psychological pres- sures which surface inside our lungs and our heart.
Article Featured in CO YOGA + Life® Magazine | Winter + Spring 2022-23
Kali Basman
International yoga teacher Kali Basman enriches the paradigm of Yin Yoga to integrate distinct aspects of Self into an innate wisdom practice to awaken a rich inner life and radiate with ritual. Her offering honors Yin Yoga as a tool to surrender to our intrinsic wholeness.
On the textured path of mindful healing, Kali is celebrated for her integration of the 5 Elements and Chinese Meridian Theory with self-inquiry, embodied Anatomy, Buddhist Philosophy of Equanimity, and sharp intellect.