Welcome to Day 8 of Learning to Breathe with Carrie Joy of Sagewood Wellness.
So Day 8,
We are almost through our 10 day course.
So today is the practice of Ujjayi Breathing.
Ujjayi Breathing is commonly used in Pranayama practice or in asana practice.
So in yoga practice.
So in Ujjayi Breathing,
We are actually contracting our throat.
When we contract our throat,
We then make the sound of an ocean.
Or that sound that you hear in a conch shell when you hold it up to your ears.
So,
This is a form of breath control.
By contracting our throat,
We also start a throat lock.
We are not going quite that far today.
But,
We are starting to learn the control of our breath.
So that we can actually retain our energy inside of our body.
So here we go.
We are going to start to practice.
First,
I am going to demonstrate.
So,
It is going to sound something like this.
When we breathe.
Of course,
We are going to start by coming into a comfortable seat.
You can do that while I am showing.
So,
We are in a comfortable seat.
We then take a nice deep breath in.
And we are going to go.
So,
The sound is made by contracting our throat.
So,
The reason that I like to demonstrate first,
Is because then you have an idea of what you are listening for when you start to practice.
Now,
We are going to jump into practice.
So,
Let's come in finding that really comfortable spot.
Taking that first couple of breaths to center yourself in.
And now we are going to go ahead and contract our throat.
So,
We are just going to tighten all of those muscles.
Inhale and exhale.
So,
Now you are just going to keep breathing with the throat contraction.
Focusing on your inhales and your exhales.
We are going to do two more rounds here.
Allowing ourselves to release our practice and bring our breath back to a normal cycle.
Observing again as we breathe normally how this practice felt for us.
Maybe our throat is a little tender from our contraction.
And that is okay.
Have a nice warm cup of tea with some honey.
Or you might notice that you may be a little more in your body.
That is also very,
Very normal.
So,
While we are practicing just our normal breath,
We are going to allow ourselves to bring ourselves back into the room around us.
So,
We are going to start moving our fingers and our toes.
Feeling the temperature of the air on our skin.
And we are going to open our eyes.
I look forward to seeing you on day nine.
Remembering that you can practice this at any point.
I hope you have a wonderful day.
