Once you open the door to yoga, you’ll find a realm of terms, flows, poses, and techniques that might be entirely foreign. As you familiarize yourself with these aspects, you’ll become more comfortable in your yoga practice and feel at ease during each flow instead of being stressed about the upcoming movements.
As you wade further into this realm, you’ll probably come across prana flow yoga. You might see a prana flow yoga class offered at your local yoga studio, or maybe you’ll come across a guided session from your favorite online yoga instructor. So, what is prana flow yoga, and how is it different? Let’s find out.
What Is Prana In Yoga?
Before we dive into this term, as it’s used in yoga, we need to understand what prana is. Many individuals, including yogis, consider prana to be the subtle underlying life force energy, which creates the sturdy foundation of all life. Although invisible, intangible, and tasteless, many individuals have experienced prana.
In Sanskrit, prana can translate to multiple things, offering similar meanings. These translations include “life force energy,” “breath of life,” “vital energy,” “spirit energy,” and “vital principle.”
Prana offers the feeling of energy moving through the body, creating understanding and awareness. This feeling is a cornerstone of prana flow yoga, which we’ll get into in the following sections.
Function
Prana, as indicated by its translation, is the driving force behind all body movement. It conducts the things that happen both consciously and unconsciously, including breathing, digestion, elimination, cellular growth, healing, and blood flow.
The energy in our bodies ebbs and flows to areas based on the quality and capacity of the nadis energy channels and the chakras energy centers. In addition to these internal functions, prana can also affect and animate our thoughts, emotions, and overall consciousness.
Although some folks are dismissive of energy flows in the body, many individuals firmly believe our health and well-being are intertwined with the quantity and circulation of prana throughout our bodies.
Benefits
As mentioned, prana has ripple effects throughout the body, affecting everything from blood flow to emotional quality. Given the physical connection with prana flow yoga, it’s no surprise that yogis and instructors utilize prana to understand and sensitize themselves to their vital energy.
Prana has a place in various types of yoga, but the notable importance of prana in this particular type of yoga reflects several reasons. These reasons include the following:
- Aids in physical alignment throughout various poses (even small, subtle changes)
- Promotes the ability for healing and wellbeing
- Helps develop vitality and strength to engage in multiple yoga practices (physically and mentally)
- Offers feedback on a particular pose or sequence’s effects, allowing participants to adjust to accommodate their body’s needs
- Promotes awareness in the present moment
- Lays the foundation for pranayama breathing exercises
- Offers feedback for the efficacy of pranayama breathing exercises
- Provides an informed take on how you’re handling and maintaining your yogic lifestyle
- Impacts the quality and quantity of thoughts, which aids in calming the mind for meditation
What Is The Flow Of Prana?
So, we know what prana is, but what is the flow of prana? In essence, the flow of prana is energy movement in your body as it distributes. It flows to areas in need based on the nadis energy channels and chakra energy centers.
So, What Is Prana Flow Yoga?
Developed by Shiva Rea, prana flow yoga (a form of Vinyasa) is a challenging approach to yoga that targets energetic flows. This type of yoga is a melting pot of other yoga approaches, pulling from numerous types of yoga. Its creator drew from Tantra, Somatics, Ayurveda, Krishnamacharya, Bhakti, and personal experience.
Prana flow yoga offers an approach to directly experiencing prana, which can create a different feel in your yoga session. Although its roots delve into various types of yoga, it brings a unique aspect to the table, allowing you to branch out in your yoga experiences.
In a prana flow yoga class, participants usually undergo a rhythmic flow session that incorporates chanting and breathwork. In many cases, the course is set to a specific genre of music to promote prana, allowing you to channel focus and energy movement.
For many participants, prana flow yoga aids in stress relief and offers energizing effects. Of course, every individual will have a different experience of prana with yoga based on factors unique to them, so this experience may vary from one person to the next. In addition, the class you participate in can affect the overall experience, as many classes feature a different mantra to focus on specific types of prana.
How Can I Increase My Prana Flow?
Although prana serves a vital role in yoga, it has its place in other aspects of your life. While prana is inherent in a living being, we can find ourselves lacking. To replenish or increase prana, we need to utilize the five elements of nature: earth, water, fire, air, and ether.
- Earth: Existing in nature helps circle back to the earth element. This includes things like camping, gardening, walking in nature, eating freshly picked produce, and much more.
- Water: There are several ways to increase prana through the water element, including drinking pure water (free from chemicals, toxins, and contaminants) and swimming in oceans, streams, and rivers.
- Fire: This element represents warmth, so to increase prana through the fire element, embrace the warmth of life. This includes basking in the sunshine, drinking warm water, and consuming warm food.
- Air: The air element is our primary source of prana, as we require a regular flow of oxygen for life. However, while breathing is essential for increasing prana, it’s best to focus on breathing non-polluted air, upholding a consistent pranayama practice (breathing exercises), and keeping living areas filled with clean, fresh air.
- Ether: This element is associated with our thoughts. Each of us has thoughts ebbing and flowing in our minds, so the ether element can aid in achieving higher prana. This includes chanting mantras, keeping good company, seeking out positive atmospheres, and more.
