The Udana Vayu
We'll be looking at another of the vayus for April's theme of the month, this time Udana Vayu, which is known as the expressive breath or the air that flies upward.
The Udana Vayu relates to the spinal channel, throat, brain, face and its movement focuses on maintaining a long spine and correct posture.
The energy here is associated with the exhale breath and starts in your solar plexus, it then moves up towards the throat.
It governs speech, expression, growth, and also affects the thyroid and parathyroid glands which regulate metabolism.
Throughout April we’ll be adding back bends, inversions, and breathing practices such as the ujjayi and the bumblebee breath.
He who breathes with your up-breath [udana] is your true Self , which is within all things.
March Theme of the Month Recap
The Apana Vayu
Last month we looked at the Apana Vayu which was all about the downward flow of energy and feeling grounded.
The exhale breath which relates to this is seen as the cleansing breath where we learn to release and let go so we practiced slowing the breath down and making sure that we fully exhaled out.
We worked through our sequence of the moon salutation, focused on balance poses especially with tree pose and the swaying and twisting variations, and practiced quite a few standing forward bends while keeping the feet rooted down.
Working with the Apana Vayu you start to allow yourself to let go by releasing body tension or anxiety and feel the energy of apana through your cleansing breath flowing through your body.