Breathe into [insert body part here]

This post is a follow-up to the one titled Breathe Into Your DNA.

I would like to quote from a wonderful article by Kat Heagberg found at the Yoga International website, titled "Six Things I Don’t Say in Yoga Class Anymore"

I believe that Heagberg has found the golden sweet spot between suggesting distracting visualizations and not suggesting anything at all. 

The instructions she suggests giving are anatomically realistic while serving to direct students' attention.

In other words, she has discovered visualizations which are not distracting, but actually useful.

[Another cue I no long give is:] “Breathe into your right little toe.”

 Or your left hip. Or your lower back. Or anywhere other than your lungs.

As a practitioner, I actually really like cues like this. They help me to bring my attention to (and often release unconsciously held tension from) the parts of my body that could generally use a little more attention. That’s why I used to give them often. But eventually, after receiving some helpful student feedback, I learned that “breathe into [insert body part here]” isn’t a cue that works for everyone.

For one thing, some students will automatically think Oh my God, does she really think you can breathe into your little toe? I’m far from an anatomy expert, but I’d rather my students rest assured that, as their teacher, I at least know enough about the human body to understand that they can’t actually, physically breathe air down into their pinky toes. And even if they’re not scrutinizing my anatomy and physiology credentials, for other students this is simply a confusing, abstract instruction that can be easily misunderstood, ignored, or worse, can make them alienated, like they're "not advanced enough" to be in this yoga class.

If you (like I) really like this cue, you might find that a version that’s slightly less, well, literal-sounding is easier for more students to grasp—like “breathe as though you could breathe right into your right little toe.” Or even “bring your attention to your right little toe."

Breath mechanics aside, perhaps the most important lesson I learned when I discovered that an instruction I often gave was confusing for a lot of my students was this: Just because I enjoy or benefit from a certain cue, it doesn’t mean that everyone else will find that particular cue helpful.