Frances’ Blog - Reflections on the Year 2020

“ I can’t breathe” These three words entered our landscape in 2020 with a new force and resonance. We watched in horror the deliberate kneeling on a man’s throat until his breath ran out. People took to the streets to kneel and protest.

Counterpoised were the stories from loved ones and friends here of the coughing and shortness of breath from those contracting the virus. Then came images from hospital wards and ICU’s of people gasping for breath; nurses and doctors offering oxygen masks, ventilators, compassion and sheer love to keep their patients able to continue breathing. Meanwhile the mother of a young girl in the south of England fought a lonely battle through the courts to prove that it was air pollution that had affected her child’s lungs and caused her death. That, in effect, our cars, planes and industry had cumulatively taken away her breath.

And, in my personal world, I sat by the bed of my husband Mike as his breathing changed in the last hours of his life. I found myself trying to mirror his breath and its undulations, knowing that there would not be too many more. Each breath became momentous. It was in the months afterwards that I came across a card we had exchanged on our wedding day; quoting a wedding ritual from a Navaho Indian tribe; “I join my breath to your breath; that our days on this earth may be long; that the days of our people may be long”.

All of this- and more- has brought me back anew to that aspect of Yoga concerned with the breath. In Pranayama, there is a whole science devoted to the art of breathing, with countless techniques given to access, nourish and strengthen the breath. Prana, means Life Force or essence and Ayama, is often translated as to elongate, regulate, extend (the breath). The ancient Yogis or Seers ( those who are able to see) understood profoundly its importance in ways that have been lost to the modern world. They saw literally how fragile this capacity can be and how it has to be nurtured like a child or a delicate flower. Because it is fragile. And sacred.

The techniques are written down and our Guruji’s book ( BKS Iyengar) “ Light on Pranayama” towers above others in explaining the techniques and methods which, as he stresses, are universal. Under the guidance of a teacher, they can be learnt and used by anyone. Yet these practices also require something of a very personal and individual nature. When we lie down, or later sit, to practice, we first have to become still. A quietness is required for watching and observing our breath, getting to know its patterns and rhythms which are unique to each of us. With this process we suddenly become aware of this extraordinary thing which we do each and every moment, waking or sleeping, conscious or unconscious. We breathe. We live.

If we do nothing else this coming year, even if we make little time for practice or reflection, let us commit to at least do this. To honour and respect this invaluable capacity to breathe and to take whatever steps are within our power to make sure that all those around us- in all our diverse communities, our vulnerable friends and neighbours, and our children, can go on breathing freely and deeply for many years to come.

With Love

Frances