Line up and Get Happy
Are happy people different from you and me?
Maybe not, but things certainly line up differently for them.
A recent study highlights the connection between mood and body movement, stating that specific types of movements can create moods from joy to depression.
These studies have found that exercise is a powerful way to lift your mood - in particular, short bursts of exercise. "Short bursts" describes the hot yoga sequence. 26 challenging asanas held for anywhere from 10 to 60 seconds, increasing in intensity, with correct attention to alignment, supported by proper breathing.
What else aligns you with Happiness?
New science says you may be able to forget your troubles, come on get happy, just by doing The Happy Dance.
Or the Silly Walk.
Or hot yoga.
In yoga, health is seen as more than absence of disease: health a perfect trifecta of mind, body, spirit. You need all three lined up to feel happy, healthy, and whole.
Perhaps you've had this experience: you feel achy, clogged, pain in your body. You go to the doctor and after a barrage of tests, she tells you there's "nothing wrong with you."
Yoga says you become vibrationally unbalanced first; then the body feels "off;" then later you manifest "disease." The good news is that you have so many chances to "turn back" before the diagnosis.
In fact I'm going to make a radical statement: using your physical senses to assess your condition is kind of like driving while looking in the rearview mirror: your body shows you what has been, not what can be.
Once something shows up in your body - any kind of condition at all - it shows that you have already spent a lot of time manifesting it vibrationally so that you get to see, to feel, to have clarity about where you've been focused.
But you're not stuck with it.
To shift your direction, look within.
With even the smallest intention to balance your chakras, you can feel a corresponding change in your body and in your mood to let you know you're on the right track.
Balanced chakras are described as feelings of bliss, ease, harmony, calm; in your body, in your thoughts, in your heart...in short, everywhere.
And, as it turns out, in your moods.
How do you create this mind/body/spirit alignment?
- Aanas move energy through the chakras. As you squeeze, press and push in the proper physical alignment so important in the hot 26 yoga sequence, you are also aligning each chakra.
- As meditation quiets the mind, endless negative thoughts cease; when negative energy is withdrawn, your mood lifts (hot yoga is a 90-minute fully-aware open-eyed meditation)
- Journaling is a way of releasing stagnant energy. Try this: set a timer for 5 minutes and simply keep your pen moving on the page. From emotion to expression in one fluid movement without interference from your "thinking mind" removes stuck energy to free your spirit, no matter what you're writing about.
Which hot yoga poses balance which chakras?
The short answer: all of them.
Some say this is the real reason yoga feels so good. Yes, your body feels wonderful. But it is because your body is the sensual exprression of the inner health of your chakras.
If you can't see or measure chakras, how do you know they're there?
Imagine colors, feelings, energy around your chakras. If you have something you want to fix or heal in your life, imagine moving it out of the way, freeing yourself of its hold on you as you move your body in the hot yoga asanas.
Imagination is powerful.
Recently, a student said this to me:
" I work closely with patients who have poor postures. Our focus is alignment of bones on bones and providing education and adjustments on how to "correct" the poor posture for ultimate alignment to decrease pain, improve strength, etc.
"This got me thinking. When we are in absolute alignment with our source energy, our body posturing should automatically adjust to correspond with this. It should be perfect! No rounded shoulders or forward heads, no flatten lumbar spines, no unlevel hips or knees, etc. As our gas gauge is on full, we feel good about ourselves, life, we are happy and positive.
"People who are unhappy, sad, depressed, withdrawn, angry, etc. typically have poor postures; now I can't help but see that these people are also out of alignment with their source energy."
We all have a sense that we are part of a larger energy source and we can feel this in our best-feeling moments. We know we are more than our physical aspects; we have physical, emotional, creative, and celestial components. Someplace we connect to a higher consciousness and that connection is essential to life, growth and expansion.
And maybe reconnecting just takes sustained moments of walking tall, bursts of skipping and habits of smiling for no reason.
Your mother was right after all: sit up straight and smile. Everything else will work itself out.
Rhonda Uretzky, E-RYT
Reader Comments (10)
This resonates with me to the deepest level!
I tend to notice the way people hold themselves more and more. wanting everyone to stand tall.
Maybe it's because I began to take a longer look at myself and began to realize bodily habits of my own that seemed to portray at skin level a deeper emotional state.
Like nail biting. Or hunched shoulders. I did that a lot - caving my shoulders inward, stooping over.
Insecurity written all over it.
Undeservingness.
Unworthiness.
I can't say what exactly starting bringing my shoulders back and down - what stopped my 20 year habit of vicious nail biting (gross). I don't think it was just one thing that did it….
But I think being truly loved by another for who I am was a big part of it. Maturing into a woman and making my own decisions for myself was a big part of it.
But I Think the key ingredient was finally deciding to stop being my own worst enemy. I still have that ugly voice in my head, but I am better and better at not listening to it. At not believing it. I discovered - I deserve it all. All the dreams in my head. They're not there to make me feel small because I don't have them yet. They're there to remind me that i DREAM BIG. That I DESERVE BIG.
My shoulders down and back. Looking into my own eyes. Smiling.
Hot yoga plays a big role in this.
Isnt it so cool to know that you DONT necessarily have to dig for the root of whatever is making you slump; you can take the easy route and just stand up straight now! The Big Physical is a big hint: how you move your body, how you hold your body, affects your emotional state. So - what does your Happy Dance look like?
My Happy Dance Looks like that I dance my heart out in my kitchen. Quite often it does happen after my yoga class, or there was another one, this one was huge when I finished my 30 day hot yoga Love Practice and realized that I had to put myself into the chamber for 30 day to realize I am in charge of MY OWN HAPPINESS and no one else! Walking with a straight back says a lot about you. I am very proud that I stand tall being just 5.25" and walk with a strong, straight back. This is my gift to myself and it is a great gift to me from Hot Yoga. Haven't you notice that we all have such straight spines!! It is so beautiful and powerful. Chest up, shoulders down, spine straight.
And Alfia, I cant even begin to tell you how that straight spine will serve you physically as you age...just as it keeps you youthfully looking forward to happiness right now
My Happy Dance is my shoulders down and back, relaxed, and a straight back, with an easy smile. Using my hands a lot, smiling too much, looking into people's eyes when we talk, being in no rush --- this is my beautiful place when I leave yoga. My happy dance, my happy place. For sure!
Thank you Rhonda, it is very special :) "youthfully looking forward to happiness".
Grace, your beautiful dance is very sweet. It is really nice to smile, look into peoples' eyes and being in no rush. I feel like our hot yoga studio is like that when people walk in, you great them, look into their eyes. They just stumbled across of something special and opened our door to smile again, to walk with a straight spine, to be happy by being present,and looking into their own eyes. This practice with the mirror is life changing because the only person you are accountable to is the one right in front of you looking back at you through your own eyes. You find your peace, you find your home, and you find your true self because by looking into your own eyes you stop lying to yourself and change your life for better and better and better. Once you find it, you will stop never and settle never for something average. From now on you go for the best, and the best is yet to come. Walk with a smile and very straight spine and see how it all unfolds for you. You found your home :). Breathe....
I agree with you Grace and Alfia. Good posture is the base of a happy dance! Standing tall and cofident, keeping that imaginary line running through your ear lobe, shoulder tip, hip, knee and ankle, shoulders down and back with the chest lifted high. This sets our confidence tone and allows us to conquer anything in our path with a happy and positive attitude.
We are in charge of our own happiness and this comes with being comfortable being in our own skin, loving ourselves and NOT listening to that ugly voice in our heads.
My happy dance also comes after a hot yoga class as yours does Alfia & Grace. Maybe its because the chakra's are aligned or imagining all the negativity out of my life. I feel light and airy, happy, energized, positive, calm. Who wouldn't want to feel like this?
Great Article. Thank you very much for sharing such a valuable information.
its definitely hard to think that someone wouldn't want to experience the awesome feeling you get after a hot yoga class! the 90 mins of focusing on doing something amazing for yourself does transform how i feel after hot yoga. but my happy dance definitely starts in the hot yoga room...like tina says aligning all the chakras i just feel amazing. it starts with each pose building on each other and then when class is over thats when the real fun begins!
its been about a month from my last post and my "happy dance" has morphed into wanting to sing after class! i have never been a singer, i can hardly carry a tune, but now when im changing im humming along to a made up song, or singing in my car on the ride home!