One of the simplest and most powerful practices you can teach your children is breath awareness. Diaphragmatic breathing, the relaxed, deep breathing that activates the diaphragm muscle, is the prerequisite for the subtle practices of the yoga tradition. It activates the parasympathetic nervous system, which induces a state of calm, improves focus, and reduces anxiety.

Pandit Tigunait’s son, Ishan, recalls, “When I was little, Swami Rama used to call me ‘Mr. Distraction.’ I’d flit around from thing to thing, and I was always on the move. By nighttime I was so exhausted, I couldn’t sleep.” Tigunait began to teach Ishan diaphragmatic breathing, placing a sandbag on his abdomen and lower ribs and asking him to raise the bag on each inhalation, and lower it on each exhalation.

“Maybe now a kid like me would get labeled ADHD,” Ishan observes, “but the sandbag breathing completely changed that.” After a few months, diaphragmatic breathing became automatic, he recalls. His focus began to improve, and so did the quality of his sleep. Next, he was taught how to sit quietly for a few minutes, focusing on the touch of the breath at the tip of his nostrils. As he grew older, his father introduced him to mantra meditation. Looking back, Ishan says, “The immersion in a spiritual lifestyle from a young age makes you feel so grounded in your inner personality that you naturally pursue whatever you believe to be your calling. You get that grounding from the fundamentals— sitting, breathing, asana—but even more important, it comes from the introduction to yourself that you get from meditation. You begin to see that a calm and disciplined mind is your most valuable asset.”

adapted from Yoga Journal by Shannon Sexton

 

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