Waking Energy 7 Timeless Practices Designed to Reboot Your Body and Unleash Your Potential

locked for some reason, prana is prevented from reaching the specific area it is supposed to nurture
and stagnates, like a pond with algae overgrowth. The result is that the cells, tissue, or organs in the
affected area suffer, as do the corresponding emotional qualities the organs themselves hold; as a
result, emotions fall out of balance and express themselves as either too much of a good thing, excess,
or not enough, deficiency.
The Art of Receiving
Trusting the simple and elegant work of the poses themselves is a miraculous cocreative process that
occurs breath by breath. Meridians are being activated and harmonized, balancing the emotional
content of the organs and the chakras, helping you to create new space through which powerful life
energy can flow. Rising above all the noise of the mind and the internal protests, this new internal
freedom, this life force, trumps everything, and what remains is pure clarity—the energy reserves and
willpower not only to make better choices, but also to honor them.
Most yang endeavors like dance, Pilates, and even vinyasa yoga, have a kind of rigid, driving
pulse that demands focus, control, timing, and coordination, all tasks that are performed under a kind
of pressure; they emphasize dynamic, rhythmic movement and muscular contraction. Though
phenomenally beneficial in their own right, they demand a high level of energy from you first before
you receive their reciprocal energy.
Yin yoga is the opposite, inviting you to show up just as you are without striving for perfection. It
entices you to release control and turn inward, open, and explore what has been hiding in your
emotional being. In utter stillness, it helps you to create the space to transform the tensions and
troubling feelings that live beneath the surface of your consciousness.
Yin offers a deeper, slow-burning, energized calm and a deep sense of confidence in your body’s
ability to regenerate itself. It’s the kind of energy I imagine Mahatma Gandhi must have possessed—
the energy of tremendous depth, patience, and honoring, the kind of energy that makes you know you
have more than enough reserves to go around and allocate to every aspect of your life.
The Impala’s Heart: Energy Intelligence
Animals in the wild provide us with a standard for health and vigor. . . . They offer us a precious
glimpse of how we might function if our responses were purely instinctual. Animals are our
teachers, exemplifying nature in balance.
—PETER LEVINE
Years ago, around the time that I signed up for my first yin yoga class without suspecting the
impact it would have on my life, on one of my many visits to East West Books, I discovered author
Peter Levine, and yin yoga would never be the same. As I was wandering through the aisles,