What is Prana Flow Yoga All About?

Whenever I tell people that I teach yoga, the first question out of their mouth is: ‘What kind of yoga?’

And when I answer, ‘Prana Flow Yoga’, they stare at me blankly. ‘Huh? Never heard of that…’

Taught by Master Yoga Instructor Shiva Rea, Prana Flow is a liberating, evolutionary, rhythmic, vinyasa-flow class that encompasses mudra, mantra, bandha, pranayama, meditation, asana, kriya and a whole lot of fun. As Shiva states on her website, “It is an energetic, creative, full-spectrum approach to embodying the flow of yoga.”

Prana Flow is all about a balance of opposites – strength and fluidity, skill and intuition, vital energy and relaxed being.

So in class, when we do sun salutations, we’re mindful of the integrity of our alignment, while tuning in to the innate intelligence within our bodies that will guide us into the postures. Downward dog doesn’t have to be static anymore, and the spine may undulate, or the hips sway, as we find release and openness from within.

Most of all, Prana Flow emphasizes connecting to the breath and awakening the flow of Prana within. Defined as “the life-force of creation”, prana lives within each of us. When we practice Prana Flow Yoga, we are practicing getting out of our minds and moving down into our bodies, and letting our breath guide us.

At it’s most simple, while breathing in child’s pose, if we can maintain our concentration on the internal processes and follow our breath around the body, we will sense blocks, or restrictions. These can be physical, mental, emotional or energetic. Just by being aware of these blocks or restrictions, and breathing into those places, we active prana to guide us into openness.

In this way, true Prana Flow Yoga practice will unfold breath by breath on the mat, with the practitioner having no attachment to where the practice might go, or even what the postures might look like. The body is freed to move into the exact asana it needs in that moment to find the greatest release and the greatest balance.

In a Prana Flow class, this might translate into asana where the teacher guides you to explore your body within the context of the alignment. If hands and feet are grounded in downward dog, and internal focus is maintained, where does the breath go? How does the body want to move? At first inhales are likely to move up the spine, tilting the pelvis forward and lifting the hips to the ceiling. Exhales travel down the back of the legs, releasing the heels to the ground. But in time, the breath will begin to travel to other places, finding other blocks to release.

This style of yoga was most famously taught at Kripalu Ashram in Pennsylvania, and written about in the books Yoga and the Quest for the True Self, by Stephen Cope, and Self-Awakening Yoga – the Expansion of Consciousness through the Body’s Own Wisdom by Don Stapleton Ph.d. Both men were senior teachers at the ashram, and with one a psychologist and one an art teacher, each brought their own emphasis to the effects of prana awakening within the body.

“The structural details of any yoga practice can be alluring, but practice comes alive with creativity when you commune with your body’s sensations,” writes Don Stapleton.  “Being true to the intelligence of the body requires leaving the known as a jumping off point and venturing into unknown territory to allow prana to truly guide you. Taking your yoga learning to this level of personal ownership frees you from the illusion that ‘truth’ exists outside of you – in the authority of an expert or a teacher.”

Prana Flow classes focus on developing students’ connections to their own internal yoga teacher, to the flow of prana within them.  It’s not about the teacher telling you what to do, or doing set postures (although both of these things do happen in class). It’s learning to trust your own body’s intuition, and learning to listen to the subtle energies within. And then having the confidence and the commitment to take that connection home to your own yoga mat, in your own time, to explore your own body’s needs.

Once prana is awakened, and a student has learned to surrender to it’s flow, yoga asana will spontaneously arise from within – even asana or kriya that the student has never learned before. It’s a magical process that is inherently natural. We all contain everything we need to know within us, and Prana Flow Yoga reminds of us this buried wisdom we carry.

And it does all of this while reminding us of the simple joys of moving in the body, of finding lightness, of playing. Prana Flow is nothing more and nothing less than life as creative energy, where we celebrate our essence of being.

Author: Kara-Leah Grant, once a Queenstown-based yoga teacher, now teaches in Wellington where she’s discovered the joy of Prana Flow Yoga. Read more of her articles on yoga and the art of living at Prana Flow NZ.