What Does “Center Yourself” Mean?
Practical advice from Yoga
I had been teaching Yoga for three decades, telling students every day to center themselves, when one of them spoke up and asked me, “What does that mean?”
I was gobsmacked that anybody wouldn’t understand this universal expression, which I had known all my life. It made me really think about it.
And I soon realized that this is exactly why we teachers are here — to explain the things that are so obvious to us, to those who haven’t got a clue.
This stuff we teach, and perhaps take for granted, is vitally important — especially to those who have never considered it before!
So, here’s what “Center yourself” means:
Yogis tell us that too much Moon energy (Feminine, Yin, Ida, breathing through Left Nostril) can make us depressed, while too much Sun energy (Masculine, Yang, Pingala, breathing through the Right Nostril) can make us manic — like a pendulum swinging uncontrollably from one extreme to another. The modern psychiatric term for this is Bipolar disorder. Too much Moon will cripple us; too much Sun will make us self-destruct. But the proper balance of Sun and Moon will keep us healthy and functioning.
So this is “Centering” in a very physical sense. We don’t want to breathe only through…
