Aligning your heart.

On an inhale, lift your sternum (breastbone)and open your chest. This open-hearted posture is the one we take, when we are feeling very brave. It becomes part of our yoga, part of our meditation, part of our way of looking out at the world - or so we may aspire. This stance says I am making myself open to you. I am not shutting down. I am here to connect. Fill all of your chest - your entire rib cage - with breath and simply observe how it fills and empties this space.

Next step:

Begin to drop your chin towards your chest. At some point, the muscles at the back of your neck or somewhere down your back will stop you from getting any closer to your chest. Take a gentle hold of your lower ribs, where they come to meet the top of your abdomen, so that your hands are resting halfway on the ribs and halfway on the soft tissue of your abdomen. The lightest touch will register the most feedback. Now allow your chin to drop a little bit more - not by forcing more stretch from your neck/back muscles, but by allowing your lower ribs to sneak inward, just ever so slightly. You may notice some tone in your abdominal muscles switch on. It is subtle. And it's just good old, plain vanilla, postural tone - there to help us support our backs - to offer some core stability. Maintaining this slightly tucked position of the lower ribs, return your neck to an upright posture. Check in with your shoulders to see if they have moved forward and bring them back to center. Check in with your shoulder blades and draw them down the back if it feels necessary. And again, fill and empty all of this space with breath. Has anything changed?

Anatomically and perhaps emotionally aligned:

This fresh alignment creates ease and stability, once the surrounding muscles have adjusted their lengths to accommodate the new position (give them some time - they like their old habits). And it's a wake up call to our abdominal muscles, which I feel can be such an emotionally loaded area for many of us. We are either crunching our lower abs in an effort to look...how we think we should look, or we are practicing letting go, letting go, letting go of the ego that lives in our bellies. Both strategies have the potential to screw up our posture and cause dire consequences for our backs. But this simple act of opening the chest, while keeping some ribs for self, lets the abdominal muscles do their involuntary, postural job all on their own, removing our brains from them entirely. What a fricking relief!

What I like even more about this alignment is the metaphor it offers me for life. I open up to the world from a place that supports me. I take care of me to take care of you. For this I am grateful to my abdominal muscles!