What am I doing wrong?

Yoga Discussion General Yoga
#1

Hi! I am brand new to yoga (I’ve been doing it daily for about four months and plan to do it daily for the rest of my life–I love it!) and am really struggling with something.

When I sit up straight for sitting meditation, I get breathless. The straighter I sit, the worse it is. If I hunch over, I can breathe much better. What’s going on? I’m assuming that my body is so used to hunching that I’m just very tight, and that the muscles I use to sit up straight are very weak.

What can I do to strengthen myself so that I can sit up straight and, once there, breathe easily?

#2

Backbends.

Bhujangasana
Ustrasana
Setu Bandha
Urdhva Dhanurasana
Dhanurasana

Please modify these as necessary relative to your level of practice, experience, mobilty, strength, and alignment.

#3

It might be helpful for you to sit on a block at first. Have you tried this?

#4

For the student’s question about sitting up straight (in the last line of the post) proping under the sitting bones would surely be the way to go. I prefer the folded blanket of foam pad over the block though.

For the breathing issue; if the issue is with the intercostals and protraction of the shoulders then neither a blanket nor foam under the sitting bones would help. Restriction in the ability to move the ribs and thus inflate the lungs calls for either more pranayama or more backbends.

#5

Yes, that’s it exactly–a feeling that my ribs/lungs won’t expand. I am quite comfortable sitting on a small prop, but it’s the expansion of the lungs I"m struggling with. Thanks for your suggestions–I’ll try the backbends.