Getting Closer to the 5 Elements of Yoga

January 26, 2023

Based on the teachings of Ayurveda, the universe is made up of five great elements: air, water, fire, earth, and space. These elements offer their own qualities to our living experience and are the basis for our connection to the things around us.

These five components are part of our daily lives and are poured into everything we do. Including the practice of yoga. Yoga is a practice that travels out of a thought, feeling, or intention to a movement in the body and returns back to enlightenment.

The five elements move just like this and are the basic ingredients that combine together, creating our minds, bodies, and experience in living. Let’s explore each of these elements to respect our connection with everything, and return back to our inner selves.

Air

This element involves lightness, movement, and expansion. The element of air gives you rhythm, grace, mobility, and an open mind. Infusing this element with yoga creates a focus on breathing. Breath control, or Pranayama, lets you open and touch your senses, leading a path of ideas, inspiration, and energy toward you.

Water

Representing fluidity, adaptability, and connection. It injects our practice with compassion and resilience that gives us fluid movement, steady joints, and an agile mind. Bringing water to your yoga invites softness to your sessions and transfers fluidity through your practice.

Fire

The fire element summons intensity and abundance along with discipline and inspiration. Lighting fire in your yoga will engage the bandhas with the core muscles and fires us up with a burning passion.

Earth

Earth is about being centered and is the expression of everything you do. Connecting this element to your yoga will boost support in your foundation (sitting bones, feet, hands). It focuses on maintaining awareness of how these positions and physical landmarks affect your experience in practice.

Space

It’s what holds everything up. Full of possibilities and potential. The space element in yoga consists of being present as well as bringing awareness to what you are sticking with; whether that’s an emotion or thought or tension that you need to let go of.

We naturally relate to one element more easily than others. In our yoga practice, we want to explore a balance of the elements to bring harmony to our life. Which element do you connect with more in your practice?  Join a class at Uptown Yoga Dallas and experience the healing properties of bringing the elements into balance.