Tibetan Yoga for Health & Well-Being: The Science and Practice of Healing Your Body, Energy, and Mind

What Is Tibetan Yoga?Yoga is a global phenomenon that is practiced today in a variety of places, from gyms, to yoga studios, to temples, to many Western homes. For the most part, these are mind-body practices that have their origin in India, some emphasizing body posture (asana), others breathing practices (pranayama), and still others mind or meditation practices. In the practice of these Indian-based yogas, the practitioner brings the body into a specific posture, allowing the breath to flow and the mind to settle.In the mind-body practices that originated in China, usually called Qigong and T’ai Chi, the practitioner learns to move the body in sync with the breath-energy (qi) and the mind settles into that flow.The Tibetan yogas, Tsa lung and Trul khor (magical movements of breath and channels), are distinctive mind-energy-body practices where the practitioner brings their mind and breath together and, while holding them still, moves the body in a particular way to direct that breath-energy in five distinct ways, then exhales and settles their mind in a radical sense of full awareness. The special quality of awareness arising from these mind—breath-energy—body movements is why they are called magical movements.Written texts describing these magical movements trace back to the 10th century, but they reportedly were transmitted orally long before that.Trul, which is usually translated as “magic” or “magical,” can also take on the meaning of “machine” or “mechanics.” Khor means “wheel,” but also “circular movement” or just “movement.” Therefore, Trul khor can be translated as “magical movement(s)” or “magical wheel,” and sometimes “spinning the machinery with wheels or chakras.” Khenpo Tenpa Yungdrung, current abbot of Triten Norbutse Monastery in Nepal, says that trul in the Tibetan yoga context refers to the magic of “the unusual effects that these movements produce in the experience of the practitioner.”Not Just Mind-Body, but Mind–Breath-Energy–BodyAlthough mainstream Western medicine has not totally recognized or embraced the connection between physical illness and energetic or mental obstacles, there are new paradigms in the emerging field of complementary and integrative medicine (CIM) that do acknowledge it and are more akin to and congruent with Asian systems. In fact, beginning in the 1930s and flourishing especially from the 1970s onward, “more than a thousand studies of meditation have been reported in English-language journals, books, and graduate theses.”Over the last decade and a half I have engaged in researching the possible practical and physical applications of these Tibetan mind-body techniques in a Western medical setting. In particular, I have focused on the potential benefits of Tibetan yoga as part of CIM treatments for cancer patients.When I met Lorenzo Cohen, Ph.D., then a behavioral researcher at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston and now director of their Integrative Medicine Program, in 2000, he asked me to design a Tibetan yoga intervention for cancer patients. We formed a team and began conducting randomized, controlled clinical trials to determine the feasibility, acceptability, and initial efficacy of these practices. Our findings have been published in various journals.In Tibetan Buddhist and Bon teachings, one’s physical body, breath, and mind are known as the three doors through which one practices and realizes enlightenment. Within the speech or energy realm, a subtle energy body emerges metaphorically and, for some, in actuality. In Tibetan, this “subtle body” is composed of channels (tsa) that help guide the breath-energy (lung—pronounced loong—called prana in the Indian yogas and qi in Chinese mind-body practices). This subtle body provides the landscape where the mind and the physical body connect with each other through the five breath-energies.As you will learn in Chapters 1 and 2, in the Tibetan yoga practices, you become familiar with the channels first through visualization and then by using your mind to direct the breath along those channels as you familiarize yourself with each kind of breath-energy. In this way, you guide your breath-energy through your channels more evenly in terms of the rhythm of the inhalation and exhalation and seek greater balance in the amount and strength of the breath.A well-known ancient Tibetan metaphor describes the mind riding on the breath-energy like a rider upon a horse, with the two traveling together through the pathways of the channels. So, as the breath-energy circulating through the channels becomes more balanced, the channels become increasingly flexible, allowing the breath-energy to find its own comfortably smooth rhythm.When the breath rhythm is smooth, like a wave, the mind has a smoother ride, which reduces the tendency to become agitated. With the help of movements that guide the mind and the five kinds of breath-energies into different areas of the body and energy centers, or chakras, the practice brings the possibility of healing or harmonizing body, breath-energy, and mind—which we can call the body–breath-energy–mind system. This is a goal of yogic practices, and also a model of good health that is in line with the concept of health or well-being in Tibetan medicine.Tibetan Yoga and Tibetan Medicine: Bringing Health through Balancing the Five Elements and Our Five Breath-Energies (Lung)Tibetan medical texts explain the “science of healing” (sowa rigpa), or Tibetan medicine, in terms of the balancing of one’s internal constitution defined by the three medical “humors”—wind, bile, and phlegm—and the five elements—earth, water, fire, air, and space. Health is not solely the concern with regard to physical illness or disease. Instead, the harmony of the body, breath-energy, and mind system is most important.Among the three humors, the “wind” humor, lung in Tibetan, is described as having five distinct kinds of breath-energies, for which the important Bon text Mother Tantra, describes as a set of five channel-breath (tsa lung) yogic movements. Each movement is explained in terms of those same five breath-energies described in the Tibetan medical system and is correlated with the five elements. This is equivalent to the five pranas or vayus in the Indian medical system of ayurveda.The Tibetan Yoga of Instructions of the A also follows the five-lung or breath-energy system, its relationships to the elements, and how it can balance your body, breath-energy, and mind. In fact, these five breath-energies are the five vital breath principles at the foundation of Tibetan yoga for health and well-being.After I had been facilitating a Tibetan meditation class for a year at the Place of Wellness (now called the Integrative Medicine Center) at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, Dr. Lorenzo Cohen asked me to propose a research “intervention” based on the Tibetan mind-body practices. I wanted to make sure it addressed the whole person and was true to the Tibetan mind-body healing practices. After asking for the approval and support of my Tibetan teachers in using these practices, I joined a research team led by Dr. Cohen with the aim of investigating the possible benefits of a Tibetan mind-body intervention in people with cancer.This first Tibetan mind-body intervention centered on the five breath-energy and channel (Tsa lung) mind-body practices, which emphasize the five breath-energies and the five elements, and Trul khor yogic movements, which work with the whole body–breath-energy–mind continuum.We had an opportunity to present this Tibetan yoga intervention for people with cancer in 1998 at the First International Congress on Tibetan Medicine, in Washington, D.C. It was the first time that Lorenzo Cohen and Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche met in person. As the three of us were discussing the development of our study and how to look into the future, Lorenzo asked Rinpoche what change in participating patients he would consider most important. Without hesitation, Rinpoche said, “Openheartedness.”As you practice this yoga with awareness, breath-energy, and movements, you will notice that you will become more centered. This centeredness can be felt in the central channel and in the chakras, particularly in the main chakra—the heart—and you, too, can experience this openheartedness.Healing, Mystical, or Magical?The Tibetan yoga texts state that through your practice, you balance your elements, making the whole body function like a well-oiled machine. With your body a cleansed receptacle and functioning well, the mind’s awareness gains lucidity that is expressed throughout the body, energy, and mind. It is in this way that these movements are magical, says Khenpo Tenpa Yungdrung, abbot of Triten Norbutse Monastery in Kathmandu, Nepal, and of the Shenten Dargye Ling center in France. In other words, these Tibetan yogic practices can be understood as movements that manipulate the body, breath, and mind, which can lead to internal or even mystical experiences and the development of a radical awareness of one’s own natural state of being by stripping away the layers of obstacles of body, energy, and mind. This is what is sometimes known as a spiritual transformation, and it may be similar to what the famous Chinese philosopher and mystic Lao-tzu expressed:Bodily shifts, however multiple or spectacular, are but incidental to the internal transformation experienced. It is internal transformation at the deepest level that becomes the most sought after religious experience.The Instructions of the A, in fact, means instructions for rediscovering or reconnecting to your natural or primordial state of mind, which is calm, open, and luminous.In 2007, Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche asked me to help condense the Tibetan Yoga of Instructions of the A with two geshes, Tenzin Yangton and Tenzin Yeshe, during the Ligmincha Institute’s Annual Summer Retreat in Virginia. During the three-week retreat, we met daily to condense the 40 movements of the original text into what is in this book. Sometimes I call them the Ligmincha A-tri Trul khor, or simply the Ligmincha 16, since there are 16 movements—one foundational and 15 principal. The principal movements are subdivided into the 5 breath-energies, with 3 movements for each of the 5, for a total of 15.As you practice the magical movements of Tibetan yoga, you can reproduce or alter your experiences by guiding your breath-energy, enabling you to connect with your natural state of mind, or what I like to call your “inner home,” represented by the crystal-clear A. In Tibetan, the syllable A, represents one’s calm, open, and luminous state of mind. And many times it is white or crystal clear, illustrating that open and luminous aspect. Using this Tibetan yoga, you can generate specific experiences and be an active participant in your own healing and your life.