Cuing students in the asanas with a balanced attitude of vairagya (letting go) and abhyasa (persevering practice) helps ensure that students feel supported in their practice while feeling free of attainment-related expectation. By conveying this attitude through every aspect of one’s teaching, including in offering and giving tactile cues, students more naturally find their way to their inner teacher, utilizing the intensity of physical sensation and the barometer of the breath to guide their effort in their personal practice. 

Indeed, an essential element of this balanced approach to sustainable and transformational yoga practice rests in the breath. Curiously, although the classical writings on Hatha yoga give primary emphasis to pranayama (from pra, “to bring forth,” an, “to breathe,” and a combination of ayama, “to expand,” and yama, “to control”), pranayama practice—basic yogic breathing—is typically given little attention in many contemporary yoga classes.  As with asana pract...