How Yoga Hand Mudras Work - a podcast by Dr. Melissa West

Hand Mudras

One of the things I hear from my students almost everyday is frustration over not being able to continue with their physical yoga poses for various reasons. Maybe they are confined to their beds recovering from surgery or healing from illness. Maybe they have an injury. Maybe they are travelling and they do not have enough space to practice yoga.This frustration always leaves me feeling frustrated too because the practice of yoga is so vast and not simply limited t o the physical yoga postures. postures. Yoga mudras which are a gesture or a mystical position of your hands that lead to the states of consciousness that they symbolize. Yoga mudras are an example of yoga that is always available to you anytime, anywhere, even if you do not have the strength to practice physical yoga postures.

Today we are talking about How Mudras work - those gestures or mystical positions of your hands - actually work.Mudras engage certain areas of your brain and can exercise an influence on them. When you bend, cross, extend, and touch your fingers with other fingers the mudras you form engage and influence your body, mind, emotions, energy and spirit.

The effect of the mudra may be felt immediately, but it may also take several days of practice. For chronic complaints it can take several days, even weeks or months to experience changes.I am going to do some cool demonstrations with you in this video to show you how mudras can change your breathing, but before I show you how mudras work with your breath I wanted to share with you something that I am super excited about. Right now in our community I have been putting together short mudra classes around specific themes.

The most recent one that I filmed for our members is a short mudra class for letting go. It helps to release the emotional and energetic knots in our brain, communication and heart to prepare us to let go. There are mudras to help us to empty out to prepare to receive. There are mudras that help to release negative energy and toxicity. All of the mudras in this series support you in your journey of letting go.I also filmed a short mudra series for our members to practice at the end of their yoga practice or the end of their day to integrate their practice, to find the clarity, discernment and inner wisdom to take into their daily life.

I will leave the direct link for members and a link to become a member: Click HereClick Here to receive a PDF download of the most highly requested mudras including:
Mudras for high blood pressure, mudras for sleep, mudras for constipation, mudras for headaches, mudras for type 2 diabetes, mudras for back pain, mudras for eyesight go to and we will send that right to your inboxSo let's do an experiment together right now. Run your thumb along your finger tips in a gentle and conscious way. It is refreshing for your breath and there is a positive influence on your brain waves when your fingers touch. Many mudras synchronize your right and left hemispheres of your brain improving your memory, ability to recollect and creativity.

There is a direct relationship between your hands and your neck since the nerve paths run through the vertibral formina in the arms, hands and fingers. Flexibility in the hands affects flexibility in the neck. Hand exercises relieve neck tension.Spreading the 10 fingers creates a reflex that causes the chest vertebrae to spread out. This increases the volume of air you can take into your lungs. Try this spread your fingers wide and breathe in. Make your hands into a fist and breathe in. Feel the difference?

So to reiterate, how do mudras work? The ends of the nerve pathways of the hands occupy a large area in the brain, much larger than the arms and legs. When we focus on our fingers and what they are resting in, they activate large areas of the brain.

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