When I first started practicing yoga nearly 15 years ago I don’t think my teacher even mentioned breathing, and if they did, I was too busy trying to pretzel myself into the next pose (that I wasn’t quite ready for), to hear it. I had no idea that yoga poses (asana) were only 1/8th of what I needed to be doing, and I certainly didn’t view yoga as a spiritual practice. It was all flexibility, strength, balance and toning – no different from a spin class or body pump class, and certainly no more influential in my life outside of the gym.