I was recently asked the following question:
Hello Bernie! I am in the search of a beautiful Yin Yoga sequence that will benefit my lymphatic system as well as my immune system! Do you have any recommendations! If you have the time I would greatly appreciate the help! Thank you so much! Suzanne
Hi Suzanne
As you no doubt know, the lymph system has several key functions, but the main one is usually described as returning the plasma of our blood back into the circulatory system. The word “lymph” is from the Latin “lymphaticus” which means “connected to water” and that is mostly what lymph fluid is. This water, however, has lots of good stuff in it, like white blood cells that is a major component of our immune system. We see here the connection between a healthy lymphatic system and our immune system; we could actually conceive of the lymphatic system as being part of our immune system.
There was one thread on this forum that briefly talks about yin yoga and the lymph system, and you may want to read the last two post there in particular. The advice was, when there is a risk of lymphedema, not to hold the poses too long. However, if you don’t suffer from swelling, then the longer holds of Yin Yoga may be quite delightful.
Yoga helps to move the lymph fluid in a number of ways: by compressing the tissues and by inverting the body. Imagine a wet sponge: when you squeeze it, the fluids move out of the “tissues” of the sponge. Twists and compressive forward folds can help achieve the same effect in our tissues. Seated twists while in Shoelace or Reclining Twists may be helpful as well as Caterpillar and Butterfly. While we do not do many inversions in Yin Yoga, outside of Snail Pose, which is not available for every body, there is a nice sequence of postures you can do using a wall. Check out this article on Wall Yin for some ideas. These positions can help encourage the lymph fluid to move back towards the heart.
If we consider the lymph system as part of the immune system, then practices that target our immune system are great too. You may want to simply adopt Ocean Breathing while you are doing the above postures due to its wonderful effect on the parasympathetic nervous system, which can enhance immune function.
But, don’t stick to only Yin Yoga: yang forms of yoga also are great to move the lymph fluid along. The movement doesn’t have to be vigorous: check out the Cloud Salutation and Moon Salutations in YinSights or even the Mini-Sun Salutation. If even those are too much, try the Pawanmuktasanas.
I hope this helps.
Cheers,
Bernie