| I'll look into tai chi as well. Why would there be any contradiction between tai chi and yoga? The way I look at it, a correct principle is a correct principle; all good practices must tend to converge on those same principles. I've never heard of a method of improving body awareness that says, "Keep your breathing shallow and your shoulders hunched."
I tend to think that the correct mindset for practicing one thing--total immersion in the present moment--is the correct mindset for practicing anything. I've observed a parallel between practicing scales to a metronome, and syncing my breaths with the movements of my body while doing yoga. In either situation, when past-thoughts or future-thoughts start to intrude on my consciousness, my rhythm becomes compromised. With yoga, there's a little hitch in my breathing, or I falter slightly in a movement; when playing scales to a metronome, I lose the beat, even if it's just by a hair's-breadth of a sixteenth note. (The old joke about losing your meditative state by being proud of yourself for attaining it seems to hold true for me.)
I've recently tried playing the bass as a kind of extension of yoga, using my breathing as the basis of my hand movements up and down the scales. I do yoga for maybe 15 minutes, then, without losing the slow rhythm of deep breathing, switch on the metronome, pick up the bass, and inhale up scales, exhale down scales. | 
