Pranayama
by cleaves Sunday, Jan 16 2005, 5:04am
international / personal development / article

Various approaches to the movement of vital force are detailed in Indian Yoga texts. For the Southern Siddha tradition pranayama is the harmonising of the vital principle that courses through the ‘system.’

In order to understand the Siddha approach a simple experiment is performed. The student is asked to hold his/her breath indefinitely – which of course results in gasps of air after a relatively short period of time. The student is then asked to identify who (or what) is the ‘master’ of breath, as it is obviously not the individual. Students are periodically interrogated until they provide a satisfactory answer or further instruction is withheld.

This is an excellent sifting process as only those who are truly dedicated follow their breath until they discover that it actually is Spanda (or the universal pulse of creation) that ‘breathes.’ In a clever way the student is tricked into dharana, dhyana, samadhi. Pranayama is then appreciated as a process culminating in Jnana.

I leave you with a question, what is asana?


I pay homage to the Eternal Lord Siva. In him only is Yoga known.

Om namah Sivaya

Om Shanti
Om Shanti
Om Shanti