Thinking about checking out the pranayama sessions Tuesdays and Thursdays, 630-730am? Curious about whats in it for you and why make the investment of time, energy etc? Questioning the process makes for deeper inquiry, as does trying it on and seeing if it fits. I wholeheartedly suggest you come if interested at all. Yoga is an answer to a call from the spirit. You’ve heard it and heeded it before. And now there is a deeper call.
The asana/vinyasa process cultivates the field of body consciousness and awareness to expose the gates of the subtle and soft realm. Done with grace and with accessibility pranayama practice can reveal these hidden gages without words, just by doing it, for anyone inclined to take it on.
Pranayama is often functionally described or defined as breath control or regulation of breath. While both of these concepts are part of the process, its rare to have explained what the outcomes might be. Patanajajli makes a few statements about it later in chapter 2 of the Yoga Sutra. Worth a look for reference and worthy of a discussion on Fridays.
Who can really know but the doer/seer what this “control” really means, what the implications are… And who gives it the time it deserves for that knowledge to be revealed? I have my ideas and would love to share but its a subtle realm. Best saved for a special time and place.
Pre the insights of my personal experience, I will say the basic practice, the one learned and done, is one phase of a many layered process that can’t be defined simply as “breath control”. This is way to simplistic and denotes a type of wrangling. Theres no deep struggle in authentic pranayama. It’s not easy either.
Once the initial cultivation of the work has been established the “subtle” practice belongs within the yogin who takes it on, the one who takes the road that passes the beginning stages beyond the pop and the trivial. Is now the time to make this a priority? I think it is and thats why I am giving it the time and place to happen.
The exploration of pranayama brings to mind the image of the wave as a wave is one of the first exposures we encounter when we take on the practice of pranayama. There is the nascent stage of getting started, slow and steady, followed by a growing exploration and ultimately leading to a full expression of the form.
Then we do it again; and an entirely dimensionally hidden subtle wave is encountered. And then?
Come by check it out and sit with that developing wave, see it for what it is, how it is unfolding and what that can reveal.