Continual Access to Practice and Education™
Continual Access to Practice and Education™ is an innovative initiative launched by Intent Consultancies Canada, Niagara Falls and Celebrate Wellness, St. Catharines to augment and expand on your own experiences of The ReikiTECH Workshop Series, The Lifetoolz™ Seminar and personal consultations with Cyrus and Barbara. C.A.P.E.™ offers graduates and others a space where personal support, additional training and regular practice in different techniques are made available regularly.
Complete Yogi Breathing
Volumes could be written about the therapeutic effects of complete Yogi breathing. Through the lungs and circulation of the blood, it fills the whole body with fresh oxygen and prana. It would be pointless to list all of our organs, from the brain right down to the toes, and explain in detail how and why each is strengthened, rejuvenated and toned up through this exercise. There is not a single part of the body, not even the smallest, which is not benefitted by this breathing. The salutary effect even reaches our mind, in that our entire being is filled with new strength. The mind gains peace, self-confidence and assurance. The Yogi breathing eliminates the impurities from our blood, increases our resistance, stimulates the metabolism and has a particularly great regenerating effect on the endocrine glands. This rejuvenates the entire organism. It is a frequent occurrence in Yoga schools that pupils who are no longer among the youngest, after exercising one or two months, joyously report the disappearance of certain symptoms such as recession of the gums, incipient hypermetropia, etc., which they had regarded as signs of old age and which they had not mentioned previously because they did not expect any improvement.
In India as well as at several university clinics in Europe, reputable physicians are experimenting with the rhythmic full breathing of Yogi. In all fields of research they have achieved amazing results, particularly in cases of high blood pressure and heart disorders. The physicians in charge of these experiments have been astounded at the results attained. In numerous cases of heart disorders which had been regarded as incurable, a complete cure was achieved; in other cases when complete healing did not take place, there was at least a permanent improvement. Merely through Yogi breathing, diseased and enlarged hearts returned to approximately their original shape.
I most cases, heart trouble is merely the result of functional disturbances of other organs, most often the thyroid and the kidneys. There are excellent medicaments for the heart-digitalis, for example. While it is true that such medicines affect the heart, they do not cure the cause of the disturbance. Complete Yogi breathing applied in connection with appropriate mental treatment and body postures heals the organic disturbances which have caused the heart trouble, and as a result, the heart also returns to health. Consequently, the effect of complete Yogi breathing surpasses that of any remedy which only treats the heart, even though the medicament may be one of the best there is. Specialization has caused medical science to be divided up, and therapeutics has become only an art of treating the symptoms. People forget that the human body is an indivisible unit, so that an insignificant little gland is often responsible for a disorder appearing in a remote part of the body.
If we have a disorder in the gall, the lungs or another organ, every part of our body, from the brain to the last pigment cell in the skin, is changed, i.e., different from the same organ in a healthy person. There is no such thing as a disease of just one organ: it is possible, however, for a general condition of disease to culminate in one organ. Thus the whole human being is sick, not just one part of his body. I was surprised for example, to find that a patient being treated for high blood pressure and suffering from a neglected case of flat feet. As a result, the static loads on his entire skeleton were so badly disturbed that the nerves emanating from his spine became disordered and his heart, completely unable to cope with the excessive burden caused by the improper distribution of weight, also became affected.
This caused high blood pressure and degeneration of the heart. Yoga exercises restored the ankle bones to their proper position. The skeleton again carried the weight of the body in the normal manner, the dissipation of energy ceased, the backbone returned to its normal position, the nerves recovered, the blood pressure declined, and the heart, now freed from its excessive burden, quickly returned to normal.
I could cite innumerable similar cases of so-called 'miraculous' healing produced by Hatha Yoga. Actually, however, these are not miraculous, but quite natural. Hatha Yoga does not heal with chemicals, but with the forces of nature. Nature is universal, synthetic, and man is a child of nature who cannot be divided, and specialized to pieces.
One who thinks logically can now clearly understand the following: if Yoga exercises, and first of all Yogi breathing, have such a great healing power, how much more effect they must have on a person who has a healthy mind and a healthy body, and always breathes in the Yogi manner! Certainly such a person is thoroughly healthy. He is immune to all disease; he can cope with all life's difficulties and be a blessing for himself and his surroundings!
Complete Yogi breathing is the basis of all further exercises in the regulation of breath. The exercises in the following pages are only extensions and variations in this method of breathing. The beneficial effect of complete Yogi breathing is inestimable. Actually it should not be merely an exercise which we perform only at certain times, but rather our constant method and manner of breathing. It has no disadvantage, only advantages, and is therefore equally beneficial for those who are healthy and those who are sick. It should be used constantly by both. Once we get accustomed to breathing in this way, we acquire a deep-seated peace of mind and such perfect self-discipline that nothing can make us lose control of ourselves.
Execution - Standing, sitting or lying. By means of our consciousness we animate our entire trunk always following the wave-like movement of our inhalation and exhalation. In this way we experience complete equilibrium. After exhaling, we slowly breathe in through the nose, counting up to eight, and combining lower, middle and upper breathing in a wave-like movement (Puraka). First, we expand our abdomen, then our ribs, and finally we raise the collar bone. At this point our abdominal wall is already drawing in slightly and we begin the exhalation (Rechaka) in the same manner as the inhalation, that is, by first drawing in the abdominal wall, then contracting the ribs, and finally lowering the shoulders, while we let the air out through the nose. In complete Yogi breathing, the entire breathing mechanism i.e. the lower, middle and upper lobes of the lungs are in uniform movement. Between the inhalation and the exhalation we can retain our breath for as long as is comfortable.
Therapeutic effect - We experience a great feeling of peace. This exercise completely airs the lungs, increases the oxygen and prana supply in the blood, sets up a equilibrium between the positive and negative currents, calms the entire nervous system, regulates and slows the activity of the heart, reduces high blood pressure, and stimulates digestion.
Psychic effect - The calming of the nervous system affects our mental condition. We are filled with a feeling of peace, quiet and security.
The above is an excerpt from the book 'Yoga and Health' by Selvarajan Yesudian and Elizabeth Haich. Published in 1953 by Harper & Brothers, New York.
