Part One - Chaotic Breathing:

our body happen due to the survival instinct. We are living due to our very desire to live. Our very breathing happens due to the desire to live. We might not have observed but our quality of breathing changes depending on your state of mind. Our emotions have an impact on the breathing process. When we are in anxiety our breathing changes, when we are angry our breathing changes and if we are aroused sexually our breathing changes. When we are in love there is a qualitative change in our breathing. Our breathing is directly related to our emotions and it continuously changes as and when the state of the mind changes. When we are in tension the normal advice given is to take a deep breath. The moment we take a deep breath we feel light, more relaxed and the tension releases. Mind and breath are closely inter-related. We can see that when we stop breathing, it becomes very difficult to think. Breath becomes the fuel for the mind. Actually in Sanskrit we use the word Prana. Prana does not directly mean breath. It means the energy that flows through breath. That energy itself is the life force.

The pranamaya kosha or the breath sheath is the where all of our desire memories are stored. Depending on our desires, our prana, the breath gets modulated. Our breathing and our desires are tightly coupled. It can be observed that when we have too many desires we breathe very fast and heavily. When we have few desires, we breathe in a more relaxed way. As the breath and the mind are inter-related, changing one automatically changes the other. We have already discussed how our emotions affect the breathing pattern. Likewise, if we were to control our breathing or bring about some change in our breathing pattern it will directly have an impact on our emotions; our state of mind.

All of our memories are stored in our muscles. THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM strongly believes that if some part of our body is amputated, we would eventually lose the memory related to that part of the body. We can do this small experiment. We can try remembering some past incident in our life without remembering our form. It is impossible. Our form is necessary for us to remember any incident in our life because all of our memories are stored in our form.

We have suppressed many emotions in our being and as a result we are not able to breathe normally. We always breathe shallow. When we breathe shallow, we never release these suppressed emotions and memories that are stored in our muscles. The breathing never touches each and every part of the body. We always breathe in a fixed pattern. Our past samskaras, our past memories which are suppressed in our Being create a particular type of breathing pattern in our system. And as a result we attract similar emotions and samskaras. Anything within our system has a survival instinct. So anything that is suppressed in our system creates favorable circumstances for it to stay and grow inside our system. If we have

suppressed anger in our system, it will keep surfacing itself and create a breathing pattern for its survival. This is a vicious cycle. Our breathing is nothing but a cumulative effect of the past samskaras.

Nithya Dhyaan begins with chaotic breathing. We have to breathe as deeply as possible and as chaotically as possible. Our entire being should become the breathing. Understand that the breathing has to be deep. The chaotic breathing should not be shallow. The deep chaotic breathing will start releasing the tension in our muscles and body parts and will start releasing the engraved memories. Normally our muscles are always under stress. Chaotic breathing will loosen the muscles and start clearing the samskaras.

Each emotion within us gives rise to a particular breathing pattern. If you observe children, they breathe deeply and blissfully. They don't breathe shallow. But as they grow, they get conditioned by the society, by their pains, pleasures, guilt's, beliefs, stress and other emotions and the quality of the breathing totally changes. Now if we have to shake this pattern; something that has been created due to the emotions suppressed in our system for so many years, we have to insert chaos and we have to create turmoil. Inserting another pattern is not the solution. We have to create utter chaos in our system to dig out all the past impressions. THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM does not recommend any rhythmic breathing pattern like pranayama in this meditation, just chaotic

breathing.

This chaotic breathing will destroy all of our past samskaras. It is like shaking a tree with dead leaves; all the dead leaves will fall down. Similarly, chaotic breathing is like shaking our suppressed system. All the past engraved memories will be released.

Deep chaotic breathing will also infuse tremendous oxygen and release carbon dioxide from the body. It creates hyperventilation as a result we will feel more vibrant and fresh. Through the increased intake of oxygen in the blood, automatically all the body parts become alive and that creates more bio-energy in the body cells. Normally we always feel ourselves as heavy dead mass and that is because our body is never alive. It is always under stress and tension and something that is tense can never be alive. If the body is made alive with increased flow of oxygen, we will start feeling light, then we will start experiencing ourselves as energy rather than matter. We feel heavy because of the engraved memories.

In fact, in some Buddhist monasteries they use this as a technique to ordain people as monks in the monastery. After you are done with your spiritual disciplines, you are made to walk on grass. If you make a path (grass below your feet dies), then you are not initiated as a monk and more spiritual discipline is prescribed. A person with less samskaras will never make a path on the grass when he walks because he always feels light within his system. The burden of engraved memories is less. With

In the second step, stay seated in vajrasana, form chin mudra with your fingers and place your hands on your knees. Chin mudra is the hand gesture where you touch the tip of the thumb with the tip of the index finger. The other three fingers remain unfolded. The chin mudra helps to maintain a balance in the energy flow in the body and keeps the energy within the body by creating a circuit. It prevents the energy from being dissipated out of the body.

In this posture, we should produce a humming sound as intensely as possible, as loudly as possible and as lengthily as possible. We should put our complete awareness on the humming. We should become the humming.

Humming reduces our inner chatter. Continuously there is talking going on within our minds. We may not be talking to anybody external but internally there is always something that is going on. Humming is an excellent technique to reduce this inner chatter. Normally people find it very difficult to sit without thoughts.

When we suddenly venture into meditation in our middle age, the first thing we would notice is resistance from the mind. Mind will revolt because it does not want to sit silently. When it has been habituated to run for so many years and suddenly it is made to sit silent, obviously it will revolt. In fact people often complain that in an attempt to be thoughtless, they encounter more thoughts. Mind is not accustomed to be silent for so many years and any initial attempt to make it silent is like swimming opposite to the river current; obviously the river is going to protest. This is the time when most people simply give up drop meditation because they become discouraged. They think that meditation is not possible at all for them. However, THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM says that this is the experience of all the seekers initially. At first we have to make the effort and this very effort is what THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM defines as tapas (austerity). If we feel discouraged by the initial resistance, then we can never succeed.

THE NITHYA YOGA PRACTICE