Friends, during Kundalini yoga, when we take long and slow breaths through pranayama, then a sense of witnessing the thoughts arises, which reduces stress. Inspired by this, we try to reduce our stress by taking long and slow breaths even in the midst of worldly affairs throughout the day. There are mainly three types of breaths. One is the breath from the stomach, which focuses the prana on the navel chakra. One is the breath from the chest, which strikes the prana on the anahata chakra. There is a very shallow breath, which puts the prana on the vishudhi chakra. You must have noticed that when you are emotionally hurt or active, the breath starts coming from the chest. When you eat and drink too much, the breath starts coming from the navel. This is yogic breath. That is why after a full meal of delicious food, there is great joy, especially if you are also traveling. Traveling increases the sense of witnessing. During a lot of talking, one feels suffocated because the breath is shallow and only up to the throat. That is why after talking a lot of nonsense, a person starts panting with long breaths. When we do chakra meditation, we breathe according to the chakra so that we can meditate properly on the chakra. By understanding this secret, we can control the action through breath during work. If we have spoken too much or have established too much emotional connection, then we start breathing from the stomach. This brings speech and emotion under control. If we start becoming too calm, stress-free and silent, then we start breathing from the chest. This creates a little tension, which is necessary in some amount to survive in worldly affairs and competition. Some breath rises above the chest and reaches the throat.
Breath from the chest rises to all the upper chakras, because while breathing from the chest the shoulders are raised upwards. That is why it is said that Prana remains above the navel. Apana remains below the navel. When we breathe from the stomach, some Prana seems to descend to Swadhisthana Chakra and Mooladhar Chakra. However, from there it again directly ascends to the Ajna Chakra and Sahasrar Chakra through the Sushumna. But it does give strength to the lower part of the body, which is the main work of Apana. Such things seem very complex on the surface. But if we understand them calmly and deeply, then everything is as simple as child’s play. This is the specialty of spiritualism. There is nothing complicated in this. You just need an open heart and a thoughtful and creative mind to understand. The other three main pranas are Vyana, Udana and Samana. These too will be understood gradually. There you go, we know about Samana Prana. It is considered to be the prana of the navel. By breathing on the navel, prana spreads evenly throughout the body, as we have mentioned above. Some part of it goes to Swadhisthana and Muladhara Chakra, which becomes Apana. It again ascends from there, and becomes Prana. A little part of it also ascends directly from the navel chakra. We will discuss the rest in the next post.
Demystifying Kundalini 