Guru Blog

NetI or Nasal Cleansing

Eka Pada Koundinyasana — Dear YogaFriends,

I’d like to share with you a practice which I have found very effective in warding off colds over the years. It’s called Neti which is a Kriya or cleansing practice. I learned this practise from books during my early years of yoga practice and have taught it to my students during my yoga holidays over the years. This I incorporate into my morning toilertry routine and only takes a few minutes to complete. So here we go with the instructions.

Neti
Proceed as follows.
1. Place a quarter of a teaspoonful of Sea Salt or Himalayan Salt into a beaker of warm water.
2. Stir it in until dissolved and exahale.
3. Taste the solution which should be mildly salty and luke warm.
4. Place your nostrils below the surface of the liquid, and as you inhale imagine you are drinking the liquid up through your nostrils and down the back of your throat into your mouth. Do not swallow the solution. Gargle and spit out the solution into the sink,
5. Repeat the process in the morning and after you return home in the evening.

Give it a go and let’s use these simple health practices to help keep us safe and well.

Blissful Heart,
Granville

Calm Abiding Meditation

Padmasana at Higher Pot Oven Farm

We sit comfortably, preferably in the Vajra Posture or crossed legged position on a suitable cushioned mat. We join our hands placing the right hand on top of the left hand with the tip of the thumbs lightly touching each other. We keep our belly relaxed, our spine straight with the crown of the head extending towards the sky. The chin is slightly lowered and our eyes can be partially open or closed. Our tongue is resting against the roof of the pallet and lightly touching the back of the top teeth. Take some time to rest your attention on the posture to see that you are correctly aligned. Then allow yourself to become aware of the body breathing as if observing it impersonally. After a while direct your attention to the very tip of your nostrils and feel the touching sensation, created by the passage of air, at this point. Allow your mind to rest there to the exclusion of anything else. If thoughts, feelings, smells sounds etc, arise in your consciousness, simply notice and return your attention to the touching sensation of the breath at the very tip of the nostrils. Continue in this way for a period of 5, 10, 15, 20 mins or more, until you can do this practice for as long as you wish. Practice on a daily basis preferably in the morning before you begin your daily activities. Once you become familiar with this practice, you will begin to realise that peace can be yours anytime and anyplace, you don’t need to be sitting on your cushion to experience this inner tranquility. We take this mind into our daily life in our interactions with people and circumstances. We understand that a distracted mind is not our natural condition. In fact a mind that can abide in it’s own naturalness, free from discursive thinking is more desirable, and once we are skilled in this method, becomes more and more the default condition of our own consciousness.

Namaste

Why We Do Yoga

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This is a very emotive title for this post. Do we ever really consider why we do what we do and are we aware of why this system of yoga was developed . Over the years I have seen many changes and developments and the direction yoga has taken. Is this how it was supposed to go…. I recently attended a showing of ‘Awake’, a documentary of the life of Paramhamsa Yogananda. He wrote a book about his life called Autobiography of a Yogi, a cult book of the 60s. What a powerful read. I remember being so inspired after reading this book that it had a profound effect on my future in yoga and my quest to find myself as a spiritual being in this world… and what a journey it has turned out to be.

I was reminded of the hours I spent in libraries and bookshops in search of the material that spoke of and recounted the lives of those exceptional ones who attained to those heights of spiritual awakening and a personal realisation of ones own divinity. Paramhamsa Yoganandya was such a person, and thorough his efforts help bring yoga to the west and oh boy look at what is happening now. He’s message was to follow the Eightfold Path of Ashtanga Yoga.

In brief the eight limbs, or steps to yoga, are as follows:

Yama : Universal morality
Niyama : Personal observances
Asanas : Body postures
Pranayama : Breathing exercises, and control of prana
Pratyahara : Control of the senses
Dharana : Concentration and cultivating inner perceptual awareness
Dhyana : Devotion, Meditation on the Divine
Samadhi : Union with the Divine

Each of these 8 steps brings us closer to an awareness of our true being. But this journey is not to be understood by intellectual study alone, but by the penetration of our understanding through the discipline and effort integral to yoga sadhana.

I ask you, is this how you practice…. do you think that your sadhana will bring you to the place of understanding of your true nature??

Namaste

Hot Yoga

We have heard allot about Hot Yoga and how it can heal and transform our bodies. Of course our muscles, tendons and joints respond in a favourable way to dynamic movements when they are sufficiently warmed up. But yoga practiced with our bodies at normal temperature still has these same benefits, but we just need to be more gentle with our approach. We are all familiar with how much more relaxed we feel when we are in a warm environment, and this has a very significant influence on how we experience our practice.

But are we not forgetting another very important element here, our minds?
For many years I felt an intensity to my practice, as if I was making some form of atonement for the negativities of my lives. This is no longer the case, but now more from an attitude of reverence and devotion. Through my meditation I have learned to be more patient and joyful in my practice, and like my teacher, Geshe Kelsang Gyatso often reminds us, ‘To practice with a peaceful and happy mind…’

I feel this to be more what Sadhana is – a method to cleanse our minds, and lead us into the purity of our own Hearts.

OneLove,
Granville X

Neti or Nasal Cleansing

Calm Abiding Meditation

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Back to the Land of My Forefathers Part 2

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