Shyam23
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Nov 6, 2005, 12:44 AM
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The medical impacts of pranayama
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Pranayama as you know is heavily cautioned against in the ancient works on yoga. Hence, I share with you a detailed analysis of what happens to the mind from this practice.
I am writing a book about asana, pranayama and 'higher' practices and if anyone would like to share views and experiences of their own on the effects of these aspects of hatha yoga, I would be pleased. You can read about the effects of asana and meditation on other posts I have written on this site.
Effects of Pranayama Practice
Pranayama is well-known amongst all yoga students and teachers for involving the taming of a lion. This is what all teachers learn when they study to be yoga teachers. This is what is stated in the classic book "The Hatha Yoga Pradipika".
Obviously, the effects of pranayama are not identical to the effects for someone who does not know what they are doing and who tries to tame a lion.
What are these effects? Obviously, here, the ancient sage who wrote the classic book (sage Swatmarama) was not referring to possible beneficial effects. We can have a debate another time about possible beneficial (that is, secondary) effects of pranayama practice. Here in this article I focus on the primary effects, the effects that the sage was referring to.
Many students of yoga do what is called "elementary" pranayama practice, that is breath control of various kinds. Some also practice more forceful pranayamas.
What are the effects of the practice? Because the various gurus and swamis who teach yoga have read that pranayama is like taming a lion, they have tried to modify the advice given by sage Swatmarama. They have invented other pranayamas, which I call under the two categories "gentle" or "simple" practices. In this way, they hope that they and their students are only taming a little lion, for example a cub. Those of you who are aware of nature will know that a cub has a mother.
The gentle breathing practice: long exposure to a cub
with this type of practice, the yoga teacher or guru relaxes first. He keeps his brain still and only slightly modifies the length of the breath or the volume of the breath. Because the breathing practice is gentle, you can keep this up for a long time. The problem with this practice is that the smaller the adjustment, the bigger the strain on the brain. Try it yourself. Once. For short while, only. Make a short sharp exhalation and observe the state of your brain. Next, do a short but slow soft exhalation. Notice the much greater tension.
The simple method of taming a cub
You tease the cub. You meet him twice. Or three times. Of course gently. You interrupt your breath and because you are doing this in a slow quiet sensible fashion you are able to prolong your exposure to the cub. I'm not suggesting that you try this but it has exactly the same effect as the first practice: the gentle breathing practice. Your brain is strained.
There are different parts of the brain, as I discuss in my forthcoming book "Indian Philosophy and Religion". Analytical work as you usually do in an active day creates strain in the conscious part of your brain. This is what the conscious brain is built for. You go to sleep, it recovers, you wake up and you are fine. The locations of the different parts of the brain are different. Hence, when you do the above practice which I do not suggest you do, you will find that it is a different part of your brain that is strained during pranayama practice than doing your normal duties in life. This part is called the subconscious brain.
Natural breathing
Mostly, one breathes unconsciously. This means that God is in control of your breathing process. I discuss this also in the same book. Now, a process which is difficult for you is rather simple for God. He created lions. They are tame in front of Him. In my other book, "The 108 Heads of Lord Patanjali", I explain why it is that God created this particular lion for "yoga" teachers and gurus to tame.
Results of practice
So, what happens with repeated strain over an extended period to your subconscious brain? It is a little like playing any kind of sport (see my web site article on the subject). In tennis, you get tennis elbow. In football, you hurt the back of your right knee, assuming you are right-footed. Well, you may say, I can live with tennis elbow and so forth. And this of course is what happens with all people who practice pranayama: they live with a damaged subconscious brain.
What are the symptoms of this damage?
Before we look at this, let us explore the amount of damage being done. Actually, you do not damage your subconscious brain. You turn it off. The amount of time that it is turned off to recuperate from pranayama practice depends on how much practice you have done. The effects are cumulative. Pranayama practice is like taming a lion. The likelihood of the mother hurting you depends on how much time you spend with her cub. The amount of time each day that your subconscious brain needs to remain in a passive unconscious state depends on your cumulative practice of pranayama in your life.
For example, if you have been practicing pranayama for ten years at an average pace of 15 minutes per day, your subconscious brain has rest for about 30 percent of the day. If you have been practicing for 25 years, it needs rest for 70 percent of the day. For typical person, the balance of 30 percent is spent asleep. The following table gives you an indication of the timing of these effects for someone who practices for 15 minutes per day, on average. There is what is called in mathematics an exponential decay pattern, and it does not follow that the effects get much worse if for example you practice intensively for 50 years than if you only practice half heartedly for this period.
Years
Hours per day the subconscious brain is switched off 5 4 15 11 25 15
You may say, well, the ancient sage's analogy does not seem quite right. Taking rest is different from a likelihood of being mauled. We are coming to this.
So, what are the symptoms? Let us explain these with some progressive examples of what happens when your subconscious brain is switched off:
· You can understand simple things if they are painful.
· If someone says to you "you are a thief", you can understand what they say. It is a type of senility. It is as if they did not say it.
· You lose your ability, during this period to know right from wrong. If you kill someone, you do not know that it is wrong.
· You hurt yourself. It is therefore painful to you. We will come onto the definition of pain later. Let us to say for the sake of illustration that we will agree it is painful. You cannot understand it. You sit there or lie there in pain but do not do anything about it. Hurt could be mental or physical. Somebody may insult you will you may break a leg.
· Someone you do not love hurts themselves. Or, somebody whom you are not emotionally attached to hurts themselves. This is not painful. You may or may not help them, this depends on your previous behaviour set (in India, this is called samskara).
· Someone you love or someone you are attached to hurts themselves. This is painful to you. You can understand it. It has to go away. So you forget about it. If they ask you to help you do not listen. Or rather you do not understand. However simple the request, you cannot comply because it would be an admission that you are in pain.
· Someone you love or someone you are attached to hurts you. For example, he leaves you. Or she does not do what you want her to do. You are in pain. This is a contradiction in terms. You go mad. You will do anything to stop the pain. Well, I can set out what "anything" means but it means precisely what I say. But whatever you do to get the person back or to stop him existing or whatever, you have done nothing wrong.
· You cannot say "no" to a person with this condition during this period. This is painful to them. He has hurt you, physically, on a previous occasion when he tried to run away. He forgets. You then say on his next period of lack of subconscious activity, I am going to leave you and he will do anything at all that he can think of to stop you leaving him. This is the real definition of pain to your subconscious mind which is none other than your self. It is the word "no". The self before you have success in yoga, which is the surrender of your self to God, wants to think of itself and itself alone. It has the property of what is called in the Hindu sacred texts "asmita". This is what asmita means. Sanskrit was the root of all languages, as you know. The word "asmita" is the origin of the English word "smite". Unfortunately, the prefix "a" which means not was missed out when people in the world departed from following the language that God gave them, which is Sanskrit. The self does not like to be smitten. The purpose of yoga is to humble the self.
· During the period when your subconscious brain is reactivated, you do not know what you have done in the intervening period. If somebody says to you that you have done this you do not believe them. This is not in your character to do. It seems completely far-fetched. You know for absolute certain, for example, that you would not break somebody's leg.
This all seems rather extreme. It is. It takes many years for the effects of pranayama to build up, as I have discussed before. Also, it is not often that someone causes you pain. We live in an artificial world, where people calculate what they say before they say it. You do not often insult or criticize your guru or your teacher, irrespective of what you think. Therefore, you do not know how he or she will react if you do.
The best way to confirm for yourself if you still wish to practice pranayama is to find someone who practices pranayama, someone whom you will not meet again and who is not in a position to harm you. For example, he or she might be in a different country. You can then try the progressive means I set out above and see for yourself the result. Obviously, you need to be careful. Also, you should not break the ethical principles of yama, for example that of nonviolence.
Trying something out for yourself is not necessarily the best way, however. Sometimes, it is best to just believe what people say. You need to choose the people you trust carefully. The people you trust should be those who love you. A yoga teacher or guru chosen at random, just because somebody says he or she is a good teacher is not the best way to find people who will love you.
Sometimes also, it is best to think for yourself. If an ancient sage goes out of his way to mention that a practice is dangerous, as dangerous as taming a lion, you need to consider carefully what someone who is wounded will do to you and whether you will be hurt. If you are practicing yoga, hatha yoga, which is the yoga that sage Swatmarama set out in his Hatha Yoga Pradipika, then you need to decide whether or not you are going to follow his advice. You do not need my article, nor to know the results of my observations based on my many contacts with people who have practiced pranayama.
The Loving Heart Centre
www.lovingheartcentre.net
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