So we’ll begin today’s session keep your back and neck straight sit comfortably and when you feel ready very gently close your eyes let’s start observing our breath watch the natural flow of your breathing as you inhale and as you exhale now slowly shift your attention to your body become aware of your portion and see if you need to

make any changes in your posture adjust your body so that you are more relaxed your spine should be straight face neck and shoulder should be relaxed now very gently come back to your breathing and begin to deepen the breath going for slow long and deep inhalations slow long and deep exhalations allow your breath to

deepen relax the mind and prepare yourself for chanting om three times followed by the guru mantra so if you know the mantra you can chant along with me take a deep inhalation for om
Om………………………………..
Om………………………………..
Om………………………………..

GururBrahma GururVishnu GururDevo Maheshwaraha
Guru Saakshaat ParaBrahma Tasmai Sri Gurave Namaha
Tasmai Sri Gurave Namaha
Tasmai Sri Gurave Namaha

inhale deeply for om
Om………………………………..
Shanti Shanti Shanti’h

Feel the vibrations now join your palms together and begin to rub your palms together place your palms on your eyes very slowly while blinking and looking at the palms begin to open up your eyes coming back with a big smile on your face om shanti namaste

Let us begin our session for today so in last class we had covered certain general notes and then we had practiced thoracic breathing right or the chest breathing and today we are going to ah cover the remaining of the general notes and we are also going to get introduced to a new practice today so general notes are nothing but

things you have to take care of before you begin your pranayam practice and these will greatly vary the way in which you practice okay so last time we had covered a lot of points varying from the place of practice to the time of practice and when we can eat the food when we can uh you know bathe right ah so today continuing with that

only next topic of discussion that is very important for us is the diet okay so whenever you are practicing pranayama there is a shift that you have to make in your diet and we are going to talk a little bit about that so ideally when you start with yogic practices you should always try to in general life also but especially when you

are doing the week practices you should try to switch as much as is possible to a balanced diet okay in modern terms you can understand the change of diet as just coming more in alignment with a balanced diet where all your all the needs of your body are fulfilled so from carbohydrates to proteins to various vitamins and minerals

fats everything should be a part of your diet and you should not miss out on any of the minerals right so you have to make sure that you take sunlight also every day right so vitamin d is so important so like this you have to just make sure that you

know overall your body is getting the right amount of all the necessary things that it requires right now coming to yogic terms uh if you talk in new good terms you have to switch to uh you have to switch the diet to something called a sattvik diet s a t t v i c sattvik okay

Okay so yeah so we were talking about the diet so i was telling you in yogurt terms what kind of diet shift you make so now i’m addressing the quality of the diet okay so in philosophy i will cover this more deeply but general idea is a diet which is easy to digest which gives you energy right i told you in the beginning of the class also

everything has some form of pranic energy right so ah sattvik food has very high pranic energy right so when you consume that food the digestion the energy that it takes to digest that food it is very little and the energy that you gain out of that food is very high okay so the energy that is set off in digestion it’s very low so overall your

body gains energy right so that is the purpose of food also when we eat food we want to gain energy right so switching to that kind of diet which is easy to digest which is light in nature right and this kind of diet generally includes uh you know um things like fruits your vegetables that boiled vegetables right or very lightly cooked

right not too many spices just with the apt amount of uh things that you require to add in those vegetables vegetarian food overall is considered to be satwik in nature right and listen until you you know just mix a lot of spices in that also and change the quality generally vegetarian food comes under the category of sattvik food so again

i’m not asking you to change your diet whatever is feasible for you you guys can do that so that you gain the maximum out of your classes okay so next very important point of discussion when we talk of pranayama is the breathing okay the breathing

most people when they will sit in your class they might have their mouth open okay because you also say like in asana when you inhale through the nose exhale through the mouth your body gets relaxed very easily right quicker than just breathing through the nose right so a lot of people when you start to introduce pranayama

practices to them they might have their mouth still open right so you have to tell this in the beginning of your classes only all the breathing has to be done through the nose unless another wise you instruct them to breathe through the mouth okay so it is a by default assumption of pranayama that the breathing is going on through the

nose only right only in a few practices we take the help of the mouth to breathe and in those practices even i will tell you that you have to breathe through the mouth otherwise the basic assumption will always remain that you are breathing through the

nose at all times okay so every time you will not add this instruction that breathe through the nose it has to be clarified in the beginning only that breathing is going to go on in a certain way right

next very important point of discussion is the sequence okay so a lot of people make a mistake in the sequence also so these practices that we are currently doing these are you know pre-practices all right we are preparing for pranayama so these can be

introduced in the beginning of the classes but pranayama itself is not done before asan practice all right so means that when you start your class maybe you can ask your students to take a few deep breaths maybe you can ask your students to do some abdominal breathing some chest breathing but you cannot ask them to

practice a particular pranayama in the opening of the session you will give them a class where asan practice is there or if you have more time you can direct them towards the cleansing practices shut karma right then you take them towards the asan practice and after the practice of asana you make them practice pranayama at

the end of your session all right don’t make them practice pranayama in the beginning right pranayama requires some level of preparation beforehand right and that will come in the form of cleansing or posture practice okay so this sequence you should ideally follow when you are taking a class right ah next point which is again

very important is the sitting position okay so i will demonstrate a few positions in which you can sit while you are doing pranayama right and these are mostly meditative postures only so in your meditation class also you can use these postures

to sit and practice and these are considered to be one of the most ideal positions to practice pranayama right so let’s begin if you are unable to grasp something or you want me to check your position you can feel you can turn on your camera so feel free to do that right so first asana for us which is very very important it is sukhasana or

the way in which i am currently sitting already right so this the cross legged position where both of my feet are under my thighs right so cross left position i am currently sitting in a cross left position like this my legs are going like this like this however you are able to understand this is the easiest posture one who is you know unable to sit

in any advanced posture because of some kind of knee pain or any other issue for them this becomes a very important practice this is the best way to practice pranayama right so cross-legged position okay this is your first position again you only have to choose one you don’t have to do 10 you shouldn’t like it’s okay if you are

not able to do all of them right you just have to choose one and sit in that for a long period of time okay second one which is uh very easy to do is uh called swastikasana don’t go too much into the names just understand the posture okay so in this posture your target is to keep both your feet between your calf muscle and your thigh

ok both the feet should be placed between the calf muscle and the thigh ok so first is very easy to do suppose first one first my first foot i will be easily able to place right between my thigh and my calf muscle now i will fold this all right now when i fold this i have to take the other foot from below right and take it out from here from below

only i take out this foot and once i take out this foot from below that becomes swastika sun okay so i will show you one more time okay what you have to do is essentially you have to grab the first leg it could be any one right right or left

whichever one you prefer place it in between your thigh and calf muscle right so now when you begin to close the leg right so that the first foot is placed between the calf muscle and you have to bring the second foot from down so lift your knee up slightly

bring the foot from down okay like this your hand will go and then you can pull this out right not exactly out it should be placed between the thigh and the calf muscle right like the first foot is okay so this forms your second portion for sitting which is swastikasana right so if you like this if you are able to do this one it’s okay if you have

tight thigh muscles right probably you won’t be able to perform this and that is also completely fine we have too many options in store for us okay this is your second position right if you feel the need you can unmute yourself let me know where you want me to repeat okay or if you have missed out on anything i know i with pushers

i am going a little bit fast right but you need to know these are the basics these are the essentials for pranayama even for your meditation right next one which is very famous is the half lotus pose in half lotus what you do you basically have to place one foot on the root of the other thigh root meaning the junction point so where you

know my ah thigh here over here this is the junction point right so i place one foot over here and the second one i place it below my knee so you see when people do lotus pose this portion of the body it remains lifted up right so this needs some support so what you do the other foot you place it below the knee so that your knee

has good amount of support and you can sit for a longer period of time so this is your third pose this is very very good for people who cannot do full lotus and this is actually one of the i uh very close to one of the ideal positions for pranayama practice which is full lotus pose okay so like this you can sit you can place your

hands however you like you can place them palms facing upwards that is totally up to you ok this is our third posture so if you are able to do this you feel you are able to sit comfortably in this this is the posture for you okay if you have been practicing for a while you are an advanced practitioner already you can go for the full lotus pose

which is the ideal pushup for pranayama practices right so now what do you do you like the first foot you have placed it on the root of the other thigh the other leg you will cross it and you will get this up and above right so now both of my feet they are placed on the root of the opposite thigh this is your lotus pose okay so this becomes

your lotus pose again you can place your hands palms facing upwards on the knees you can gently close your eyes and this posture your body gets locked it is very difficult to sit with a hunched back in this posture your back generally remains straight only so this is a very very good posture if you are able to do this right just

coming to one last portion that you can do pranayama you can go for vajrasana right this is a very famous pose a lot of people sit in it after eating their food right so all you have to do is you have to sit on ah sorry sit between your heels okay so your knees are together from front in this position your palms are generally facing

downwards they are placed on the thighs right you roll your shoulders back okay your neck remains straight and you can gently close your eyes now you have to observe this thing that i am not sitting on my heels i am sitting i have opened up my heels and i have made space so that my buttocks can fit in between my ankles right

so ankle flexibility is a very important key here i will just turn around and show you this pusher from behind also so that you are not confused what i am talking about i could have gone for this this is not correct this is correct okay where i am sitting in between my heels right so ankle flexibility plays a major role in this so if you feel you

have any kind of ankle injury you have you know knee related issues then don’t go for this posture okay even lotus posture it will have good amount of pressure it will give good amount of pressure on your knees so in that case you can just simply sit in cross-left position now what about people who cannot sit on the ground who cannot

sit in a cross leg position for them first thing you can do is give them cushions you can shift their mat so that they can sit against the wall right initially even that helps to sit against the wall to keep a check on the that the spine is straight for someone who is absolutely unable to sit on the floor you can make them sit on a chair as well okay

so that becomes more comfortable for certain people and certain age groups right but the best position again for you is sitting on the ground either cross-legged or in lotus pose these are very very good positions and if you are planning to pursue yoga

if you are not doing it for any health related issues or anything like that just to become a teacher it will be better for you to start already start your practice of sitting on the ground right because eventually you will have to get used to it right

when you take your sessions ahead so this can become your beginning point for sitting practices so this is how these are the various setting postures the quality of the posture should be comfortable and stable these are two important qualities as long as you are able to sit comfortably and stably in either one of them that can become your pose all right if there are any doubts again let me know right

so i think i’ll cover the remaining of the points right um yeah so next point of discussion which is again very important and most people miss out on this is avoid strain okay so a lot of people what they do is they do pranayama and because pranayama is more

i would say it requires more level of attention to see where you have gone wrong most people are just practicing pranayama like that right and like asan if i stretch myself too much i will immediately get to know i will immediately get the pain right but with pranayama what is happening if i if suppose

i count for you guys right so you end up holding the breath somewhere more or it’s not your capacity you cannot inhale for that amount of time right so you end up straining your system you end up straining your lungs now lungs are very sensitive right so pranayama should always be done at the at the person space okay so that is

why um you should avoid counting when you are giving your classes okay because some students will have some level some students will have another level right so everybody has a different breathing pattern and we are also currently correcting our breathing pattern only right with these free practices so like that you might end up

pushing someone too much right beyond their limit which will harm their body right so just take care whenever you are introducing pranayama practices it is a part of your instruction that there should be no string right so you can brief them about this in the beginning only so that you don’t have to repeat this again and again in every class

but avoiding strain is a very big part of pranayama sometimes our own ego kicks in we want to hold the breath for a longer period of time you know we want to reach 10 seconds of retention 20 seconds of retention one minute of retention so what we do we harm our system and we push ourselves to hold the breath and pranayama is not

asking you to harm yourself or to push yourself pranayama is saying that practice so much that it becomes normal for you right 30 seconds retention it will become normal for you right but slowly and gradually practice it doesn’t say that on first day you have to be able to hold your breath for 20 seconds right no slow gradual movement

keeping your body and your breath and your capability in mind is the key to mastering any pranayama practice right so just keep this in check because people are practicing pranayama like anything but they are also harming themselves like anything because of the lack of this awareness right ah last point of discussion for us

is the side effects okay so suppose you are in hot temperature right now and suddenly you step out and it is cool right i have already talked of temperature so when you do this thing what happens your body gets a shock no that from too cold too warm you are going into too cold right so in that same way when you start doing

pranayama your body because it is not used to a way of breathing currently because the practices have such a cleansing impact already right it is their nature to cleanse right so the body can go ahead and show some symptoms to you right like you might experience some change in temperatures in the body sudden very sudden change in

temperatures or you might feel some itching you might feel some sweating right i am just naming a few of these symptoms that the body shows and it is only showing these symptoms because till now you were breathing in a certain way till now you were living your life in a certain way and suddenly you started the pranayama

practice and with the change in breathing the body also somewhere not in to extrema shock but body is also slowly going to adjust to the practices so initially it is very common if any of your students or even you show any symptoms in the body in the form of sweating itching sudden change in temperature it is absolutely all right as

soon as the body starts getting used to the practices of pranayama all of these symptoms will eventually subside right so ah if currently you face any symptoms you can definitely consult me but my ah suggestion will remain the same these symptoms will go away as you deepen your practices if they don’t go away that is

when you for now i am because i am teaching you pranayam you consult me right and when your students will come and they will consult you okay so if they remain for a prolonged period of time then it becomes a matter of concern otherwise these symptoms will show up for most of the people you will teach and that is absolutely

normal all right so ah if there are any questions related to any of the things we have discussed please feel free to write them down yeah i will begin with today’s concept because we are already running short on time and we have to practice also right so today we are learning a new breathing technique and it is called clavicular breathing

okay clavicular so ah your collar bones this is the region this breathing is connected to this is the third breath in the three part breathing all right so first is your abdominal then it is your chest and now we have reached the clavicular region right so now um generally clavicular breathing will not take place all right for you in your life most of

the times clavicular breathing does not take place clavicular breathing is associated with a very stressful kind of situation right so if you physically exert yourself too much right one is physical exertion right and because of that you switch to chest breathing but then when you go into intense of that also then your body starts breathing in this

manner where only the ah upper portion of the chest there is move the the movement is only over here in the upper portion of the chest so clavicular breathing eventually with practice we are only opening our chest capacity right but eventually clavicular breathing is completely removed all right right now because we are doing the training of the breath also we are doing the training of the posture also so we

require clavicular breathing but eventually you have to suspend it right so people generally who have respiratory disorders they generally go for clavicular breathing hence it is very good for you to introduce chest breathing and abdominal breathing to such patients like patients of asthma patients of bronchitis so these people you know

they are generally always falling short of breath and that is because they are only using the upper lobes of the lungs so in previous classes i have told you that lungs are divided overall in three lobes at least the right side so the upper lobes of the lungs they get oxygenated when we do clavicular breathing okay out of all the three

breathings this is the most stressful one right so abdominal breathing will require the least effort then thoracic breathing will require some more effort and clavicular breathing will require the most effort so when you take the breath in and you feel you have completed the breath right after that you make some more effort to take a little

bit air in right more air in and that is when you feel a rise in your collar bones right and eventually when you begin to open up your capacity you might even feel the rise in the shoulders a little bit a little bit strain in your neck right and it is only happening

because you are making the extra effort to breathe in a little bit more right and when you exhale the collar bones the neck shoulders the collar bones they go into a downward movement right so when you inhale again they expand when you exhale

they again go into relaxation right so clavicular breathing ah it can be like when you do clavicular breathing generally what happens is you are not even immediately able to begin with clavicular breathing right so it happens as a conjunction to the thoracic breathing only right so if i just ask you to do thoracic breathing you will be able to

keep a check on the outward and inward movement of the chest but collar clavicular breathing is not that easy to trace and in itself you its very rare for you to start this kind of breathing right so what we do we first expand the chest so we combine it with

thoracic breathing generally we feel the chest expand and once we feel the chest has expanded to the maximum level we breathe in a little bit more right and when we do that we feel the rise in the collar bones and then when you get go in the opposite

direction first the collarbone should relax and then your chest should relax okay so ideally this breathing is done by crossing the hands and placing them on the collar bones right so what i can do i can cross my hands like this keep them on my collar

bones right and then i’ll just give you a short demonstration okay so i cross my hands keep them on the collarbone sit straight you can also doing do this in a laying position okay as you inhale you begin to expand the chest okay

right so right now when i bri uh took a breath in it’s a very subtle movement that will take place initially okay so don’t worry if you are not able to feel it today okay or in the upcoming classes also clavicular breathing takes a while okay for you to even understand what the movement is what kind of movement is taking place so when

you inhale you feel the collar bones expand right so they there is a rise and when once you exhale you feel the collar bones relax this is a very subtle movement that takes place so you need good level of concentration when you are doing this practice

eventually again like i said this practice is suspended and even i would say that when you make your students practice this don’t make them practice too many rounds okay because this is quite straining right so we are just doing this in order to train the

breath to correct our breathing pattern right and after clavicular breathing always uh ask your students to practice a little bit of abdominal breathing again because that indeed is the best way to breathe right so switching back is very very important after you do clavicular breathing right which most people forget to do right so always

switch back to abdominal breathing after you introduce clavicular breathing as well so any questions doubts or queries around this around the practice or whatever we have discussed today any issues all right okay if you still feel you can definitely write your doubts down i will be happy to address them right

okay side effects of pranayama yes so sometimes when you start practicing pranayama what will happen maybe you feel some shivering in the body may maybe you feel sweating in the body you might also your body might also immediately

change the temperature right so you might experience the change in temperature in the body which is very immediate all right not slowly but immediate switch in temperature right so these become your side effects right initially they show up right

and then they go away but sometimes it will happen they will prolong in that case you have to consult your teacher in this case you have to consult me right and if like um

but they are not going to persist it’s just that the detoxification is taking place so it is showing up in the form in these forms itching sweating shivering right these things can happen and it’s totally normal or absolutely fine right

okay what are the two types of breathing two types of breathing which two types are you talking about there are three types of breathing so we have covered abdominal then in previous class we covered the thoracic and this time we are covering clavicular

which is done along with your chest breathing so when you begin to breathe first your chest will expand and then you will feel the collar bones rise and then when you exhale first the collar bones will relax and then your chest will also relax eventually these are the uh like for clavicular breathing we generally take the support of thoracic

breathing first feeling what’s the name again please which meaning yeah collar bones these are uh clavicular yes sorry sorry which one uh this wasn’t the one that i i didn’t understand which one okay clavicular clavicular here

awesome great so we will begin our practice for today you can lie down on your mats if you feel the need or you can sit comfortably back and neck should be straight right and once you settle yourself in the position right shavasana is keeping your legs apart hand should be away from the body palm should face upwards and spine

should be straight once you get into your position very gently close the eye and now begin to shift your attention to your breathing now slowly take a moment to check your body you should be relaxed you should be comfortable there should be stability

in your body now once you feel ready gently come back to your breathing and just take a few deep breaths feel your breath as it flows in and as it flows out and now prepare yourself for abdominal breathing so you can choose to place one hand on your abdomen or you can just be aware of it while your hands are on your knees

exhale fully contract your abdomen as you begin to inhale feel the abdomen rise and expand as you exhale contract your abdomen again and again going in the same process as you inhale your abdomen should rise exhale contract the abdomen try to deepen your breath after your next exhalation suspend your practice keeping the

back and neck straight simply observe how you feel after abdominal breathing see how much effort you put in when you were doing this practice keeping the back and neck straight if you’re lying down it’s good if you’re sitting up just make sure your spine remains straight we’re going to begin with the clavicular breathing only we are

going to combine thoracic or chest breathing and the clavicular breathing together so begin to first exhale fully and now you can cross your hands place them on the collar bones so you’ll have a good idea of your chest as well as you inhale feel the chest

rise and expand and just to fill in a little bit more air take the breath in and feel that rise in your collarbones as you exhale first your collarbone should relax and then relax your chest completely

continue the same cycle first expanding your chest and then feeling that rise reach the collar bones as you exhale go in the reverse order your main focus and attention should be on your collar bones you require good amount of awareness to feel the expansion and contraction and the upper lobes of the lungs take a few more breaths

in the same manner after your next exhalation suspend your practice if you are lying down you can relax your hands on the floor if you are sitting up relax your hands on your knees see what changes have come in how much effort it took you to take the breath when you used your chest and you use the upper lobes of the lungs keeping

your back in next straight we are going to go for a few rounds of abdominal breathing again exhale fully and then feel your abdomen rise as you begin to inhale as you exhale contract your abdomen just relax your breath as much as possible take some time to switch back to abdominal breathing after your next exhalation suspend your

practice come to the natural flow of your breathing keep your back in next straight if you are lying down very slowly and gently begin to move your body move your fingers move your toes take your time join your legs together and turn towards your left side make a cushion with your left hand place the right hand on the ground and

slowly begin to pick yourself up with the right hand come in any comfortable sitting posture if you were already sitting straighten up your back prepare yourself for closing the session we will chant one time followed by the shanti mantra take a deep inhalation for om

Om………………………………………………
sarve bhavantu sukhinaḥ
sarve santu nirāmayāḥ
sarve bhadrāṇi paśyantu mā kaścidduḥ khabhāgbhaveta।
oṃ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ śāntiḥ॥

Take a deep breath in for om
Om……………………………….
Shanti Shanti Shanti’h

Feel the vibrations join the palms together gently bow down just a sense of gratitude and respect begin to rub your palms together place your palms on your eyes very slowly while blinking and looking at your palms begin to open up your eyes coming back with a big smile on your face om shanti namaste to everyone.

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