Yoga Nidra
Yoga nidra is not what you think. It was created by Swami Satyananda Saraswati in the 1960s as a result of his being able to remember chants that he did not recall being exposed to. It turns out that he was exposed to them while he slept and young boys chanted them at a monastery in India where he was stationed. Ancient yogis, indeed Patanjali in the Yoga Sutras (1:38) make mention of reaching samadhi through contact with sleep and dreams. This is one piece of yoga nidra, which is often referred to as yogic sleep.
Yoga nidra is not what you think. It was created by Swami Satyananda Saraswati in the 1960s as a result of his being able to remember chants that he did not recall being exposed to. It turns out that he was exposed to them while he slept and young boys chanted them at a monastery in India where he was stationed. Ancient yogis, indeed Patanjali in the Yoga Sutras (1:38) make mention of reaching samadhi through contact with sleep and dreams. This is one piece of yoga nidra, which is often referred to as yogic sleep.
Swami Satyananda Saraswati realized that sleep was not a state of total unconsciousness. “When one is asleep, there remains a state of potentiality, a form of awareness that is awake and fully alert to the outer situations. I found by training the mind, it is possible to utilize this state.” ( p. 3) In the yogic view of consciousness, humans primarily focus on the aspects of our experience and therefore brain that involve the ego. However, there are other states of awareness - the subconscious and unconscious mind - that are not organized through the ego, yet are part of us and our experience. Most people do not have awareness of, access to, or skills to work with this part of themselves. Yoga nidra is a system for working with all parts of our consciousness.
Yoga nidra is a method of pratyahara (p.29), the fifth of Patanjali’s eight limbs of yoga, withdrawal of the senses. Yoga nidra is done in savasana, with the eyes closed. It is important to have a teacher speaking the instructions to you or for you to be listening to the instructions via a recording. Yoga nidra requires the relaxation of the thinking mind. You can not think through the sequences yourself. You must listen to them. The first instruction is to focus your attention on external sounds, which in effect withdraws the other senses. The instruction is to move your attention from sound to sound with a witnessing attitude - do not analyze or think -- just witness the sounds. Soon, the mind grows tired of this and you drop into a deeper relaxation.
This is when one of the defining features of the yoga nidra practice takes place: the rotation of consciousness. Nyasa, a trantric practice, taught a very specific and quick rotation of one’s awareness through body parts and with a mantra for each body part. The idea was to instill divine consciousness in each body part as the mantra was chanted. The specific sequence is based on the motor or cortical homunculus, which is the somatotopic organization of the motor cortex in the brain. Each part of the brain is identified with motor or sensory input from a specific part of the body in a specific sequence. [see image] The image is a distorted view of the human body because it shows the order and intensity of the sensory processing that takes place in each space along the motor cortex.
By rotating your consciousness through a sequence which follows the motor cortex homunculus, you heighten your awareness of the body in order to stimulate the brain, which induces physical relaxation as well as clearing the nerve pathways from the brain to the body. Further to the deeper relaxation, a “dissociation of consciousness from the sensory and motor channels of experience occurs.” (p.38) This continues the practice of pratyahara, withdrawing the senses. The body is relaxed, the senses withdrawn. The key here is to remain aware -- not to drift into sleep, but to become deeply relaxed, with the senses withdrawn and completely conscious of your experience. This is where the mind training comes in. “When the mind dissociates itself from all the sensory channels, it becomes very powerful, but then it needs training. Unless involuntary systems of the brain have been trained, there is practically no difference between yoga nidra and sleep.” (p. 30)
From here, yoga nidra directs you to become aware of your breath, again another practice intended to bring you into a deeper state of relaxation. Then the practice instructs you to feel your body in contact with the ground and to feel it being very heavy. Yoga nidra always starts with heaviness, instructing you to feel the experience of heaviness and then feel its opposite, lightness. The practice flows through several sensory opposites and then turns to emotional opposites (love-hate; sadness-joy, etc). The instruction is to experience these opposites, one, then the other, then both at the same time - not to think about them, but to experience them. This is a kind of mind training, creating new neural pathways that allow you to hold the experience of opposites together witnessing that they can exist not as one or the other but both at the same time. This is referred to as training in the “transcendence of duality” (p. 42) which develops a mature personality, balanced outlook, and calm demeanor.
Then yoga nidra instructs you to experience a series of images, named by the teacher. The images are usually symbols of universal archetypes. “Words and concepts are the language of the conscious ‘intellectual’ mind. The subconscious mind has a language of its own based on symbols, colours, and sounds.” (p. 25) While learning yoga nidra, one often finds that when images are suggested by the teacher, other distracting images come up. These are from the unconscious, the ego and “they are often the root cause of tension.” (p. 46) By viewing this image in a detached way “as though one were merely watching a movie” the ego will become inactive during the practice and will no longer identify with the attachments, aversions, and inhibitions that produced the secondary images. This is a kind of purging which releases tension.
The primary purpose of yoga nidra is to release tension. Everything we do or don’t do outside our practice creates some kind of tension - mental, muscular, or emotional tension. We often think that relaxing is reclining in a chair or couch with some kind of drug -- coffee, tea, alcohol, nicotine, food -- and watching a screen or reading something. From the yogic perspective, this is merely sensory diversion (that creates more layers of tension) and not relaxation. “For absolute relaxation you must remain aware.” (p.1) Much of our suffering is caused by stress and stress related diseases because we have had no method and no training in real relaxation. Yoga nidra is the method for real relaxation. The final suggested image in the practice is one that induces the experience of calmness and peace.
There is one other critical component to the practice of yoga nidra and that is the resolve (sankalpa in Sanskrit). The resolve is made entirely by you and you bring it to mind at the beginning, right after the initial relaxation by focusing on external sounds, and then again after the final image. The resolve is a short statement which is impressed into the subconscious mind when it is receptive, when you are relaxed and have started to withdraw your senses. The resolve is like a seed that you plant at the beginning of practice and the practice is watering that seed. Statements such as, “I am transformed” or “ I am successful in everything I do” are good examples of the brevity and directness of one’s resolve. The resolve is always present tense.
Like preparing the garden, you must be prepared, receptive in order for your seed or resolve to grow and actualize. The practice of yoga nidra makes you receptive by withdrawing the senses, developing a witnessing attitude, opening the whole mind - subconscious and unconscious, while remaining clear, alert, and aware. “The science of yoga nidra is based on the receptivity of consciousness. When consciousness is operating with the intellect and all the senses, we think we are awake and aware, but the mind is less receptive and more critical.” (p. 29)
True and deep relaxation has the potential to be transformative both in terms of the restorations that can occur and also through the use of specific resolves when the body and mind are at their most receptive. A yoga nidra session lasts between 20 and 40 minutes and can build a foundation of resilience within you.
Resources
The quotes in this blog are from Swami Satyananda Saraswati’s book Yoga Nidra published by Yoga Publications Trust, Bihar India. 2001-2012.
Richard Miller, PhD.’s book Yoga Nidra is another good resource. It also has audio recordings of yoga nidra practices.
Image credit: By OpenStax College - Anatomy & Physiology, Connexions Web site. http://cnx.org/content/col11496/1.6/, Jun 19, 2013., CC BY 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=30148008
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Deb McDermott is a first-year student in Yoga Therapy at Prema Yoga Institute. She has been a Yoga teacher for 20 years and recently completed a 40-hour training on Trauma Center Trauma Sensitive Yoga (TCTSY) with David Emerson and Jenn Turner.
The Practice of Mindfulness: To Judge or Not to Judge…
Judgment is an automatic practice for nearly every person on the planet: from the clothes we wear to the foods we eat to our surrounding environment and the people we associate with. As a practicing attorney in New York City, judgements were as natural to the legal practice, as is water to a sea full of fish. Without either, neither could survive. However, in the years after I left the practice of law, I began to engage in the practice of Mindfulness, which relinquishes judgment of each moment and its occurrences as they arise. Say what?!
Judgment is an automatic practice for nearly every person on the planet: from the clothes we wear to the foods we eat to our surrounding environment and the people we associate with. As a practicing attorney in New York City, judgements were as natural to the legal practice, as is water to a sea full of fish. Without either, neither could survive. However, in the years after I left the practice of law, I began to engage in the practice of Mindfulness, which relinquishes judgment of each moment and its occurrences as they arise. Say what?!
Mindfulness, a Buddhist-based practice, is a practice in which we are aware of each moment, thought, or emotion as it arises without injecting one’s preferences about what arises. It’s a beautiful practice because you can engage in mindfulness anywhere, and at any time. When you start to become more conscious of the inner workings of your mind, without judging it, you may notice a shift towards compassion, understanding and/or love for yourself, and thereby, for others.
What happens when you let go of your likes and dislikes? The attachment or resistance which accompanies judgments dissipates. We can allow ourselves and others to have the fullness of life experiences and feel good about it. Non-judgment allows each of us to accept where we are and not beat ourselves up for being where we are.
Judgement separates; it divides. The person who perceives the world through a fragmented lens, may perceive others as being ‘not good enough’ or ‘up to one’s standards’, or on the other end of the spectrum, ‘too good’, which can also create feelings of inadequacy. The thing is, people’s preferences and standards change throughout life. That’s an awful lot of people and things that must change in order to please others and keep up with one’s standards. It is just not realistic.
To cultivate this practice, try a simple exercise: journal about an aspect of life that you may be struggling with. Then, read through your journal entry, without judging yourself or anyone involved in the story. In other words, detach yourself from the situation and try to be as objective as possible.
If after reviewing, you are not able to perceive the words without injecting criticism or praise, that’s okay. When one has permission to do so, there isn’t a residue of feeling bad or inadequate. With continued practice, deep ingrained habits eventually diminish in power.
For those who are able to review their words in a more detached state, ask yourself, are you able to feel more peace, compassion and understanding towards yourself, or others? Or perhaps, you perceived the situation differently and thought up a solution or resolution that was previously blocked by the previous surveyance.
Mindfulness slowly loosens the grips of your likes and dislikes, which create division, and instead, creates ease and unification within. Life becomes more fluid and you begin to move with that flow. The practice allows you freedom to be, and be happy. Who doesn’t want that?
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KAREN NOURIZADEH
With more than a decade of experience, Karen has studied yoga, mindfulness and meditation in both India and in New York City. She holds certifications with Yoga Alliance, E-RYT 500, and through the International Association of Yoga Therapists, C-IAYT 1000. Prior to teaching, Karen was a litigation attorney in New York City, and during this time, discovered the power of meditation and mindfulness. Applying simple techniques, she found relief from chronic sinus and tension headaches, which affected her for nearly 20 years. Karen is now teaching Mindfulness and Meditation Techniques for Stress Management in Prema Yoga Institute's “Yoga for Healthcare" training in October 2019.
Yoga Hacks for Allergy Season
The Sanskrit word for “Bless you!” is Bhagavadanugrahapraptirastu!, and if you’re a New York City yogi, it’s probably a good idea to learn it. New York makes the cut when it comes to the top five worst states to live in if you have seasonal pollen allergies, and there’s plenty of suffering to go around: because of our great American variety of allergen-producing flora, every region in the U. S. offers it own unique aggravations for your histamine supply. Moreover, rising temperatures across the globe have lengthened spring and summer at both ends, creating an allergy season that begins as early as February and lasts as late as November, depending on where you live. If you travel cross-country frequently and suffer from seasonal allergies, God help you: your allergy season is basically ten months long. Bhagavadanugra-hapraptirastu! indeed.
The Sanskrit word for “Bless you!” is Bhagavadanugrahapraptirastu!, and if you’re a New York City yogi, it’s probably a good idea to learn it. New York makes the cut when it comes to the top five worst states to live in if you have seasonal pollen allergies, and there’s plenty of suffering to go around: because of our great American variety of allergen-producing flora, every region in the U. S. offers it own unique aggravations for your histamine supply. Moreover, rising temperatures across the globe have lengthened spring and summer at both ends, creating an allergy season that begins as early as February and lasts as late as November, depending on where you live. If you travel cross-country frequently and suffer from seasonal allergies, God help you: your allergy season is basically ten months long. Bhagavadanugra-hapraptirastu! indeed.
The Three As
According to Ayurvedic medicine, allergies are the result of an inefficient immune response: a poorly calibrated or depleted immune system perceives a basically harmless allergen as a threat to the body and releases histamines to attack it. It’s this over-production of histamine that causes the classic allergy symptoms: a runny nose, watery eyes, sneezing, itching, and so on. Antihistamines, the go-to allopathic treatment for allergies, can result in particularly adverse side effects for yogis, such as dehydration and fatigue. (Diphenhydramine, the active ingredient in Benadryl, causes both.) Happily, yoga and Ayurveda offer a protocol for combatting the root cause of allergies, with the primary goal of strengthening the immune system so it can respond efficiently to allergens. In short, to conquer allergy season, remember the Three As:
• Strengthen the Abdominals
to
• Increase Agni
and
• Reduce Ama
Agni, the Hindu God of Fire
In the Ayurvedic conception of wellness, proper immune function is linked to sufficient agni, or digestive fire. Weak digestive fire results in poor digestion, which in turn results in the production of ama, a toxic by-product of undigested food. (If you want to know how ama shows up in the body, invest in a tongue scraper.) Excess ama compromises immune function and makes allergic reactions more likely. From an Ayurvedic perspective, if you want to minimize allergic reactivity, you must ensure that you are fully digesting your food by eating appropriately for your dosha. If you have yet to determine your dosha, you can take an Ayurvedic Constitution quiz here.
Provided that you are eating to balance your dosha, the first step in boosting agni is strengthening the abdominals, including the solar plexus. Asana that target the abdominal muscles include phalakasana (plank pose—make it more intense by lowering to the forearms) purvottanasana (upward plank) utthtita trikonasana (extended triangle) and virabhadrasana (warrior) III. Strengthening the lower back muscles will also contribute to your core strength, so make sure that your on-the-mat practice includes plenty of vinyasas (adho and urdhva mukha svavasana are both excellent for increasing back strength) as well as urdhva danurasana (bow), salabhasana (locust) and/or setu bandha sarvangasana (bridge).
In addition, try practicing the simple but highly effective pranayama/asana hybrid agni sara. Considered an indispensable practice in Hatha yoga, agni sara (literally “essence of fire”) targets the solar plexus, lower abdominals and pelvic floor muscles. The practice stimulates the digestive system and aids in proper elimination of waste. Efficient elimination derives from proper digestion; because ama is literally a waste product, it’s impossible to overstate the role of thorough elimination in peak immune function. You can view a step-by-step guide to agni sara here. For beginners: start in sukhasana or malasana and contract the lower abdominals. Breathe deeply into the belly and pelvic floor, pulling the navel firmly towards the spine on the exhale and relaxing the belly fully on the inhale. Three rounds of ten breaths—ideally on an empty stomach—are sufficient.
Heating spices such as turmeric and ginger help balance kapha dosha.
Finally, in the Ayurvedic model, allergic reactions such as sneezing, a runny nose and watery eyes are considered a consequence of the heavy, wet qualities of excessive kapha dosha. Heating and drying yogic practices combat vata and pitta vitiation (impairment) and balance kapha. If you’re anticipating the onset of allergy season, stimulate your inner fire with kaphalabhati (breath of fire) and aerobic exercise or hot yoga to “dissolve” the ama. If your allergy symptoms are acute, try cutting out heavy and oily kapha-aggravating foods (such as hard cheeses, gluten, sweets and dairy). Adding spices to your food and indulging in drying foods such as popcorn, white potatoes and dried fruit can also help in balancing excess kapha.
According to the Food and Drug Administration, approximately 36 million Americans suffer from seasonal allergies every year. If you are among them, take heart: your yoga practice needn’t be curbed by lethargy, dehydration, and other side effects of allopathic allergy medication. By keeping the Three As in mind and thoughtfully balancing kapha, you can address seasonal allergies yogically to ensure that you stay on the giving end of “Bhagavadanugrahapraptirastu!”
Would you like to learn more about the Ayurvedic perspective on health and wellness? All PYI therapeutics courses reference Ayurveda, and our Ayurvedic Yoga Therapy Course is offered yearly. For more information, visit our Trainings page.
Online Sources
Image Sources
Sneeze: https://www.consumerreports.org/medical-symptoms/why-youre-sneezing-sniffling-wheezing/
Spices: https://chopra.com/articles/light-and-aromatic-herbs-to-balance-your-kapha-dosha
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Molly Goforth is a yoga and meditation teacher and a student at Prema Yoga Institute. She specializes in accessibility and trauma-informed yoga teaching and practice.