COOLING MEDITATION EXPERIENCE
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This is definitely the time of year where the mind can be very busy and overheated, especially for Type A personality types. We may have had too much exposure to the sun and its rays upon our heads, emotional stir-ups, over doing it at work or even just feeling anger and/or irritability coming up because the heat and humidity tend to do that. The latter indicators show us that there is some sort of disruption in our nervous system. It is important to get a hold of our mind and nervous system by focusing our mind and body on a breathing technique called Chandra Bheda which is a "lunar" cooling practice. An irritated mind causes irritation in the body, having a cascade of health effects especially sleep issues. Over activity of the mind can cause the body to feel hotter than it is and even increase the heat of the body overall through stressing the heart causing circulation to become increased. Heat has a dispersive quality and through this we feel the heat escaping, coming up and out, over and over, without us feeling much alleviation from this process. This following technique will help settle the mind and cool the heat down some. Check it out! Let me know what you think.
CHANDRA BHEDA
1-Sit with your spine straight. (whether on a chair or on the ground in a comfortable cross-legged position.
2-Close your eyes and focus your gaze inwardly towards the heart center.
3- Take your left hand and connect both your index finger and your thumb gently together, face down.
4- With the right hand, create a hook with your fingers. People do it all sorts of ways but generally, the idea is that the thumb will be positioned on the right nostril (lightly) and the ring finger (or index finger) is lightly touching the left nostril.
5- Pinching the right nostril shut, inhale through the left.
6- Exhale through the right nostril.
7- REPEAT...Inhale through the left, exhale through the right.
8- Slow, deep and easy breathing.
9- Do this for about 10-15 minutes. At least each night before bed. You can also do it in the morning to start the day and later in the day. Most importantly it is to be done at night so that the nervous system has a better chance at calming, soothing and engaging the parasympathetic nervous system so that you can have a good nights rest. Good sleep, between 11 and 7 or 10 and 6 pm, supports and anti-inflammatory process for the body. See my previous articles regarding good sleep and the recent article on how to keep the heat of summer down.