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Embrace the Hustle & Bustle with this “Shake it...

Dharm Khalsa
Karena Virginia — November 21, 2017

Sometimes life is complicated, especially during the hustle and bustle of the holiday season. We may be able to cope with everyday stresses, but when we have multiple traumatic events happening at once, we can feel frozen by fear and uncertainty, stuck in our painful circumstances. We may feel victimized and incapable of making a move. As our modern age speeds up, this feeling can intensify to the point that we make ourselves sick. What can we do when we feel so confused and empty that we become immobilized and exhausted?

This kundalini meditation is designed to help center your consciousness and channel all your confusion out of your psyche. You give your feelings of uncertainty, pain, and blame to the universe and replace them with the pure, clear light of your soul, accessing what was actually there all along.

Sit up with your spine straight. Center yourself with your breath.
Interlace your fingers in front of your heart with the index fingers pressed together pointing up. Close your eyes, focusing internally on the third eye point.
Begin chanting the mantra “Wahe Guru, Wahe Guru, Wahe Guru, Wahe Jio” (pronounced “wah-hey guh-roo, wah-hey guh-roo, wah-hey guh-roo, wah-hey jee-oh”). Our translation of this mantra is: “As in amazement, here and now, all darkness is transformed to illuminating light in my soul.” Practice doing this chant with the following visualization:
- On the syllable of “wah,” feel the sound vibrating at your navel.
- On the syllable of “hey,” feel the sound vibrating at your heart.
- On the syllables of “gur-roo” and “jee-oh,” feel the sounds vibrating at your lips.
Continue chanting the mantra for up to 11 minutes.
Inhale deeply and hold your breath in. Feel the echo of the sounds still vibrating in your navel, heart, and lips. Suspend your breath for as long as you comfortably can and then exhale very consciously.
Inhale a second time and again suspend your breath. Release the feeling of being trapped by circumstances. Surrender it to the universe. Surrender your pain and feelings of blame. Release your stress and your uncertainty. Give it all to God. Hold the breath for as long as you comfortably can and then exhale, still holding your concentration.
Inhale a third time and give your life to God. Surrender. Whatever God means to you, offer your existence to that. Allow yourself to feel the purification this action creates in your psyche. When you are ready, exhale and sit for a while with the whole experience of this powerful meditation.

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Excerpted from Essential Kundalini Yoga by Karena Virginia & Dharm Khalsa.

Karena Virginia brings 20 years of experience as a certified healer and registered instructor in the kundalini and hatha schools. Before her teaching career, she worked in the entertainment industry as an actress and model. She lives in the New York City area. For more information, visit karenavirginia.com.

Dharm Khalsa is a board member of the Siri Singh Sahib Corporation, the nonprofit overseeing kundalini yoga in the US since founder Yogi Bhajan’s passing. Trained directly by Yogi Bhajan, for whom he was a personal assistant for nearly a decade, Dharm has taught kundalini yoga since 1980. He lives in New Mexico.

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Breathing Meditations – a new free gift from Sou...

Sounds True — July 24, 2014

The transformational power inherent in the simple act of breathing is truly remarkable. With Breathing Meditations, join seven Sounds True authors for a series of simple guided practices that can open you to the many benefits of breathwork—from a deeper sense of presence and serenity in the moment, to revitalized health and ease of being, to creative insight and higher perspective, and more.

Stream or download Breathing Meditations here at no cost!

Tracks include:

1. “Breathing Meditation” by Jack Kornfield from Meditation for Beginners

Learn the art of following the breath, a foundational skill for all meditators, with Jack Kornfield, co-founder of the Insight Meditation Society.

2. “The Relaxing Breath” by Andrew Weil, MD from Breathing: The Master Key to Self-Healing

Dr. Andrew Weil gives us a potent practice for activating the body’s relaxation response and returning to balance after stressful situations.

3. “Breath Meditation” by Sharon Salzberg from Guided Meditations for Love and Wisdom

A mindful breathing practice that helps us open the heart and experience compassion for ourselves and others.

4. “Soft Belly” by James Gordon, MD from Freedom from Depression

Harvard-educated psychiatrist Dr. James Gordon presents a guided exercise for liberating stuck energy in the body.

5. “Observing the Breath” by Shinzen Young from Meditation: A Beginner’s Guide

An introductory meditation inviting us to discover what can happen through full and complete attention to the breath.

6. “The Power Breath” by Mark Thornton from Meditation in a New York Minute

Executive meditation coach Mark Thornton teaches us a stress-reducing practice that both relaxes and reenergizes the body.

7. “Meditation on the Breath” by Sally Kempton from Beginning Meditation

A guided meditation in which our breath becomes the doorway to the depths of the self.

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The Purpose of Life is to Love

Reginald A. Ray — July 31, 2013

Within all of the great wisdom traditions we find an emphasis on love, kindness, and opening our heart to others. It is quite natural to open in this way to our family and friends, but what the great traditions teach is that this reservoir of love inside us is unlimited, extends to all living beings, and even to the universe itself. This reality of love is not an abstract experience, notes respected meditation teacher Reggie Ray, but something that is alive the core of who and what we are. One way to envision the spiritual journey is as a pathway which unlocks the love in our hearts, thereby enabling us to become fully human.

Please enjoy this short video from Reggie on the unfolding of love.

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The ‘Good Enough’ Interview

Mark Epstein — January 27, 2015

Mark Epstein is a practicing psychiatrist and noted writer on Buddhist meditation practice. With Sounds True, Mark has created What the Buddha Felt: A Buddhist Psychiatrist Points the Way to Uncommon Happiness, an audio program concerning the merging of Western psychotherapy and ancient meditation practices. In this episode of Insights at the Edge Tami Simon speaks with Mark about the often paradoxical benefits of Buddhism’s emphasis on non-identification. They also talk about the early childhood traumas experienced by Siddhartha and how they shaped his journey towards becoming the Buddha. Finally, Tami and Mark discuss what can be learned from the Buddha as a realist. (60 minutes)

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Shinzen Young: The Science of Enlightenment, Part 2

Shinzen Young — November 1, 2016

Shinzen Young is a renowned mindfulness teacher known for his live gatherings, where he uses a scientific, “algorithmic” approach to explain the many aspects of meditation. With Sounds True, he has published the decades-in-the-making book The Science of Enlightenment: How Meditation Works. In the second half of an extensive interview on Insights at the Edge, Tami Simon and Shinzen talk about how to bring equanimity to both pleasurable and painful sensory experiences and how that has a purifying effect on consciousness. In order to ground this experience, Shinzen leads Tami and the audience on a guided practice to help give a “taste of purification.” Finally, Shinzen shares a quick, powerful technique for starting on the path to enlightenment and something intensely personal—his happiest thought. (75 minutes)

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How to Breathe With Your Whole Body

Clemens G. Arvay — January 24, 2019

Blog header - How to Breathe With Your Whole Body Sounds True blog

Spending time in the woods—or shinrin-yoku (“forest bathing”)—has been proven to significantly strengthen our immune system and increase our overall happiness. The forest air triggers our bloodstream to produce 40 percent more natural killer cells, which help fight harmful viruses, bacteria, and other illnesses. The tradition of forest bathing goes back a long time in Japan’s folk medicine, but it has its longest history in China and Taiwan and has been called senlinyu there for centuries.

Ancient knowledge about healing from nature is also found in traditional Chinese medicine. Numerous exercises from qigong are designed to “absorb the chi of nature” and are carried out mainly in forests or green areas with trees. Even the qigong masters of the past apparently knew that nature not only heals in the form of plant- and mineral-based pharmaceutical substances, but also by a person simply being present in a green space and breathing. In qigong, absorbing the chi of nature is always associated with breathing techniques.

Xiaoqiu Li, a two-time Chinese state champion in wushu (traditional Chinese martial arts), taught me the following exercise for “whole-body breathing.” This specific exercise helps you to take in the healthy forest air quite intensely and to release old air and harmful substances very consciously. You will especially feel the purifying effects of this exercise in your body if you are a smoker or live in a polluted city.

Look for a place in the woods that appeals to you and that has an even surface to stand on, and then follow these steps:

Stand with your feet shoulder-width apart and as parallel to each other as possible, with your knees slightly bent and arms relaxed at your sides.
“Open” your chest cavity by lifting your arms up in the air away from your body, in the form of a circle overhead, as if you were a tree revealing its mighty crown to the sky. Take a deep breath in while doing this, starting in your stomach and continuing to fill up your chest with air.
When your arms meet over your head, guide them down in front of your body, holding them together and parallel to each other. Simultaneously begin to breathe out, making fists with your hands while squatting down.
At the end of these movements, slowly press your elbows against your body at stomach level. This pressing of the elbows and curving of your body help your lungs to empty themselves entirely.
Repeat these movements slowly and mindfully and try to make everything as smooth as possible.

Excerpted from The Biophilia Effect: A Scientific and Spiritual Exploration of the Healing Bond Between Humans and Nature by Clemens G. Arvay.

Born in 1980, Clemens G. Arvay is an Austrian engineer and biologist. He studied landscape ecology (BSc) at Graz University and applied plant sciences (MSc) at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna. Arvay examines the relationship between humans and nature, focusing on the health-promoting effects of contact with plants, animals, and landscapes. He also addresses a second range of topics that includes ecologically produced food along with the economics of large food conglomerates. Clemens G. Arvay has written numerous books, including his bestseller The Biophilia Effect. For more, please visit clemensarvay.com.