Oscar G Najarro

I have been practicing Kundalini yoga kriyas daily for the last 5 years.

My practice has been rather constant though sprinkled with some interruptions due to traveling, exhaustion, or plain and simple laziness or even fear (of which I will explain later). The difference, when I’m engaged in constant daily practice, is quite noticeable in both my mood and physique, compared to the times I have had to take a break from it.

My Sadhana:

Before I begin my description of the outcomes from my practice, let me explain, what my daily Sadhana consists of.

In essence, my daily Sadhana consists of the following steps:

1. waking up 1-2 hours before the sun rises (4-5am),
2. take a cold shower, and
3. practice of meditation and/or kriya.

After my Sadhana is complete, I go to the kitchen to prepare my breakfast and be ready for my day.

Depending on how much time I have (before I have to start getting ready for work), how much energy I have, and whether I’m injured or have any aches, I will choose one of the following kriyas or meditations:

1. Silent meditation/deep breathing meditation, anywhere between 1min to 15-20min. (I choose this when I do not have much time before my day starts, or I’m feeling tired, or feeling I need to recover, emotionally that is, from my previous kriya.)
2. Sun Salutations: 3-6 times, taking approximately 5-10min. I do this when I have no time (if I wake up late), or if I need to slowly ease into my practice again.
3. Basic Breath kriya: I choose this one when I have more time; it usually can be done in about 40-45min, and if I’m quite tired, or if I need to slowly ease back into my practice again after a long interruption.
4. Kriya for Morning Sadhana: I choose this one when I feel great in my body and can dedicate, at least, 1 hour of practice. Be mindful this kriya may be quite physical.

Below, you can watch the video for the Basic Breath kriya (which includes my Sun Salutations which can also be used as a warm-up), and my Kriya for Morning Sadhana:

If you think any one of these kriyas may benefit you in any way, please use them. You may watch the videos until you need to watch them no more (and have memorized the sequence of the exercises).

The fruit of Sadhana:

There are probably thousands of kriyas to choose from. As a yoga instructor, I have taught no more than 10 different kriyas. However, quantity is, of course, not what matters. What matters is the non-attachment and discipline (as per the Yoga sutras). In my case, with only 2 kriyas, I have experienced 2-3 different outcomes: 

1. I immediately feel invigorated, energized and ready to start my day with enthusiasm. 
2. I do not feel anything immediately, but after a delayed time, later in the day, or sometimes by the 2^nd or 3^rd day of doing it, I feel a pleasurable sensation I cannot explain at the level of the heart center that sustains me and suffices me (which means that I do not crave anything else other than that sensation/emotion which I’m able to maintain for days sometimes), or 
3. I do not feel anything immediately, but after a delayed time, I experience unsettling emotions and heightened dream activity, usually right before I’m fully asleep, in the liminal moment between wakefulness and sleep. More than dreams, it is a combination of day-dreaming/imagination and hallucination. (I will explain what I believe actually happens later in this post).

My explanation:

Here is what I think happens to me, based on my own experiences described above and my studies in psychology and world religions, specially Hinduism and Yoga (as a sub-branch of it):

First, from my studies of psychology and dream-analysis, I have come to observe that one of the peculiarities of dreams is that they predominantly seem to occur between 3am to 6am or until I wake up. I know this because every time I woke up in the middle of the night after a dream that I had to record in my notebook, it has predominantly occurred between those hours. This seems to be the preferred time for my unconscious to express itself via dream-work. So, what happens when I wake up, at 4-5am, before I can dream? The answer is: a lot!

When I practice kriya or meditation during those times of the early morning, I force my unconscious to express itself via asana, pranayama, mantra and meditation, and later during the day via real emotions and altered states of mind. The unconscious does not have any other option other than become manifested (rather than un-manifested and disfigured via dream-work).

Second, my unconscious and the forces of life will become manifested in my body via bodily-sensations to which an emotion accompanies them (btw, can emotions be anything else than bodily sensations, or if that is not the case, can they exist by themselves without a bodily sensation?), a process that can happen in 2 ways: balanced in the heart or unbalanced outside the heart in whatever other form.

Heart-centered experience:

This sensation is not entirely pleasurable (not just pleasure alone), it is also painful. In this respect, it is a paradoxical sensation in which the polarities meet. I do not think I have the words to explain it other than, perhaps, love.

Whenever I experience this in the heart, if I think about any other bodily pleasure, I assess that “yes, that other pleasure would, indeed, bring me the associated pleasurable sensation in the body, but it will not surpass this sensation I’m currently feeling in the heart. This sensation suffices me.”

This sensation in the heart is such a one that it is easy to meditate upon, it is a sensation I will naturally yearn to maintain and be devoted to, and I assume that it is exactly this sensation that a Bhakti yogi would seek in his or her devotion to God. The more one focuses on it, the more it increases, and the more it stays.

As for the reason I lose touch with this sensation, I attribute it to being distracted from it (losing focus, concentration) when I engage in the world and its worldly affairs. ((The goal, then, would be to maintain that sensation despite the worldly affairs, which is the definition of what a jivanmukti is (or liberated being while alive).))

Heart-off-centered experience:

When I lose concentration, sometimes immediately, sometimes later in the day, or sometimes later in a few days, I will be thrown into a different kind of experience off-centered from the heart. Whenever this happens, whenever I’m particularly unbalanced, I would feel one or other of the lower or higher chakras (in reference to the heart) with more intensity. Because having too much of one or the other is the cause of unbalance (balance can only be properly attained in the heart, where all chakras meet), I experience heightened activity associated with those chakras in the form of bodily sensations with their respective emotion and mental activity, which will be also reflected in my dreams (or hallucinations) (which probably belong to the third eye chakra).

Some of the hallucinations are visual, akin to dreaming, others are sounds, voices or even mantras, and sometimes, it is a sensation of losing balance, falling down, or at some other times, it is cool breeze or wind blowing. As of this moment, I’m not analyzing what meaning they may have (via dream-analysis or symbol-analysis). For now, I’m just experiencing and observing.

Some of the bodily sensations I will experience are heightened sexual arousal, heightened anger, over-activity, laughter and heat. A lot of heat! Once, after focusing on the heat intensely, being exhausted of it, I experienced coolness near the throat (throat chakra). (this surprised me, since it makes sense that the heart is where the heat of the solar plexus and the coolness of the throat collide).

Hyphotesis:

Because my unconscious is being activated via my practice of yoga (and not repressed), it stays with me during my waking life. When the last off-centered experience happens, my moods and behavior become difficult to control (ego inflation or possession). Also, because I can’t sleep well enough due to having images presented to me in between the eye-brows, I’m usually very sleepy and can’t continue the early risings. Because of this, I pause my daily practice to resume it some other day. Naturally, in due time, these forces of life, not being able to be used productively by me, have to undergo repression once more, so I come back to ordinary life, which, in turn, causes me feelings of drowsiness, boredom, apathy. This is the cycle I seem to be trapped in. (this actually excites me since I’m deeply curious to experiment more with these occurrences).

The path ahead:

Also, just like everything else, there can be excess or deficiency. I believe I will have to ration the intensity of the kriyas I practice. I have noticed that the Morning Kriya is very intense and produces the most effects, whereas meditation seems to compensate for this. This only makes sense given that meditation and relaxation is when integration occurs.

I have found particularly helpful meditating with these impulses, also, with a method akin to Active Imagination, in other words, having an imagined conversation with them and seeking answers while acting upon those insights in real life. Not an easy task.

I’m still trying to figure a lot of stuff out. The sensation in the heart center is the only one that does not make me unbalanced nor causes me distress of any sort. When engaged in the world, this sensation in the heart calls for courage in action. That’s another of its characteristics. If I do not exercise these courageous actions, I feel how I lose it and become distracted by the world and its worldly affairs.

Interesting to say the least.

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I believe that the thorough study of the human being leads to a genuine experience of the divine within, which is the only sure way to achieve happiness and wholesome changes in society… beyond the grasp of institutionalized religion and government. The power, then, shifts back to the individual.

Your Ashram Online

That’s all I have for you today,

Sat Nam,

Oscar N.