Breathing Exercise - Dark Facts

Let me explore some ‘dark facts’ related to meditation and other forms of pranayam (henceforth mentioned as pranayam). I believe the effectiveness of pranayam depends on number of factors.

1st of all, it is to be noted that pranayam should be practiced in the dawn and dusk. It has some scientific basis. Doing pranayam long (2-3 hrs) after sunrise and sunset will not yield the optimum results. Terminally ill patients, if they want to be cured (if at all pranayam can cure), need to practice pranayam to get the optimum results.

Secondly, I would like to mention about food habit. Normally, it is rationally expected that a terminally sick patient isn’t exposed to alcohol or smoking a cigar. Those who are doing pranayam should culture a strictly vegetarian food habit. Well, here I encountered a patient who was a vegetarian, but had a strong desire for non vegetarian foods. If I go by the words of the enlightened persons, I must mention that one needs to curb desire too to enjoy optimum results. This has an important implication which I’ll discuss in my later posts.

Thirdly, we often ignore an important point. Pranayam requires absolute devotion. Let us check whether environment around us is conductive to pranayam. Free from visual pollution? Noise free? In most of the cases we’ll find that the answers are NO. At least not free from visual and noise pollution upto that point where the environment can be said to be conductive to develop peace of mind and subsequently devotion.

Mindless deforestation and massive industrialization are making the climate vulnerable. Pure air is now an abstract concept. The quality of air, which is the most vital in breathing exercise, is susceptible. So how can we expect an optimum result ?

A lot of birds, like vultures and crows, are at a risk because of our heartless and mindless madness for industrialization. How can we expect a polluted atmosphere, which is itself a cause for a number of dreaded diseases, can help us to cure a disease? It is not the fault of pranayam that it often fails to deliver what is expected. But we are absolutely responsible to make the atmosphere more and more polluted. Funny enough that we still believe that such a man made polluted environment will allow us to get cured.

Well, a correction in the direction of the above mentioned points will certainly yield better results. By better results, I mean, better quality of life. To know more about the ‘dark facts’, please stay tuned.