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Dear yoga brothers and sisters here in Strelky, and respected friends watching the webcast, let me introduce you to a unique sequence of yoga postures and exercises created by Paramahaṁsvayī Māheśvarānanda called Kaṭhūpraṇām. The name Kaṭhūpraṇām comes from Kaṭu. Kaṭu is a village where Bhagavān Śrī Divnāreya Mahāprabhujī used to live for many years. "Praṇām" means greeting, so the exercise expresses love, greeting, and devotion towards this great saint. We have two versions of Kaṭhūpraṇām now, and I would like to ask Dr. Martin Repkov from Masaryk University in Brno, the head doctor of the orthopedic clinic, to explain. He is a great surgeon dealing mostly with spine operations, and he is well-known not only in the Czech Republic but also abroad. I ask him to come and explain the meaning of Kaṭhūpraṇām and the benefits of the postures, both the first and second versions. Thank you. Praṇām Viśvagurujī, Praṇām Mahāmādāśvarī Vekpurījī. Thank you so much for this opportunity to speak a little about Kaṭhūpraṇām. To speak about Kaṭhūpraṇām could take hours, days, and weeks, and still it would not be finished. For us, Kaṭhūpraṇām is like a diamond on the crown of the system Yoga in Daily Life. We are very fortunate to have a living master, and when the master is living, the system is living as well. That is why it is really very nice for us to receive something new in a field we thought was closed; it was like a miracle. Because Viśvagurujī is still working on our health, and it is very, very important and nice for us. In my short speech, I would like to speak a little about the wrong position of our body, explain some positions in the previous version of Kaṭhūpraṇām, and finally explain in an anatomical way what is happening in the new version. Perhaps you will be satisfied with this, or we can discuss it further. I would like to start with a little theory on why we utilize Kaṭhūpraṇām, because it is not easy to correct something in our bodies. We can speak of many things that can be improved by Kaṭhūpraṇām: internal organs, the nervous system, breathing, glands, and so on. Each and every part of our body can be improved by Kaṭhūpraṇām, but it would take a long time. That is why I decided, as it is my professional field, to speak about the spine and the trunk. It is only a small part of the topic "What can Kaṭhūpraṇām do for us?" but hopefully you will be satisfied. Can you give us both versions? Yes, so that friends watching Swāmījī TV can see version number one—what happens when you do this—and then the new version and how it helps. The new version is a higher level. First, I would like to introduce the anatomical landmarks because it is really important to know what is going on. I would like to ask one girl, please, can you stand up? I mentioned we will speak about the trunk and spine. I will focus a little on the thoracic and lumbar spine because it is easier to explain. Everybody knows that our spine is straight when we are looking forward, as with this sister. If there is any problem in the frontal plane, we call it scoliosis. When we turn her to the side, we can see—if we had X-ray eyes—that there is no straight spine. This is typical; we call them physiological curvatures. If the spine were straight, our movement would be very rigid. That is why nature produced two types of curvature for us. One is kyphosis, which we find mostly in the thoracic spine. Kyphosis means the curvature on the backside. On the opposite side is lordosis, which means the curvature going to the front. We find lordosis in the cervical spine and the lumbar spine. So we have two lordoses (cervical and lumbar) and one kyphosis for each person. There are typical degrees, but if the degrees become higher, we see the wrong posture of the body. Usually it starts with the shoulders going forward, and we go forward a little, making more kyphosis in the thoracic spine. Conversely, you can see the lumbar lordosis producing a posture like this. She bent her knees a little, which is good for our explanation but not good posture. This is the typical wrong posture of the body, which can be solved by surgery or by doing some diaphragm exercises. I will explain how to correct this wrong posture and make the body much straighter in a physiological way. To this body posture, there are also muscles working together with the spine. Mostly we speak about the shoulder muscles, pectoral muscles, which are shortening, and similarly there is a problem with the interscapular muscles (between the shoulder blades), which are mostly weakening. On the lumbar side, there is shortening of these muscles and weakening of our abdominal muscles. That is all for anatomical landmarks, but it is necessary to know what is going on in Kaṭhūpraṇām as well. Okay, let's go back. We would like to change from this posture to a better one. What is going on in Kaṭhūpraṇām? Let's go in a practical way. Can you please stand up? We have two versions of Kaṭhūpraṇām: one version which is mostly popular among people, but there are still some improvements, and I will explain what these improvements are. First, we can see in the basic posture and posture number one that there is a nice shape to our spine. We can improve it a little. When we are sitting at a table, we can improve our straight sitting posture. That is why we need to take some time to find a better position. Do not be in a hurry to start. When sitting in Vajrāsana, you can wait a little and correct yourself. You can also play with the pelvis and lumbar spine to find a better position. This is like a starting posture. Swāmījī mentioned two very important things from my point of view. The first is to perform slowly. We have two things: we have postures, and we have movements between the postures. Both are very important. It is not only the position or āsana that is important, but also the movement between two āsanas is extremely important. When we are not able to perform it in the right way, we perform wrong movement stereotypes. That is why we can correct our movement stereotypes by utilizing slow exercises. I can explain with the first posture. When you go up really quickly, there is no control of any movement. The main problem for the shoulder blades, which I spoke of before, is that the muscles between them are very weak. When she goes extremely up quickly, there is no control of these muscles, and every movement is done by the shoulder joint. When we go nicely and slowly, you can see—just stop in this position—now is the time for the shoulder blades to go a little nearer together. If you go really quickly, there is no time to adapt these muscles and strengthen them. From this posture, when the shoulder blade goes above the horizontal plane, the shoulder blades go a little together. This is the nice time to make them stronger. The main problem again: when we raise the shoulder joint above the horizontal plane, the interscapular muscles are going to be strengthened, but they need time. Let's go really slowly. Just now, when the shoulder is going up, is the time for the muscles between the shoulder blades to come together. Again, when going up, it is not the way to push the shoulders up as much as possible. We need to go a little down with the shoulders, with the hands up, shoulders down, and make it straight between the shoulder blades. This is the first explanation for the movement between the first two āsanas. We can also explain the second movement. When going to śaśāṅgāsana, if you go quickly again and again, there is no control of the lumbar spine, its muscles, and the discs. We need time to adapt the lumbar spine to this process. When we go slowly down, and when the first touch of the abdomen occurs, the lumbar spine starts to bend step-by-step. This is much more effective and safe. If you go really quickly, there is a risk of dangerous things for the lumbar spine. I would like to explain why we perform the āsanas slowly. Now we can explain the first version and how it works with the thoracic and lumbar spine. I mentioned we need to make it in a physiological way, so we need to make the kyphosis a little smaller. We need to move the thoracic spine forward a little and move the lumbar spine back a little—not so much curvature. The first version starts with the physiological position of the whole spine, so we need to correct a little in the beginning. We move to the first āsana. You can see we perform a little more lumbar lordosis, which is not so nice. We need to compensate with the thoracic spine. If we move only the lumbar spine and do not engage the muscles between the shoulder blades, we overuse the lumbar spine. It is not necessary to extend the cervical spine so much. Then we go to the second āsana. You can see how we move the spine. Before, we had bigger lumbar lordosis. Now we go a little to the opposite side with lordosis. This is very good for the spine because the movement makes the whole spine more movable and protects the intervertebral discs. In this position, you have to stop a little and think about the position of the hands. For each person, the hands make the right position. The hands have to stay where they are. Now we move forward. Here you can see we perform more lumbar lordosis because the lumbar spine is going like this. It is moving, which is fine, and we need to fix it a little between the shoulder blades as well. Let's go to the next. Again, about the thoracic spine: if we perform bhujaṅgāsana only by the lumbar spine, it is not good. We need to adapt the thoracic spine for this āsana to make it more efficient. Next, be careful you are not off the table. Again, the other position. We are still changing the position of the spine. Before, the lumbar spine was curved in front; now it goes the other way. It is very important to change this because it produces nice flexibility of the spine. Next, it is not so easy to perform the exercises on the table. Again, we need to go a little with the pelvis down to perform a more stable position with the pelvis and knees. Next, again the same process. When going up with your hands, you need to check and control the interscapular muscles. Back. Next. And again, from hyperlordosis of the lumbar spine, we go to the correction of hyperlordosis. It changes with each and every posture, changing this way and that way, which is very natural. Going up, I will speak more about this posture in version two. You can see: go down and go up. Once more, down and up. You can see it is not easy for the lumbar spine; the muscles are under big tension. That is why we will speak about version two. Go back down. You can go slowly, āsana by āsana, back to Vajrāsana. Next, next, next. It is a very hard table. Next, next, and going back. Especially on this hard table, you can see what is going on in each āsana. In each āsana, we search for some center of gravity. It is very important because each yoga posture is more or less unbalanced, and we search for balance. From this point of view, it is very important to perform slowly because you are still searching for the center of gravity and need to balance the whole body. That is version one. We could speak more deeply about each muscle and movement, but it takes a lot of time. That was only a short explanation. Let's go to version two and see what changed and how it is nice for us. Start again from Vajrāsana to the first posture. This is the same. We need to go a little near to your ears. The tension now goes mostly to the muscles between the shoulder blades. For the lumbar spine, it is very activating. Next āsana again, very, very slowly, with concentration on the lumbar spine. We need to know what is going on in the lumbar spine: it goes vertebra by vertebra, step-by-step. The lumbar spine bends forward. If you go really quickly from this āsana to the next, you have no control around the lumbar spine, and it can produce problems like disc hernias. This is not so easy. Next āsana is still the same. It is very important from my point of view to fix the knees and hands a little. If you move forward and your hands move forward, you completely destroy your center of gravity and stability. Next. Again, this is very strong for the lumbar spine, and we need to make the muscles between the shoulder blades stronger. Next version: you need to go a little forward. Fine. Now you are really nicely performing the strengthening of the weakened muscles between the shoulder blades. It is really very strong. Going back. We will go once more because you can see, with both sisters, that before going to this posture, you need to change the balance a little. You need to go a little more forward. If you do it quickly and only put your hands beside your body, it produces big stress in the lumbar spine. We need to do the same position as before: go a little forward, then perform this posture. Go back a little, release the lumbar spine. You need to make the muscles between the shoulder blades stronger. If you do, you will release more tension in the lumbar spine. This posture is maybe for advanced people who have been doing the essential version of Kaṭhūpraṇām for months or weeks. Next āsana. The same āsana as in the first version. Next. In this, it is important to put the pelvis down because if you are still up, it overuses the hip and knee joints. You need to go a little down. When you would perform the version like before—to go up with the hands—it would again produce tension in this part. That is why we have a golden opportunity to take time and we have the new version for this. Go. You have time to adapt the spine for the posture. If you go the old way, tension mostly goes to the lumbar spine. Now you can again do the same thing to strengthen between the shoulder blades. Making more power between the shoulder blades releases tension in the lumbar spine. Understand? Now it is like an intermezzo between two postures, and we can go to the next āsana in a much easier way. It is much easier for the lumbar spine. Going back again to strengthen these important muscles. When we have no strength in the muscles between the shoulder blades, our shoulders go forward, we perform hyperkyphosis, and our standing is like this. Next, going back. Next. The same things will come. If you stand up from this posture, it creates big stress in the lumbar spine. That is why, from this point of view, we again have some new posture. Let's go for the new one. Again, two main things in this āsana: one, we have time to adapt to the straight posture; two, we have time to work with our abdominal muscles and diaphragm. In this posture, you can strengthen the abdominal muscles, which are usually weakened in each of us. This takes a little time to prepare for standing up from a straight posture. Now we can go up, very slowly, with mental control of the lumbar spine and each movement. It is very important. Now going back, again with the posture between. Again, we have time to make our abdominal muscles stronger and work with our diaphragm. Going down. Next. Instead of straightening really quickly, we can perform the same way with a new āsana. You can see how the shoulders go back, the whole trunk opens, and our breath becomes more intensive. It is very nice for our breathing process, prevention of asthma, and many things. Next. Next. From my point of view, in this posture it is very important to make the pelvis as low as possible because we are touching the lower part of our stomach to our thigh. It is also interesting how the breath goes to the side. As I mentioned, each āsana is a little unbalanced, and we need to find balance in unbalance. This is very important. Next. Next. We could speak for hours about each āsana, so I would like only to explain the changes. Now we can perform the new one. You can see how the sisters go forward before trying to make a stable posture again. Back down. This āsana is not a relaxing one; it creates good tension between the shoulder blades and in the lumbar spine. It also stretches the shoulders and pectoral muscles. It is a very effective āsana. Going back, you can see if the hands go back as well, it means they moved forward during the exercise. It is not so good, but it is not easy on the tables. Now we can go up again, a little tension between the shoulder blades. Shoulders go down, hands go up. It is like somebody is making traction on you. Going back. Each slow movement allows us to control everything. When your shoulders are healthy, you do not feel anything. If you have problems with the shoulders, you will find it is not so easy to hold up. If you are healthy and young, it may not matter if you go quickly. But if you have some problems, you can find it is not so easy this way. These are two main points, Viśvagurujī. If somebody has a comment or question for Viśvagurujī, it was Hari Om. Very nice, thank you. One very important point in Kaṭhūpraṇām, both versions, as Dr. Martin mentioned, is about practicing. This is a very important point. Have you some nails? In the hammer now, this hand is here. It should not go back and forth until it comes to a posture where we are able to lift up, as well as this foot. Only the feet can move from here, either standing or flat, but they should not move forward or back. This is the main point. Point in the heart, open up. For example, now number three, yes, and remains here. Good. Number three, perfect. Number four, hands are still there. Five, no, we are going to advance. Six, now you must know where it is. Now, toes static. Seven, now heels on the ground. This is the hard point because she cannot bring her heels down due to tight hamstrings. So go more and more; it will come. Therefore, in the beginning, take enough space. Go one step with the foot. This would be the right position for hands and heels. Next, but this should not change the position. It should only move from here to here. Next, on the back, then further as usual. Make it pull yourself. Do it, please. Next. Now you should know where the hands are. Next, next. It is about both persons doing the first one. It's good. Next, and next. Now choose the right distance. Next. Now hands will not move. Good. Next up, no, good. Next, and next, once more. Go back up; this is the right place for the neck. Some do like this, more like this. Then you can become dizzy, have a headache, or pain. Therefore, your ears should touch your upper arm. This is the right way. Next, and next, heels on the ground. You see? No steps coming up. Next, yes, that's it. Hands on the back, and next. Now you see, as Dr. Martin said, the balance of the body is on the toes, knees, hands a little, chest, and knee. As Dr. Martin nicely explained anatomically, we give strength to the back muscles and stretch the front muscles, but at the same time we relax the stomach muscles. Next, two hands walking back—you see, so it means you moved. Up, very good, slowly come back. The girls did a good job. Come, doctor, you stand here. I have one question: if there is anyone who has a profession of making dresses, we need the dress not very tight, not very loose, but it should come a little more down so when we go to a certain posture, our shirt or T-shirt does not move high up. When we go into a certain posture, the length of the T-shirt should still be at least half of the thighs. Rozumis, translate. We should have two kinds of yoga dresses: one for satsaṅgs, walking, etc., and second like a T-shirt, which can be half arms or full arms. The material should be a little like rubber—not too wide, not too tight. Anyone who knows how to make dresses, please come to us. Kaṭhūpraṇām is really very effective. These two variations are very powerful. Thanks to Dr. Martin for very useful advice. Thank you. Tomorrow, someone is coming who is working with the heart—sweetheart. That comes on this as well as the breathing. When we do comfortably, we have normal breath. When we move up, we inhale. Normal breath, then we move back, we exhale, and normal breath. Also, the effect on the digestive system, our lungs, against asthma, and many things. With this, thank you. I thank you all, our dear brothers and sisters, who were with us through the webcast. Tomorrow, for the yoga teachers, there will be another nice program, most probably prāṇāyāma. Thank you and adios. Thank you.