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Practising asanas from Rijeka

We practice āsanas to bring awareness to each chakra from Mūlādhāra to Sahasrāra. Begin by standing and feeling the Mūlādhāra area. Āsanas activate chakras like a reflex point, not the organ itself. Perform Maṇḍūkāsana, focusing on the perineum and practicing Aśvinī Mudrā by contracting and relaxing. Abdominal breathing here also engages Svādhiṣṭhāna. Feel a warm sensation in the pelvis. Practice grinding and rolling movements to engage Maṇipūra and feel warmth at the navel. Rolling includes head movement, affecting the Viśuddhi chakra and thyroid. Each chakra connects to the physical body, prāṇa, and states of mind. For Ājñā, practice Ākarandanurāsana by focusing on the thumbnail like Trāṭak, maintaining single-point concentration. For Sahasrāra and overall focus, practice Ekapāda Praṇāmāsana, balancing on one leg with hands at the heart center, focusing on a point and then visualizing it internally. Conclude by observing the effects in the body.

"Āsanas influence and activate a point in our body connected to a cakra."

"If we are concentrated on one point, we will remain without movement."

Filming location: Rijeka, Croatia

Hari Om. We now have the opportunity to practice āsanas from Mūlādhāra to Sahasrāra, though this is not so easy from a standing position. In other positions, we have many āsanas. Thankfully, in our book, we have an āsana for each chakra, so we have many exercises available. Now, stand in a position that feels pleasant. Separate your legs a little. Be aware of your pelvis position. We will start from the Mūlādhāra Chakra. First, be aware of where your Mūlādhāra Chakra is. Try to understand that the chakra and its location are like a reflection zone. You know, when you receive a massage, the therapist might say, "Oh, your kidney—you have a problem with your kidney." We all know the kidney is not there, but by working on that point, we activate the kidney. It is the same with some āsanas; they influence and activate a point in our body connected to a cakra. Be aware of your Mūlādhāra Chakra—the area of the pelvis and perineum. This is the area where we practice Aśvinī Mudrā or Mūlabandha. Now, slowly go down into Maṇḍūkāsana. Come up, please. Very good. Come, come, come. And go down. If you have a problem with your knees, you can remain standing. Now, be aware of this area—the anus, the perineum. Breathe. Try to relax this area of your anus. An excellent practice is Aśvinī Mudrā. It is excellent if you have painful periods. It is like blinking your eyes—a blink of your anus muscles—then relax. Why is it called Aśvinī? They say that after defecating, a horse contracts and relaxes its anus muscle a few times. Humans also do this, but we are not aware or do not speak of it. Gently contract and relax, contract and relax. Relax. Breathe with your abdomen. When you start breathing with your abdomen in this position, you are not only working on Mūlādhāra but also simultaneously with your Svādhiṣṭhāna Chakra. We will do a great āsana, Maṇḍūkī āsana. We will work on many things at once: Mūlādhāra, Svādhiṣṭhāna, Anāhata, Viśuddhi. Just try: inhale, exhale. Inhale and exhale. Three times: inhale, exhale. Inhale and try to feel the area of the Mūlādhāra, the perineum. Feel the area of the Mūlādhāra, the perineum, and exhale. Remain in the position, breathe normally. Try to relax this area of the pelvic diaphragm. Now, slowly sit and stretch your legs. In this position, it is very easy to feel the area of your Mūlādhāra Chakra. Your knees are not the Mūlādhāra Cakra. Try to feel this. Where is the pelvis? The diaphragm? In one area, you will feel a nice, warm feeling. You may also feel something like a hard bit. From the first level, we have a great āsana: the grinding. It is excellent for your Maṇipūra Chakra and also for your Svādhiṣṭhāna, but you will also feel your Mūlādhāra Chakra a lot. Mostly, with Maṇipūra Chakra, you feel a nice warm feeling in the area of your navel. As you will read in the Hidden Power of Human in the Chakra and Kuṇḍalinī book, a little feeling of hunger is also an awakening of this Maṇipūra area. When we practice, not only that, but if you want to feel all this—Mūlādhāra, Svādhiṣṭhāna, Maṇipūra chakra, hip joints, and everything—we will now not talk about influence on the body, but try to go to the side as much as possible. A little back, squeeze your body to the other side. Rotate your body to the other side as if you are squeezing it. We will do it five times on one side, five times on the other. Try to have your body under your control all the time, and also with your breathing. Inhale and exhale. Down. Two. Inhale. Exhale. Three. Squeeze. Four. Exhale. And five. Exhale. Now, five times on the other side. Inhale, and exhale. Two, exhale. Three, exhale. Four, exhale. And once more, five, and exhale. Come into Daṇḍāsana. Now, observe your body. I hope you will very easily feel the area of your abdomen—a nice, warm feeling. Where is the navel? Not only from the front side, you will also feel it on your back side: a nice, warm feeling in your low back. Breathe with your abdomen. Also, try to be aware from the front side of where the pubic bone is. You will feel and be aware of the urethra. If we are practicing, we will easily find the muscles which are the sphincter of this urethra. You can even feel the muscle that closes the urethra, the mucous membrane. In that area, also a nice warm feeling. That is the area of the Svādhiṣṭhāna chakra. You will also feel the muscles of the pelvic diaphragm. This means below is Mūlādhāra. All these three you will feel now: pleasant, warm feeling and some flow—the comfort, the feeling of warmth, and the flow. Now we will do another āsana from the first level: the rolling. You will also engage the Maṇipūra Chakra and feel all we talked about before. But when we practice rolling, we have another movement with the head. When you are down, you relax your head. When you go back, you look a little above. What are we doing? Not back completely; we do not push our head back to the end. As you know from the first level, yoga with the mobile phone? It is back, and that is Ākāśa Mudrā and Jālandhara Bandha. These two movements are excellent for your Viśuddhi Chakra. Because of that, in the first level, you will see that rolling is an excellent āsana for your thyroid gland. When we talk about chakras, we are also talking about the five bodies. First, the physical body: painful periods, incontinence, some glands, and so on. The flow of prāṇa, Manomaya Kośa—every chakra has a different state of your mind. We are also talking about Manomaya Kośa, where every chakra responds to a certain state of mind, and each āsana also has all of this included. Now we will do rolling, also for Maṇipūra Chakra. But if you want to do it on the right side, the right wave is there. Here is a relaxed head, nice back, but do not sit on the pelvis or tailbone; maintain this position and look up. The hand is not here, but here. And down. Also, when you do this, it is very similar to the fifth level Paścimottānāsana. If you read about Paścimottānāsana, you will read not only about the Maṇipūra cakra and all these cakras, but that Paścimottānāsana is excellent for the flow through the spinal column. That is also preparation for meditation, because you have this flow and your mind is coming down. If you read about Paścimottānāsana, you will see how it is excellent for increasing prāṇic activity through the spine and is excellent for preparation for meditation. Okay, together, five times. Relax your head. Now, slowly inhale and exhale. Now, try to be more concentrated on the Viśuddhi. Concentrate on the Viśuddhi a little bit more. Two, exhale. Three, exhale. Four, exhale. And five, exhale. Now, backward, inhale, feel the stretching in your thoracic area, in this throat; Viśuddhi is through this. Two, exhale, three, four, and once more, five. Relax in Daṇḍāsana. Observe your body. Try to feel Viśuddhi—the area where your thyroid gland is, the area of your throat. Be aware of your breathing. Try to relax completely. You may also feel Mūlādhāra and Maṇipūra very strongly, and feel this Viśuddhi. As you have all read the book, you know each chakra is also connected with some gland. But the chakra is not a gland; it is connected. Now, slowly stand up. One āsana: Ākarandanurāsana. This āsana is excellent, first for your Ājñā Chakra, because there is a similar way to practice as when you want to practice Trāṭak. There are many layers in each āsana. If you practice for the thoracic area, against kyphosis, if you want to breathe more, we will talk about one way. But today we are talking more about chakras. Separate your legs a little. Trāṭak is excellent for your Ājñā Chakra, but we will not use a candle now; we will observe the thumbnail. Open your right hand, but remain facing forward. Right hand, try to keep your arm parallel with the floor. Look at your nail. Also try to stretch your neck. We are observing the thumb. Nothing else exists, only one point. Look in a nice, soft way, the same as in Trāṭak, but also try to keep your eyes relaxed. Be aware of your pelvis position, not too far back. Here, we will also practice opening of the chest, which means Anāhata, but we will talk more about Ājñā. Try to be aware; maybe try to feel your eyebrow center. Now, together, slowly inhale, remain, and exhale. Two, slowly inhale, also try abdomen, chest, thoracic area. Keep focus on one point, exhale, and three inhale, and hands down. On the other side, just observe; nothing exists except the nail of your thumb. As if there is nothing else, just a nail on your finger. This is a very important āsana. Why is Arjuna always the one who is the great archer in the arch? There is focus. Nothing exists, only one. And that one is also our Self, that is Ātmā and Paramātmā, and our focus is on that one. Inhale and exhale. Two, do not hurry, only look at the one point. Exhale, and third, exhale. Now relax, breathe normally. We will do one more āsana. For Sahasrāra, headstand is mostly excellent because it also works on the honey śakti, but we will not do headstand today. We will do something else, excellent for concentration—I would say, for all our chakras: also Anāhata, Ājñā, focus. It will be from the fifth level: Ekapāda Praṇāmāsana. In Ekapāda Praṇāmāsana, we put the foot here, on the inner side. If you cannot do this, no problem, like in yoga for children. Standing on one leg is important. Hands beside. Now, in front of your heart. But where? Try to have your thumb in the middle. In the middle of your chest is your Anāhata Chakra—on the top, not the bottom, but a little top. Focus on one point. On the floor is much easier than on the mat. If you are standing on the floor, just observe one point. This āsana is also—I will not say famous—but some sādhus have sādhanā of standing in this position. I can say that this dream is very well known because one sādhu had many sādhus be in that position. Also, if you read the Mahābhārata, Arjuna was standing in this position to get a weapon from Śiva. Arjuna, in the Rāmāyaṇa—not the Rāmāyaṇa, but in the Mahābhārata—was in that position to get one weapon from Viṣṇu, Śiva. Now, close your eyes, as when we do Trāṭak. Close your eyes, as when you are doing Trāṭak, and try to see that same point in the inner space, in the negative. As when we do Trāṭak, try to see the same point as the negative inside, in yourself: Chidākāśa. Open your eyes. Hands go up to the sides and down. Change your leg. Thank you. Hands aside, and fold your hands in front of your chest. As we said before, the tops of the toes are on top of the Anāhata. Hṛdaya ākāśa, in that area. Be aware of your pelvis position. Also, do not lock your knee. Observe only one; focus on one point—not your neighbor, but something that is not movable. Now, close your eyes and try to see in the Chidākāśa, in the space of your inner space, try to see this point. If we are concentrated on one point, we will remain without movement. When our mind starts to go here and there, we lose concentration. Now, open your eyes. Hands up, to the side, and down. Praṇām Viśvagurujī. And slowly down. Let's go down. Stay a few moments in this position. Just remain for a couple of moments. Feel the effect of what you did. Hari Om and good appetite. Hari Om and good appetite.

This text is transcribed and grammar corrected by AI. If in doubt what was actually said in the recording, use the transcript to double click the desired cue. This will position the recording in most cases just before the sentence is uttered.

The text contains hyperlinks in bold to three authoritative books on yoga, written by humans, to clarify the context of the lecture:

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