"Who is Breathing?"

Swami Hariharananda and Don early 1980's at Chuck's Gallery NYC

God means different things to different people. 

Baba Hariharananda would often say:

"Watch the 'Marvelous Power of God', which is formless, breathing and performing action."

 Raghabanandaji like to use the term “Cosmic Force”. 

Each person should come to their own individual understanding and experience, as to who or what God is. 

It is a deeply personal relationship, as well as the role this understanding, integrates into ones life. 

Equally important is we should honor and respect each person’s individual understanding and belief, as long as it is an expression of love and compassion towards one own self and others. 

“Namaste” has become a popular expression in society and the meaning is to recognize and honor that every living soul is of the same divine source.

Kriya Yoga teaches that humanity shares the common belief that the “spark of the divine is in every living thing” 

As long as that divine spark is there, we say something is alive, and when that "divine spark" goes, we say it is dead.

Kriya Yoga is a technique which helps one find that “spark of the divine” within one’s own self and facilitates a deeper inner connection with this “divine spark”.

Finding this “divine spark” gives a person a much more joyful, fuller experience of being alive. 

This “spark of the divine” is an “inner experience” which is beyond the limitations of speech to fully define. 

It has a ‘formless quality of light, sound and vibration” and is not perceived by using the five senses. 

When one experiences this "marvelous formless power", one will perceive it as an all-pervading quality, both in the body form and in the surrounding formless infinite universe. 

The Kriya Yoga techniques help a person maintain "a constant alertness of this marvelous spark of the divine."

My cousin Lloyd who first introduced me to Swami Hariharananda and Kriya Yoga in 1981.

When I first met Baba Hariharananda is 1981, what impressed me was his very simple message and his ability to help a person directly experience what he was teaching. 

Meditating with him you felt your molecules re-arraigned. 

He asked: 

“Who is breathing? 

Can you perceive it is the living power of God who is breathing? 

No breath, No Life. 

Dead man cannot earn money, Dead man cannot enjoy sexually, Dead man cannot digest food.

So, you should watch your breath, love your breath, try to perceive the living power of God in every breath. 

It is God alone who is breathing. 

Thank God in every breath.”

This breath is a very special precious process which we don’t appreciate fully. 

We inhale and we exhale. 

But if even just once the process stops and we fail to inhale fresh oxygen into the body, the process of physical decay will begin and the heart and body systems will start to shut down. 

Our entire body system is designed to bring fresh oxygen into the lungs to purify and energize our blood, which is pumped throughout the body by the heart to nourish the cells and organs, particularly the brain. 

With each inhalation, we are bringing more fresh life nourishing oxygen into the body. 

With each exhalation we are removing the harmful carbon dioxide from the body.

"Oxygen is the principal source of energy for the brain."

It is because of this breathing process we are conscious beings and have the ability of higher cognitive functionality.

Kriya Yoga is known as “The Ancient Science of Breath”.

The tradition teaches that thousands of years ago, ancient Rishi’s, (wise souls) living in the Himalayas, studied the effect that the natural environment had on their consciousness. 

Their advanced mental capacity was highly perceptive of the body system (Ayurveda), the  natural physical environment (Vatsu), the effects of stars and planets (Jyotish, Vedic Astrology), and primordial sounds (Artha Veda,) to list a few of their intuitive abilities.

They studied their own consciousness and the effect that the “breath” had on their own perception and awareness.

They recognized the benefits that different body movements (mudras-asanas), breathing techniques (pranayama), concentration of the mind (dharana and dhyana), and primordial  sounds (mantras) provided. 

Their ability of direct perception of the effect that the breath had on a person’s consciousness, led them to the realization, that the breath has a subtle spiritual energy (prana – life force), in addition to its physical quality (oxygen). 

They could perceive this spiritual energy (prana - life force) and developed the ability to control or direct this divine current through-out the body system. 

Chakras

Particularly around the spine (chakras - spinal nerves) and brain (cranial nerves and glands).

Developing and applying a system of breathing techniques, concentration of the mind, and body movements (Kriya Yoga), they could become so absorbed in this spiritual energy (prana - life force), that the heart and breath would become completely still, while the mind and body remained in a non-decaying state. 

This “prana – life force" is completely sustaining and feeding the brain and physical body, so the oxygen requirement naturally drops off. 

Baba Hariharananda taught the real meaning of Pranayama:

 “the natural cessation of breath”. 

Consciously one’s awareness expands beyond the limitation of the senses and becomes one with the infinite all-pervading formless divinity. 

Baba would often say from “human consciousness to super consciousness to cosmic consciousness”.

This is known as “Nirvakalpa - Samadhi” (breathlessness - pulselessness state). 

The Yogis teach that this is the highest state of being, absorption with the divine. 

Beyond duality. Completely “merged with love”. (oneness)

“Brahman is transcendental yet all-pervasive and all-permeating. 

The Knower of Brahman (the Ultimate Reality) becomes Brahman."  (Pingala Upanishad)

For twenty years, I heard Baba Hariharananda say:

“Breath control is self-control. 

Breath mastery is death mastery. 

Breathlessness is deathlessness”.

Swami Hariharananda Giri early 1980's in Chuck's NYC Soho Art Gallery

“In the perfect stillness of body and mind, the yogi enjoys the ineffable peace of the presence of the soul.” …Paramhansa Yogananda