Can Anyone Identify this Pran Yoga?

hi, i've been doing this form of pran (breath) yoga, where you sit in lotus position, plug your left nostril, and exhale through your right nostril, envisioning red smoke coming out, which is supposed to symbolize anger and disease. the you do the same for the left nostril, envisioning blue/gray smoke, which symbolizes mental obstruction. then you exhale through your mouth and it's purple smoke, which is inertia on the path. i thought i read about this in Ram Dass's Be Here Now, but i can't find it in the book, and now i don't know anything about it except how to do what i described above. does anyone know anything about this? i'd like to find a source to verify that i'm doing it right.

 

hey, actually ive read of the practice that youre performing. youre doing it correctly, if you are female you have to reverse the order. but yea, the book is "the tibetan yogas of dream and sleep", good book. but yea, youve got it right, only "prana" is the word that youre looking for. good luck and enjoy!

 

The practice which you speak of is called Pranayama. (Control of the breath for mental discipline.) Prana can be translated to "breath" but it is as difficult to define as God. Prana is a life force which is in all things. The body can live with out touch, sight, taste etc. but the moment breath stops, life stops.

First off, Pranayama can be a dangerous practice. Advising one to try Pranayama out of curiousity can only be described as criminal so I advise you to seek a teacher if you are serious. Second, Pranayama is one of eight branches of Yoga, only to be practiced after a steady practice of Asana (posture) is attained. Devotion to God is vital for progress.
As far as practice goes, one should not focus on anything but the breath and how the mind reacts. Absolutely do not breathe through the mouth. Pay attention to what thought waves arise in your mind at certain points. I will not go into specific explanations of practice, but it is about letting the breath shape you, to the point that your insides are no longer mysterious anatomy. It is about concentrating where the breath touches you, also about observerving the sound of the breath. It's not a detached state, but a very focused state... just not the way most of use are used to focusing. Anyways I hope this helped you and I wish you the best of luck.


Namaste

 

well thanks guys, that gives me some background. i can't say i agree with prana yoga only to be practiced after asanas, due to the fact that some people (such as myself) are naturally less-than-very-flexible, and cannot easily perform asanas. i heard of prana yoga as simply another possible practice for spiritual development, rather than a stage before or after something, and the only yoga i've been advised to take caution with has been kundalini, which i dont know much about anyway. also, i know there are several different specific practices that could be called pranayama (or pranyam, the way i learned it before), so what's this particular one called? while im on the question roll, is it a buddhist or hindu tradition (not that it really matters)?

 

It is one kind - one of the most basic - of pranayama.