Meditation is becoming more and more popular modern world. Why are yogis, doctors of traditional and alternative medicine, psychologists, martial artists and representatives of creative professions confident in the undoubted benefits of this practice? Scientific research from the US National Library of Medicine tells how the cyclic meditation technique affects the body.

Theory. The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali say: "Tatra pratyayaikatanata dhyanam" - a continuous stream of consciousness directed at the object of meditation, is dhyana (Skt.). Why is dhyana the seventh of the eight stages of self-improvement, and is it recommended to start with more accessible yoga techniques? The point is in the reactions of the mind that prevent the unprepared consciousness from concentrating:

1. Rajas - the mind jumps from thought to thought and is not focused on practice;
2. Tamas - the mind falls into inertia and falls asleep.

The Mandukya Upanishad verse says: “In a state of mental inactivity, awaken the mind; when the mind is agitated, calm it down. Between these two states, experience the full range of its possibilities. When the mind reaches perfect balance, don't disturb it again."

In 1996 at the University of Yoga. Swami Vivekananda, inspired by ancient lines, Dr. H. R. Nagendra, personal yoga consultant to the Prime Minister of India, developed a dynamic technique of cyclic meditation (a sequence of stimulating and relaxing asanas with instructed concentration on sensations). In subsequent years, the Center for Scientific Research at the university, together with scientists from the United States, studied its effects on humans and found out the following:

• Breath. Breathing volume after the practice of cyclic meditation increases, and oxygen consumption decreases by approximately 30%. This may be due to a decrease in oxygen consumption by the brain and skeletal muscles due to deep physiological relaxation.
• Metabolism. Measurements of energy expenditure, respiratory quotient, and heart rate before, during, and after cyclic meditation and normal rest showed that the cyclic meditation technique resulted in greater reductions in energy expenditure.
• autonomic nervous system. Measuring the power of high- and low-frequency fluctuations in heart rate variability after the practice of cyclic meditation indicates an increase in the tone of the vagus nerve of the parasympathetic nervous system, aimed at self-regulation and normalization of life. The activity of the sympathetic nervous system, characterized by a state of stress, is reduced.
• Attention and memory. A study of P300, "cognitive potential", an electrophysiological measure of focused attention, has documented an improvement in the ability to distinguish auditory stimuli from different sounds and an increase in the waiting times for evoked potentials formed in the cerebral cortex. Immediate improvement in memory tasks and elimination of redundant words that require skills in selective attention, concentration, visual scanning and repetitive motor response is seen immediately after practice. The mechanism by which cyclic meditation increases attention while decreasing the tone of the sympathetic nervous system is difficult to understand and explain. As a rule, an increase in susceptibility is associated not with a decrease, but with an increase in sympathetic tone. The effect can be explained by an increase in the influx of proprioceptive impulses into the reticular activating system, which, in turn, maintains the susceptibility and activity of the cerebral cortex field. Presumably The practice not only improves productivity globally, but also selectively reduces the likelihood of distraction.
• Occupational stress. Cyclic meditation leads to a decrease in the level of professional stress and physiological manifestations of anxiety.
• Dream. Polysomnography measurements and post-practice self-reported sleep showed a significant increase in the percentage of non-REM sleep at night; the percentage of sleep with rapid eye movement and the number of awakenings per hour are reduced, and well-being in the morning improves. Cyclic meditation contains a number of sleep-promoting components: increased physical activity, muscle stretch, interoception, and instructed relaxation.
• The Nature of Mindfulness and Delusion. The picture of the human world consists of two parts: objective - information received from the organs of sensory perception (vision, hearing, smell, taste and tactile sensations), and subjective - numerous filters of personal assessments and associations through which this information then passes. At the stage of subjectivization (occurring in the form of an internal dialogue), a person begins to distort the picture of the world with his own thoughts and emotions, which leads to acute and chronic stress and results in psychosomatic diseases.

The solution that yogis have found is simple: there is control over thoughts and emotions - there are no health problems. Not a single manifestation of reality in itself can be either bad or good - it receives an assessment already in the head of the perceiver. The famous “I am THAT” means the ability to turn off all subjective filters and get a complete picture, formed only by the organs of sensory perception. In such a moment of awareness, the boundary between the observer and the observed is blurred, and he becomes what he feels.

To succeed, you need to keep the focus of attention on continuous observation of sensations for a long time by an effort of will, avoiding any distractions and conversations in your head. Practices that allow you to learn how to do this are meditations. Their benefit is that the brain at rest, freed from numerous stressful impulses and senseless energy expenditure, has the opportunity to better process objective sensations and adjust the body's vital systems in accordance with them.

Regular meditations allow you to gradually move from the nervous world of ideas about right and wrong into reality, from anxiety about the past and future - into a healthy feeling of the present.

Cyclic meditation is a technique of deep relaxation of the body and mind, developed at the Vivekananda Yoga Kendra Institute (Bangalore).

Ilya: “I mastered it over 15 years ago under the guidance of my first yoga teacher, Jayakumar Swamishri from Mysore. Since then, it has proven itself more than once in my numerous classes and seminars as an effective technique for expanding the boundaries of the perception of one's body and relieving internal tension.

During the practice, we perform several simple asanas in extremely slow motion with our eyes closed, tracking the subtle and hidden sensations in the body. For deeper relaxation of certain parts of the body, we chant bija mantras (syllables), directing sound vibration inward. It gives a very interesting and tangible effect.”

Cyclic meditation allows you to increase the level of sensitivity by entering an altered state of consciousness, as well as to reveal and dissolve hidden tensions in both the body and mind (due to the enslavements of the body). The ability to consciously monitor the state of your body from the gross to the most subtle level of sensations is the key to the practice of traditional meditation, and also frees you from many psychosomatic tensions that are invisible to us in the normal state, giving a feeling of lightness and clarity in the body and mind.

The session includes a lecture on the method and a 1-hour session of cyclic meditation.

Cost - 500 rubles.
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Meditation is a state that cannot be described in words, it is beyond the realm of words. Therefore, everything that is written below is only a rough attempt to describe possible ways to approach meditation.

Method features

Yoga masters say that meditation cannot be achieved by any means. She happens on her own. "The door opens with reverse side". But it opens only to those who are ready.
Therefore, people practice different types of meditation. For example, these:

• Dynamic Meditation- synchronous movements that require calmness, balance, even breathing ... all this distracts attention from the usual thought process, and the state of meditation arises by itself.
• Cyclic meditation- when exercises combined with breathing are performed one after the other in a circle. Exercise forces you to pay attention to the sensations that arise in the body. Thus, something new enters the consciousness, for which the mind has no name. By keeping attention on new sensations, the practitioner enters a state of meditation.
• Meditation on God(one, or one of His incarnations) is not a prayer. That is, there is no request for something for yourself or for others. Here there is only place for unity, and this leads to identification with God or one of his hypostases.
• Meditation on a saint helps unity with a holy soul, freed from illusions, and able to help others in this.
• Meditation with support. For beginners, this is the best meditation practice. As long as the mind is not calm and cannot free itself from the cloud of thoughts, it can be trained to focus on one thing. Chanting a mantra, breathing, a dot on the floor, a picture of a deity, visualization are all supports for the mind. Having become accustomed to turning off all thoughts, except for the support, the practitioner discards it too, remaining in a state of pure perception.
• Meditation without support- more difficult. How difficult it is, you can feel right now. Close your eyes and try not to wander off with your thoughts. Observe the birth of thoughts and let them go without following them with attention.

Effect

One of the consequences of meditation is a state of balance and peace. In meditation, a person goes beyond the boundaries of his mind, perceiving the world as a whole. In meditation it is impossible to be unhappy, because “unhappiness” is also only a category of the mind, a conditional assessment.
Harmony acquired in a state of meditation has a beneficial effect on the entire body, bringing all organs and systems into balance. Enveloping the depths of the subconscious with peace, meditation heals from diseases that medicine is powerless against.
For most practitioners, meditation does not mean a state of meditation at all, but even an attempt to meditate clearly shows what processes usually take place in our mind. By observing these processes, we understand how to get rid of thoughts that burden us, forcing us to desire something all the time, to be afraid of something, and to achieve something by the sweat of our brow.

Who will suit

Meditation helps anyone. The question is to choose the appropriate method. People differ greatly in temperament, lifestyle, culture, way of perception. That is why there are thousands of ways to meditate.

"Circular Meditation"

For a long time, deep relaxation techniques have been part of the practice of hatha yoga, both in its ancient medieval version (familiar to us from Sanskrit treatises), and in modern approaches that take into account the increased stress loads of current practitioners, especially residents of megacities.

For example, shavasana - the “dead body pose”, designed for deep relaxation after the practice of “training” asanas, is mentioned in the 15th century treatise Hatha Yoga Pradipika. Any asana practice session in various schools in India necessarily ends with shavasana, often with the voice of a teacher who, with a relaxing intonation, calls all parts of the body in turn, helping the practitioner to relax the body consciously and in stages, which gives a deeper effect. This is practiced, for example, in the line of Sivananda Yoga and many related schools.

Hence, from the “shavasana to the voice of the teacher”, which may have been practiced in Indian yoga schools for many years or even centuries, a whole series of deep relaxation techniques arose, where, in addition to “just lying”, work with attention and entry into trance states (that is, altered states of consciousness, when the activity of the ordinary, “rational” mind, in which an ordinary person has an almost continuous “internal dialogue”, is reduced, as if “lulled”). The state of light trance acquired through relaxation, according to modern psychologists, is in itself a healing "unloading" of the psyche. As my hypnotherapy teacher, Professor M.R. Ginsburg: "The trance state is therapeutic in itself."

Similar yogic techniques of deep relaxation include Yoga Nidra, developed by Swami Satyananda Saraswati and Cyclic meditation, known to us from the methods of the Yoga Therapeutic Institute "Vivekananda Yoga Kendra", Bangalore, Karnataka, India.
My first yoga teacher Sri Jayakumar Swamishri from Mysore graduated from this institute, and under his guidance I got acquainted with the practice of Cyclic Meditation in the classes at the Indian Embassy in Moscow in 1995.

The name Cyclic Meditation reflects the gradual movement of attention through the body (attention “scans” the body from the feet to the top of the head and back, describing the “cycle”), which is also reminiscent of working with attention in the Buddhist meditation technique “vipassana”. Of the publications known to me with a description of this practice, I met only one - the actual textbook on English language for students of the Bangalore Yoga Institute who are taking a 3-year course of study, which is not available commercially. Therefore, this practice, despite its effectiveness, is quite rare in the arsenal of Western yoga teachers.

The objectives of the practice of Cyclic meditation are as follows: deep relaxation of the physical body, detection and release of habitual muscle tensions, enslavements (what is sometimes called “blocks in the body” in colloquial language), learning to control attention by consciously turning attention inward, directing it to “ gross (muscles, joints) and subtle (blood circulation, signals of the nervous system) sensations in the body, as well as observing the change in states of mind and emotional background - which is the first step to the practice of meditation as such.

The entire session of Cyclic meditation is performed with closed eyes, which provides partial pratyahara (one of the steps of Patanjali's Ashtanga yoga, meaning "turning inward" sensory perception) - after all, in psychology there is an opinion that about 70% of information we receive through visual perception, therefore very a large amount of attention is redirected to kinesthetic sensations and introspection (self-observation).

Physically, the practice of Cyclic Meditation is very easy, several postures are simple and no matter how a person performs them in terms of "aligning" the asanas - one must do it in a relaxed way, "as it turns out." The task of asanas here is only to observe the internal sensations in the body in different positions of the body (the main directions of mobility). The basic version proposed by me on the audio CD "Cyclic Meditation, Tratak, Shavasana" (2014) uses a minimal set of poses - shavasana, tadasana, parshva-chandrasana (lateral tilt from a standing position, also found under the name ardhakati-chakrasana), anuvittasana (half-bending from a standing position with palms on the lower back), relaxed uttanasana and again shavasana for “sound relaxation”. This is quite enough to observe various sensations in the anterior, posterior and lateral planes of the body. In a more complex version of the practice, Vajrasana, Yoga Mudrasana, Ushtrasana are added (in accordance with the manual of the Bangalore Institute). An experienced teacher can add other poses that compensate for the impact of each other.

The practice begins, as is customary in traditional Indian yoga, with a mantra that sets you up for meditative performance and reminds you of the goal-setting of yoga as such (purification of consciousness).

Here is an excerpt from the tutorial with the initial mantra.

“The mind, which is in a sleeping state, should be awakened.
The distracted (restless) mind should be calmed down again.
One should fully know the mind colored by desires.
The mind that has reached balance should not be disturbed (again).

Then a “quick relaxation” is performed in shavasana - the well-known principle of post-isometric relaxation is used here (this type of shavasana is widely used in Sivananda yoga). First, all muscle groups, under the voice of the leader, are tensed as much as possible for a few seconds, then they are “released” with an exhalation. There is a deep relaxation.

Then, in a standing position (tadasana, but not according to Iyengar, without detuning, just standing straight with hands at the seams), the practice of observing the sensation of the center of gravity in the feet and mentally “scanning” all four sides of the body with observation of any kind of sensations is performed (detailed instructions on the audio recording ). This allows you to “tune” your attention to observing “subtle” signals and body sensations. A further method of focusing attention is the extremely slow (“as in slow motion”) entry and exit into the asanas indicated earlier in the text. Slowing down the movement ("millimeter by millimeter") leads to the ability to feel previously imperceptible processes - the work of muscles and joints, the movement of blood circulation, impulses of the nervous system and changes in the state of mind. Also, such a slow movement can be attributed to the methods of "kinesthetic" entry into a state of light trance (and this, as we remember, is already unloading the psyche), because it "shifts" the process of perception from the ordinary level.

An important point of practice, which I always explain before a session, is the position of the "internal observer", the mental "disidentification" of the observer and the observed objects (in this case, one's own body and state of mind). The principle of disidentification underlies all meditation practices East, and in Ericksonian psychotherapy is one of the tools for immersion in trance (dissociation). In addition to the relaxation of the psyche, it has a much deeper potential than just a trance state - the ability to control the mind and emotions, observing their fluctuations "as if from the outside." However, in this case, we adhere to a simple, basic task - to learn to observe and feel the signals of the body and changes in the mind, while staying at a certain stable point of the “observer” or “seeer” (how can one not recall the term “drashta” in the first slokas of the Yoga Sutras ). So simple technique relaxation may well be a stepping stone on the path to Raja Yoga.

Whatever sensations and states of mind the practitioner notices, he should observe them evenly, impartially, not becoming attached to pleasant sensations and not worrying about unpleasant ones (due to the release of tensions from the body and mind, there may be short-term pain in one area or another body, usually in places of old traumas, or short-term "jumps" of the emotional state). The practitioner learns to observe any states with detachment, while maintaining calmness and stability of his “internal fulcrum”. The release of tensions occurs spontaneously (as I suppose, due to the state of light trance), the practitioner himself needs only to observe.

Another important point of practice is the singing of sounds (syllables) with the mental "direction" of sound vibration to one or another part of the body, for a deeper relaxation effect. In traditional yoga, there is a whole range of practices called "nada pranayama" (from the Sanskrit "nada" - sound). These are techniques such as Brahmari pranayama (described in the Hatha Yoga Pradipika), Brahma mudra pranayama (taught at the ashram of Swami Gitananda in Pondicherry) and others. Work with sound is even more widely represented in Mantra Yoga: bija mantras of the Tantric tradition of Sri Vidya and the like. At our level of practice, the sound vibration of the Vedic mantra Om divided into three syllables (long sounds A, U and M are sung), along with directing attention to parts of the body, is a psycho-somatic relaxation technique, the effect that everyone can feel for themselves.

At the end of the practice, the “Omkar-dhyana” technique is added - “meditation on the sound of the Om mantra”, when practitioners lie in shavasana for 10-15 minutes and sing the mantra, mentally imagining its vibration throughout the body.

The whole session in the basic version takes about an hour. Together with the practice of Yoga Nidra, Cyclic meditation is one of the most effective deep relaxation techniques that does not require the practitioner to have any special level of training and experience in yoga, and can be used as part of both independent (on record) and group yoga practice along with asanas. , pranayama and meditation.

Made by me together with sound producer Sergey Galoyan (Moscow, Los Angeles), a professional audio recording contains detailed instructions, but the ideal option is the experience of practice with a qualified teacher (familiar with the methodology), and then independent practice on the record. The insert to the cover of the disc contains drawings of asanas and recommendations for implementation.

Also released disc contains audio tracks for independent practice of Trataka (contemplation of a candle flame with 4 focus points, in the tradition of Sivananda yoga, according to the instructions of yogacharya Munusami Madavan) and detailed shavasana with the voice of the presenter.

Practice Trataka(contemplation with focused attention) on a candle flame refers to the traditional yogic purification techniques (shatkarmas), described in a treatise of the 15th century AD. Hatha Yoga Pradipika. The practice has a beneficial effect on vision and detoxification of the eyes (through tearing), and also "purifies" the state of consciousness, helping to make it stable and one-pointed. In medieval Tantric hatha yoga, it was believed that trataka activates the power of intuition and the ajna chakra (eyebrow energy center). IMPORTANT! The flame should be at a distance of at least 1.5 - 2 meters from the face, at eye level. Abundant tearing is favorable, but with severe discomfort (burning, feeling of “overheating” of the eyes), the practice should be ended.

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In cyclic meditation, exercises are combined with breathing. They are performed one after the other in a circle, allowing you to pay attention to the sensations that arise in the body. Thus, something new enters the consciousness, for which the mind has no name. By keeping your attention on new sensations, you enter a state of meditation.

This is a simple and effective stress relief technique that helps you relax deeply. Cyclic meditation is based on the principle of alternating stimulation and relaxation. The combination of simple postures, sound and focused attention significantly reduces psychological stress.

It has been proven that Circular Meditation can reduce the amount of time spent sleeping and at the same time lead to rejuvenation.

Benefits of Cyclic Meditation:

* 30 minutes of deepest rest during Cyclic Meditation is equivalent to 6 hours of sleep

* Practitioners of Cyclic Meditation sleep less and get better sleep

* Calms the mind

* Increases productivity

* Eliminates anger and irritability

* Leads to emotional stability

* Increases creativity and discipline

Meditation is conducted by Anna Sidilkovskaya.

Phone for preliminary appointment 777-115-7.

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