The Gentle Revolution - Episode 4 - The Symphony of Practice
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Hi there. Welcome back to the gentle revolution podcast. Firstly, my sincere apologies for taking so long to come back with this episode, I think we're up to episode number four. Now it has been a little bit of a pause between the episodes. I had a little bit going on. I was in the tail end of a meditation, teacher training.
And there was a lot going on there. Plus Christmas, new year's, all this stuff happened. So had a little pause, but we are really revved up for the year ahead. 2025. I have. Organized a whole bunch of guests.
Covering a whole range of topics. The core of this podcast is about self-awareness about using meditation breath, work, yoga self-awareness practices in intentional, meaningful ways. I am a teacher of yogic meditation. So obviously I have a very particular. Interest in this area, but I'm really open to explore all the modalities as long as there's [00:01:00] some reflection of self-awareness things, tools, experiences that we use to. Calm the farm, slow us down.
Bring us into this capacity for. Awareness via Vairagya, gentle detachment from emotions and experiences and the capacity to reflect, to be accountable. To be counted to be purposeful Dharma karma, these core teachings that resonate within the heart of yogic practice. This is the. The passion that I would wish to explore and to share with you through this podcast. So my name is Mark Purser. I am a teacher.
As I mentioned of yogic meditation, I've studied the area for over 25 years now. Caught up with a friend over Christmas and we reflected pretty much at the beginning of our journey together in my very early twenties, I was introduced to Qigong through my friend's auntie, who is a Qigong teacher and started exploring the energetic elements of [00:02:00] Qigong. Found that fascinating to connect with Chi / Prana and. Over time developed competence in that school.
And then I was introduced to yoga through yoga, Asana of Vinyasa yoga, particularly Ashtanga Vinyasa. I started practicing and. Studying classical Vinyasa yoga, which I found to be really profound and brought me into a state of balance. Physically and energetically that I didn't realize were possible. From there, I had a fairly wide journey which include periods of No yoga and I was fairly wild. So many times in my life, in fact, And I had experiences of mental ill health, depression, anxiety that led me to ultimately a school of meditation through the insight meditation tradition. And that really turned things [00:03:00] on. As to what. Ultimately, the practice is all about, I was at. Time's really balanced and physically powerful in my body, but I was not balanced in my mind. And I hate to say it, but it's very true that you do see many yogis in the current world who are doing a lot of yoga, but they're not getting the result because they're not. Having the complete practice, which brings me to the topic for today's podcast, which is what I've described as the symphony of practice.
Ultimately bringing different types of practice together to cultivate. Holistic experience of wellbeing. So we've physically strong. Energetically powerful and balanced and mentally refined and purposeful. This is the offering of yoga and particularly the school of yogic meditation. I mentioned before that I'd was introduced to meditation through Buddhism. Which is the Vipasana technique is a [00:04:00] Buddhist tradition.
I was very fortunate to have in factor a psychologist who I was consulting, going to see, because I was a bit of a mess. Her name was Radha Nicholson, and an amazing psychologist who very gently over a period of time led me to understand that. For me to get truly well. And for me to find the equanimity. That I was so desperately seeking. Meditation was going to need to be a part of the package.
And so I started actually, Practicing. Vipasana with her. And then I went and did it. A number of sits through the Goenke tradition, which is. Very commonly known. They offer an amazing opportunity to do 10 day sits at various retreat centers around the world. And then from there, I was really lucky to be introduced into the school of Andy yoga and such an under yoga is essentially classical yoga. That has meditation baked into it.
So it is a. A tradition of yoga that brings together. [00:05:00] Asana physical practice. Meditation pranayama. Arm and Kriya yoga, as well as the fundamental practice of karma yoga, which is ultimately the yoga of awareness of action. Yoga beyond the mat, yoga out in your daily life. Mindfulness is it's often referred to. The school of such in under yoga, which was developed by a Swami sateen. And under who was a student of Swami Shivan under a Rishi cash. Has had a really powerful presence in the world over the last.well Swami Satyananda a was born in the 1920s Swami Shivananda under born in the 18 hundreds and have had prolific reach and bringing yoga. A holistic system of yoga out into the world.
And if you look on the shelves of most yoga teachers, they're going to have a number of Bihar squads off. We're known as the Bihar school of yoga. This is such an under a yoga publications trust. They have three stripes on the books and they have an amazing library. I think about 300 books that they've published to her. University text level, and that [00:06:00] school has had a profound reach around the world, but particularly in my world, that has resonated very deeply.
I did all their. Yeah, yoga teacher training studies over a number of years and have subsequently offered. That system of yoga through my own trainings as well. For me. The holistic practice is. Fundamental and the purpose of this podcast. I hope that I can introduce you to what that looks like. And for those people who have perhaps a physical practice of yoga and are looking to add more elements, You can consider what elements might be more suitable to you where they're going to help.
And perhaps those who have more of a meditational focused practice might want to introduce more physical components. So there's a couple of things that I want to introduce as. A bit of an overview and we talk about Asana, Pranayama & meditation is the three pillars of a holistic practice. But under each of those.topics s asana pranayama and [00:07:00] meditation.
We've got many subcategories. So we'll start with Asana, which is essentially postures, yoga, postures, and most of the physical practices, all of the physical practices are going to include us asanas. So you heard of many of them. Trikonasana triangle pose often has Asana at the end of it.
All of the asanas. Asking us to bring our body into. Particular states of being this can't be a holistic covering of the whole purpose of arson, or I'm really looking at it more of a helicopter view. But ultimately what our center is looking to do is bring balance to the physical. And also it resonates across the energetic and the mental body as well.
So through movement of the body in particular ways, we're looking to. Bring balance into joints. Stretch muscles build strength. As well as activate Nadis, that's a really [00:08:00] important part of Asana as well. So we're looking to activate Nadis. If you're looking at the practice of Vinyasa yoga. That's dynamic movement.
So we're bringing breath very much into play here, movement and breath aligned. And that is a very powerful mental practice. So bringing the breath. Aligning. The mind, the breath and the body has a really profound effect on. The whole body mind complex and is a profoundly. Transformative experience. It's not going to be suitable for all people all of the time.
And in fact, a lot of the Vinyasa yoga that's taught is really strong. Probably unnecessarily. And unfortunately a lot of the emphasis gets put into really strong postures rather than that fundamental alignment of body breath and mind. So we can. Really refine the Asana practice. In fact, Vinyasa practice doesn't need to be super complicated.
You can slow it down and [00:09:00] just anywhere. Where you gently align movement and breath. Can be Vinyasa Vinyasa actually means to intelligently sequence. So to bring postures into an intelligent sequence, to create a desired effect. We have the school of Hatha yoga, any form of physical yoga is ultimately a practice of Hatha yoga.
Hatha describing the sun and the moon. So it's this idea of creating balance between the polarities balancing the. Pingala and the Ida Nadis which are the main meridians, the main nadis that run through each of us and allowing the Sushumna Nadi to flow. Once they come into balance.
Hatha yoga is quite systematic.
Hatha yoga. We're talking about the classical Hatha yoga. It is. Really refining. Prana in a particular way. So we can. Look to activate Kundalini. [00:10:00] And they have the yoga, which is espoused through the Hatha yoga Pradapika and also the Geranda Samita, two key texts on Hatha yoga there. Gives us an instruction manual to help ultimately. Activate Prana in a very particular way. We're raising prana, upward, burning off some scars. Which are our. The accumulated karmas in a very particular building, fire building strength.
Fire is very much at the core of Hatha yoga practice, building power, building heat. So how the yoga requires a strong body, but it is also incurred including. They've got a lot of physical postures, but there is an alignment also with breath. And also Mantra and pranayama. Is fundamental to it, including which we'll get more into in a little while Bundas, which are energy locks and mud. which are energy seals.
So I am going to touch upon each of these elements just [00:11:00] briefly just to give you an overview of what they might look like. I want to give you a helicopter view and give you some detail for the nerds, but also not make it too academic. So the next part of yogic meditation. The holistic yoga system is going to be premium.
So pranayama is. Working with breath in a very particular way that. We can create desired effects. So there are plenty arms, which energize us create heat, create fire, as we mentioned before, so we can burn off some scars. There are. Pranayamas which bring balance to the body. Pranayamas being. Breath practices, but not just limited to breath practices. Pranayama goes beyond the breath and we have plenty arms that ultimately will tranquilize. The system as well. I did. I mention Arsenault before there's also categories of us and us.
So there's our centers that will activate us. For [00:12:00] example, back-bending chest opening are very activating extroverted practices. If you do the opposite, if you come into forward bends, it is considered to be more introverted. And these have profound effects on our nervous system and our minds twisting can be energizing detoxifying. Standing postures, building strength, earthing, grounding. Balancing posture.
So there's all sorts of different categories of postures under asana and are in the same with pranayama in fact the same with meditation as well. We have different meditation techniques, which work in a very different way, which is why we need a holistic system. I've often said, and if you listened to my previous podcasts, I'm very clear that we generally speaking one meditation technique is not going to be suitable for all people all the time.
And within our trainings, we are. Very big on ensuring that people have. Not an overwhelming number, but a core number of key techniques. So you have techniques to focus the mind, what we call focused [00:13:00] awareness meditation mantra. Is a really big part of that. Being able to focus your attention, whether it's on the breath. The mantra bringing mantra and breath together.
The so hum mantra, a beautiful practice introduced into Ajapa Japa. And we have Antar Mouna mindfulness practices, but passion is one helping us to recalibrate our relationship to thoughts, to experiences. This. Capacity of Vairagya or mindful detachment. They're really profound skill that all meditators should learn.
And then there are certain meditation techniques, which bring a lot of this together. So when I talk about the different categories and the different techniques, They're very rarely done exclusively. What we would do. If we look at Pranayama, for example, it is working on our mind. It's working on our. Energetic system.
Our nervous system is also working on our physical body, the same with physical practice. And this is where the symphony of practice comes together. When we're bringing Asana, pranayama, breath, and [00:14:00] meditation, and together, we create this holistic system. Which it's a toolkit ultimately, which will enable us to cultivate really profound change.
So there are various models, which we can utilize to help. Understand how to use these techniques. One of the most important is the Koshas and the Koshas are the dimensions of experience. So we have a Anamaya kosher, which is our food body. Pranamaya kosha. We've heard the word Pranayama before so we have And my kosher, the energy body Manamaya Kosha, Manas is the mind. Is our intellect. Mental body. And Vijayanamaya is the. Part of us that connects to divinity. So it becomes more and more subtle in working from the physical, the food body undermine means literally food. Into Panama, the energy body Mona my mind is becoming [00:15:00] again, more subtle.
The undermine is moving beyond the individual mind into the Buddhi mind, the higher mind moving beyond our individuality into. Bliss consciousness and ultimately arriving in an Anandamaya, which is pure bliss. And so the practices that we do are designed a holistic practice is designed to affect each of the koshers in. Maybe just general ways just doing something for each kosher, I think is a very. Sensible start to the practice, making sure that I'm doing something to work with my physical body, something to work with my breath, something to work with my mind. And something to connect me to bliss and various practices.
I mentioned before, will do. Multiple things and work across various koshers. But as far as physical practice goes, I see a lot of yogis these days, who aren't actually doing so much. Asana. [00:16:00] They're actually doing a lot of different physical practice. I think yoga practice gives you a really wonderful. Bedrock of understanding using Bandhas and mudras and that awareness of proprioception my body and time and space. Sets me up to do most other exercise better.
So for myself, I love to surf. I'd love to be in the ocean and to swim and to dive I'm really into free diving. So I love to climb mountains, hug trees. Love lifting weights. I've been doing a lot of white training recently and just. General. High energy workouts,
I still practice Asana and I still do. Not necessarily every day, but at least a few days a week. A gentle stretching routine, which again, brings breath, mind, movement together. I'm not looking towards Asana as being the way that I'm going to transcend. It is a practice that I use to bring [00:17:00] myself into. This current time and place.
So I can then move into the next practice, which is pranayama so I can breathe better and I can sit more quietly. That is ultimately. Y our center is there to bring us into this time and place so we can breathe with the fullness of capacity and exploring the breath, I think is something that. Can take a lifetime.
There is so much to do there from the simple practices. And again, I've discussed this in previous podcasts. Worthwhile going and having a look. If you haven't already. Understanding, just the simple breath, full yogic, breathing, abdominal breathing, understanding my diaphragm. Learning how to balance my energy system through naughty showed on. And then moving perhaps into the more complex, sophisticated practices of primary arming, including Bundas breath, retentions. Learning how to move energy whilst. Breathing and.
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is a really fundamental part of Kriya Yoga and Kriya yoga is when we bring. Awareness of breath. Awareness of prana. Awareness of our chakras and using more dramas. Does bonders.
To create specific effects to burn off some scars. So create yoga is a very sophisticated science, which includes. A lot of different elements that could include us in, or it could include pranayama. Arm month, right? And it is ultimately a time system of meditation, which I highly recommend. It's quite profound, but it's not for beginners.
Plenty. I'm the primary arm. Everyone can do. Is the belly breath, full yogic breath. And look for some of us, maybe that's enough for the lifetime. That's such a powerful practice to understand how to breathe more completely and fully how to relax ourselves with the breath. With lengthening the exhalation, playing around with the ratios within our breath is a really [00:19:00] profound tool kit there.
Maybe that's enough, but if you want to advance and I know many of you are curious, then that is the way I'm actually going to be in July this year. Running a course in Bali, a seven day Kundalini tantra course. So here, interested in learning more about the path of Kriya yoga. Kundalini yoga is that sometimes called. Check that one out.
There is. Beyond that again, the school of meditation, which Raja yoga, doesn't actually talk about so much about us and there isn't expectation and understanding that there is a practice that brings the physical body into balance that has happened. And then you are ready to meditate. And again, meditation has different. Different forms and different purposes.
And it's not just about locking onto one. Maybe for a time you could just work with one exclusively. But certainly in my meditation training, I am teaching a focused awareness meditation. Number of focus awareness meditation. The core [00:20:00] one is a Ajapa Japa which is using breath awareness within the Chakra points. To Awaken chakras and to stabilize the mind.
And then we have Antar Mouna, which is a practice of mindfulness, which is helping us to. Declutter the mind ultimately coming into this experience of Antar Mouna means in Inner Silence, this experience of moving beyond the mind.
And there is, of course, my dear friend, yoga nidra, which is a practice of letting go of the mind completely.
In fact, letting go of all thoughts all time and experience yoga nidra is our resting meditation, which is deeply restorative. So again, they all work in symphony over time. You will learn how to. Practice each one appropriately.
You have the complete effect. And it might mean in my own journey.
There's been times where I only did yoga nidra. I might've been, I was always doing some other sort of [00:21:00] exercise, but my core practices. A yoga nidra. And there's times where I'm just working on Antar Mouna or just focusing on Ajapa Japa or going really deep into a premium practice. And other times where I do blend it all together.
But. Over the course of time. I have had an experience, a deep experience with each of these practices, which gives me the holistic understanding. And they all the ripple effect continues. So I hope that is useful. I hope that gives you a little bit of an overview as to, as I described the symphony of practice, why we should consider.
Including. Each element. Of the practice. I do have various podcasts, which talk about this more deeply. Particularly around the relationship with meditation. And also if you go into yogicmeditation.net, there is a short, free course you can do. I am running. Trainings in [00:22:00] depth trainings. Meditation breathwork, teacher training.
There's one running it starting at the end of January, 2025. I'm not sure when you're listening to this, but there's one more from the date of recording coming up in a few weeks and I'll run that training a couple of times a year. That's probably another one. Later in the year, I'm also running trainings in Bali. Best thing to do is check the BambooYogaByron.com website, all YogicMeditation.net for all those dates, or just reach out, ask a question I'm really happy to interact. It's a deep passion. Two. Bring forth this. Information in a way that is meaningful and purposeful. As I mentioned before, we've got a bunch of guests coming up and we'll be talking about different elements of the. Meditation system. The mindful life, the spiritual life over the year to come.
I wish you all the best for 2025. I hope that I get to connect with some of you and. Bring all of you, a little bit of. Clarity. I hope this [00:23:00] podcast is useful. Hari Aum Tat Sat.
