Breathe!

 by Kerry Edwards

Where do you turn when the canon of great and contemporary fiction leaves you wanting something more? When you find that current affairs make you anxious and that your optimism for the future seems to be waning.

As trite as it sounds – you must breathe! Yogic traditions have long hailed this simple practice of connected breath as the great healer both for the physical and the metaphysical.

I came across this practice recently and discovered the amazing reach it has, to plough the depths of your psyche and to root out buried trauma and fear that had long been forgotten. There is, therefore, an opportunity for counselling that works without words, that you administer yourself and with your support just with your own breath. It has the power to transform.

Consider the idea of your soul being a collection of your thoughts. It is the I Am and according to yogic tradition the most significant call to our higher selves. It doesn’t take long to realize that our thoughts may not always have been the positive ones of our enlightened selves.

If our souls are our connection with our spirituality and they are composed of our thoughts, then there is work to be done. If each thought gives birth to our actions and each action starts with a thought, it follows that our thoughts determine our lives in a micro way that we do not imagine. Therefore, we create our reality. We must ask for what we want, and it will be given, we are told and if you follow this line of thought, we create our own path, barring events beyond our control. We are the tryptic, it is known by many names; the physical, the non-physical and the metaphysical and the mind, body, and spirit. That which you are – I Am is the spiritual call (God). The theologians have called this the father, son, and the holy spirit. Psychiatrists have called this the conscious, the subconscious and the super consciousness. Philosophers call this the Id, the ego and the super ego; Scientists call it energy, matter and anti-matter; poets call it, mind, body, and soul. Time is divided into past, present, and future. These ideas hold space just as your soul holds space. These energies could be thought, word and action. Your Soul, id, sprit. Past is the sum total of every feeling you’ve ever had, your memory.

So, when you ask, how can I make my life better? – look within yourself and be guided by your breath.

You create what you choose.

Nothing exists that didn’t start as a pure thought. – this is where creation began,

Thoughts are ideas formed and lead to words, forces released, elements released. Words to action and experience.

Nothing exists that didn’t start with a thought.

So, make it your priority to breathe positivity into your thoughts.

Breathe consciously.

Remember the words of George Floyd which started a revolution in Black Lives Matter, ‘I can’t breathe!’ Remember the most significant aspect of Covid was that it could shut down patients’ ability to breathe.

Breathe for health and for a higher consciousness and for a bright world.