Live captioning provided by AI-Media SPEAKER: Recording in progress KEVIN KARAS: Hello everyone and welcome! I am Kevin Karas and I use he/him/is pronouns and I am the board governance manager here at Yoga Alliance and I will beer host for today's webinar, The Power of the Pranamaya Kosa: Transforming Your Somatic Experience. Before you get started, you will see a poll pop up in your screen. Please take a moment to let us where you are joining us from. And while you wait for the pole -- poll, our facilitator today is -- Mirabelle D'Cunha,… High-performing individuals to experience more clarity, vitality in life to practice yoga as a way of life. (Indiscernible) the (unknown term) foundation, attended by thousands, Mirabelle… Featuring 24 of the most adept wisdom keepers in science. Her journey encompasses 19 years of studies with swamiwho are the monks… And she is currently practicing (unknown term) which is the female yogi practice (unknown term)… But the thing ashram's in India, Canada, the Bahamas Bermuda, and the Cayman Islands where she is located. Practicality, action and trust are the pillars with which she works. In today's program, you will learn how to bypass the authentic experience in pranayama kosha and explore techniques that help bridge the gap between breath and being, allowing for a more profound and authentic experience of pranamaya kosha. As a quick, final reminder, today's workshop is eligible for continuing education credit and the (unknown term). Extractions for that will be logged into the chat as well.… With that, I will pass the microphone over to Mirabelle to get started. MIRABELLE D'CUNHA: Thank you so much, Kevin, there is so much warmth and enthusiasm in your voice. Thank you. To everybody that is here, I cannot see you but I am grateful that you are here and I am very excited. I truly feel very blessed to be able to share this webinar. We are going to begin with the practice and then go into theory. Just before we begin, I want to share why I chose this particular topic as a webinar. Like Kevin, I (indiscernible) and I was (indiscernible) practice because the (indiscernible) was brought into my life. But also, with my yoga practices,… The true (unknown term) in my life, the pranayama kosha. In my work, whether the people in my life are content or practicing, I found that the practice of following the pranayama kosha, which is disembodied, it is important to nurture the experience in the pranayama kosha. External experiences that we may raise our consciousness. I hope that this webinar will give you the tools to be able to experience this for yourself. And, to have more peace and discomfort, and the joy that can bring. (?) I would like to begin with the mantra, then I will lead you through practice of feeling and sensing the pranayama kosha, then we will open for comments and we will go into the theory to end it. For now, I am going to invite you to chant. Wherever you are sitting or standing, just tense your whole body. Tense every muscle of your body as tiny as you can. Even tighter, noticed the sensation. Now, just come into full presence with yourself. By that, I mean aligning your intention or the desire that brought you to this webinar. Align your action, your body, your physical stance with that intention. Like, you can be in alignment with your own desire as we begin the practice. (Chanting "Om…") Gently allow your self to connect to the source of energy, however you relate to it, beyond (indiscernible). Draw your awareness to the crown of your head. Feeling the space of the fontanelle. And inviting purity and directness of connection with the soul. Holding that desire in your heart is enough (?). Become aware of sensation in the crown of your head. Feeling like you are sending energy out to receive the full potency of connection. That nothing stops you from being worthy of receiving this connection. There are absolutely no prerequisites. Begin now to notice what thoughts are present and brush aside any thoughts that have to do with expectation with your identity as a yoga practitioner or teacher. All the beautiful knowledge that you have learned. Just refresh the entire internal browser. Come into full awareness of your physical body. Notice what parts are speaking to you louder than others. The other parts around you you cannot feel so much. Notice the presence of heaviness or lightness, or both. Spaciousness for contraction or both. And now, just connect and hold that intention, the hard intention, to deepen your intimacy with the breath of life. Feeling the touch of the cool breath on the rims of your nostrils. Blessing the inner worlds of your nose. In breath making a full image of the breadth of your heart. See if you can feel the vibrancy that is in the breath. Making this pilgrimage, this offering at the altar of your heart. And, feel your heart that the (indiscernible) sensation of your chest. As you do this, allow yourself to listen to and ask yourself this one question, "what is it that I long for more than anything else in life? What is my heart's deepest desire? All the things I do, I achieve, I practice, what is it I really want to experience?" Knowing there is no right or wrong, just allowing your heart to communicate with you. Within the full openness, what is it that I long for more than anything else in life right now? Notice the sensation that arises in your heart, in your chest. Allow yourself to feel them, ask them what are they? "What is nonnegotiable to my heart?" Allow the essence of the sensations to find themselves in one word. One word that encapsulates an essence of your heart's deepest longing. Then, allow yourself to articulate that world out loud, noticing what it feels like: a sensation when it journeys from your heart to your throat, and out through your mouth. Notice the sensation in your body after you articulate that word. I am going to invite you, invite us all into the Tantric practice of meditation sense more deeply into this pulsation of the pranayama kosha. Note that there is no right or wrong way to do this practice. There is nothing to achieve, no way to arrive. There is no goal except to be open to the experience. If it feels OK for you to hold desire, to open two new experience of that one word that arose as a longing from your heart, know that the power of that desire of (unknown term) is enough. Now, begin to track sensations in your body in a steady, continuous dream. I am just going to go first to give you a sense of what this is like. Then, I am going to invite us to do this together. I'm going to share exactly what I feel as pure sensation in my body without interpreting it, without analyzing, and without filtering anything. I am noticing a slight tightness in my throat. It feels a little raw. Like a tender, raw pain. As I zoom into it, the sensation is intensifying. It feels like it is hard to swallow. Noticing and apprising in the sensation, an urge, it seems to have an urge to rise upward. In this way, just inviting you to track sensation in your body. Lean into whatever is strongest in your body right now. Go internally into yourself to track the sensation. As you feel the sensation, allow yourself to zoom with into it a little more. With an eagerness of warm curiosity, let it be seen in the way that it wants to be seen. To be felt in the way that it wants to be felt. You allow the sensation the autonomy to express itself. Unfettered by judgment and label. Become aware of what most wants to be noticed in your body at this moment. Notice exactly where you feel that sensation. Allow yourself to describe, to fill into its texture, its meat. It's a sense of urgency or impedance, expression. Just sitting with the unfolding. If the sensation is intense, allowing yourself to zoom deeper into the intensity. I will guide you how, in a moment. If it is hard to feel sensation, if the body feels a little numb or (indiscernible) to feel, come back to your heart's deepest longing, that which strikes a chord for you and make a gentle request to your body to show you all the places and all the spaces in which this experience, is one word you are longing to hear, is restrained. Whatever sensation you are feeling, allow yourself to zoom into it once more. Really tuning into the heart's desire. Asking it to show you where the desire is not met in your body. If you notice resistance or a sense of tightness, become more aware of what that tightness feels like. Instead of pulling in, stretch it out. It is it -- is it is squeezed kind of tightness? Opening yourself up to more and more of the subtle feeling. And, wherever sensation is present, if there is discomfort I want you to zoom into the discomfort. To the epicenter. (indiscernible) in the mind, that is to really call into you the experience. Really zoom into the epicenter and notice what that feels like. It is possible to feel reward or rejection or a need to distract. It helps to sometimes think that that is your client or your friend or your child, and you are just there to offer kind, compassionate presence. Not to fix or tune. Just to allow space for this energy in the epicenter to express itself. Feel a little more into this energy now. Notice if it is familiar to you. My body experienced this before. This (indiscernible) sensation. The body has experienced it before, ask your body to take you back to the first time you experienced this sensation. It is possible that memories or beliefs will come up. Allow them to be present (indiscernible) and feel more into the bodily experience of memory. Use them to fill into the space as though you are there right now. Notice the sense of space, (indiscernible) in that space that you are in. Notice if your body feels afraid or unsafe, just a sense. Notice the need that is pressing, if this energy had to say one thing about itself, what would it say? "I am?" Or, "I feel?" What happens when you listen and acknowledge the need of this energy? Does the sensation stay the same? Does it shift? No right or wrong. We are just allowing sensation, pranic expression to unfold, and exerting with kind, loving attention. Take a moment in whatever way you can to acknowledge the need of this energy. And, ask this energy to communicate to you in what way it wants its need to be met right now, in your life, as you are. Be open to whatever comes. It may not mean anything. Listen and tune into sensations. Acknowledge the need and see if you want to make an action, a promise, a commitment. To act on, acknowledge, provide in the way that this energy wanted. You are very clear in action. Love is attention. Love is action. Taking a moment to acknowledge how you are going to meet that need. Think clearly, the time, the place, the setting, the sense. And then take a moment to just thank your body and think this subtle energy of the pranamaya kosha. The kosha, the saturation, the peace of prana. Back to your heartspace. With the intention to come back to you that word that is your heart's deepest longing, before you go to bed tonight. (Indiscernible) noticing how you invest practically in action to support your (indiscernible) and acknowledge it as a feeling, not the situation. The sensations in the body. Gently become aware of the boundaries of your body, the touch of the air on your skin, the touch of your clothes on your skin. Notice how you feel and gently prepare your eyes for the light of the screen again. Slowly open your eyes. Welcome back. Before I go into the theory behind this practice, I would like it if, in the chat you could share briefly what your experiences was, maybe in one word. Or, if you want to share more if you do that. Maybe take 15 seconds to do that. I'm just making sure that the chat is open for people. Kevin, could you check that please? Thank you. My idea with this is to give you a different experience of the pranamaya kosha. Because, so many times we tend to limit our experience of prana to (indiscernible) of prana, and allocate it just to, "This is the pranamaya kosha, this is the sensation or experience and the way to work with prana is to do pranayam." I will share my screen and go directly into the theory of it. So, the prana of the pranamaya kosha, transforming your somatic experience. This is a co-meditation session with one of my clients. In the practice, when a person comes in or we come into this practice ourselves, we tend to want to have an experience or provide an experience. The practice of feeling into the pranamaya kosha, just like with meditation, is to allow an experience instead of doing a technique with the goal that it will give me an experience. We empty, to allow the experience. It is very different from doing. The techniques are very important, I still love pranayam but it is important to be not limited. Probably already know this, but I just want to give a little bit of an overview. Prana is that vital, resplendent, potent energy that is palpable. It is not breath, it is present in breath. The core of prana — and I do not mean (indiscernible) — that which is everything, that which activates everything is prana. So eventually it is an activating energy, therefore we can feel it. And, we can fill it on time because we are constantly animated. Because we are alive, we are animated. The experience of the pranayama kosha is a (indiscernible), and our invitation is to have constant awareness of it. Even as I am speaking to you, I have this background awareness of how my chest is feeling, or how my arms are feeling when they make contact with something. You know, how the throat is feeling while still being aware of the breath. We spent a lot of our day in breath awareness, and this is wonderful. This is grounding us in safety (?), this is really coming into ourselves. ? But at the same time we want to have an awareness of pranayama, the sensation in the body. Another way to feel pranayama is to put up a sheet. In a space of saturation,… You can think of, I don't know, Christmas is coming and fruitcake is really saturated. We usually don't talk about it in yoga, (Laughs) but that is a -- complete, delectable experience. That is the kosha. (Indiscernible) is the kosha is the place where we demystify the (indiscernible). The practice we just did is being aware of sensations in a certain way. Not that prana is like that all the time, but our personal experience of prana and, that based on an identification of "I should be like this, I must do that, or this should be this way." This is an identification of you are missing something. So this kosha is saturation, and saturation can be saturation of discomfort, of pleasure, innovation, energy inward. There is no right or wrong, he just wants to understand what the saturation is. I can read the messages in the chat, thank you so much! I am so grateful that you were able to experience it. My prayers were answered! (Laughs) So, let's go to the next one. You know all of these, this is the goal of the vedas (?). I want to point out that this encapsulation of the cushions is from the (indiscernible). I like that pranamaya kosha is conscious mind. And the (unknown term) is unconscious and subconscious mind. Anyone who is sharing heavy emotions, I applaud your courage. Thank you for sharing that. We are not doing a one-on-one and I cannot see you. But when you're doing that, your body is feeling safe to express its deepest longing. We think so much of goals. We think so much of what we want to look like, but behind all those goals is the need to experience something. "I want to experience something!" I am teaching you right now, my need is to experience transformation and connection. The reflection of my need is how I am sharing with you, the further I get into the presentation, all of that. But that is not the goal. The goal is not to make a presentation, the desire is to feel and experience, to be saturated with inexperience. And in that saturation, even though your intention is there in your longing is there it is beautiful because we all have it. When we think about love and light we forget about the shadows. The shadow is where our energy is not. In the women's path, in the goddess path, this is where we go into a lot. So, when you are feeling discomfort, into the epicenter, I invited you to see a memory or an experience that came up for you. How many of you felt that you had experienced that sensation before and it took you back to something? You may or may not have, there is no right or wrong way. But, see how when you feel the pranayama kosha it activates the (unknown term) kosha. You can see this is a tool for our subconscious and unconscious minds. I want to say something, there is a lot of talk about trauma within the yoga field, but it is very important to understand the desire and the place and focus of trauma in our lives. It is actually a gift for evolution. In the context of life, trauma is the opportunity for evolution. Because trauma causes separation. The deeper the separation, the more the longing for it and that is how it can come alive. If we understand the concept, context,… We limit the gift of trauma. It is the most amazing gift, and if we are all able to learn about it through meditation or psychoanalysis, there are many names for it. But as we tune in, only to sensation, we feel into need. Need is pure. Desire is (indiscernible). Need is devoid of the expectation of how something should occur. Need is pure, pranic energy. It is undeniable! If I have a desire that I want roses every Friday, the trauma occurs that I do not get something that I expect. Or I blame somebody else for something that was not in their control. What I am doing by blaming, I am bypassing. I can go into the neurobiology about this if we have time. I am checking, we have done. In that moment when you are experiencing whatever is called trauma, we are actually experiencing a disconnection with my own prana and not being able to expect it or to requested in a way that it hears. With pranayama kosha activates things in the subconscious and unconscious minds, so we can go there and make a suggestion. We are not working one-on-one, so we could not go into that practice. But as we zoom in and zoom in with loving curiosity and we feel into, "What does this energy want to do?" Instead of, "I should not be feeling this, I am a yoga teacher!" I have done this. I think, "I can only think on these things because I am in yoga practice and, and, and." (Laughs) no. When not pranic energy is set, and you give it the space to express itself, it will unravel because emotions are energy in motion. Energy cannot be created or destroyed. Prana is pure energy and can not be transformative. So zoom in and feel the discomfort, and allow it a space to express itself. OK, I am seeing messages and I will come back and do this in a moment. When that happens, when I feel the need that -- I will give you a personal example. My brother, when I was a child,… I became an over achiever when he wanted to get attention. But when I felt into what happened inside of me, I was rejecting my own need to be seen by myself. And once I realized that, and I say that in the body, in the pranic experience, it just -- sometimes it is like that, sometimes it is a scream, sometimes people throw up, we are not trying to put a label on it. But then there is an experience of this pranayama kosha, but it is no blame. This person was doing their best. Do I provide for myself now? Am I seeing myself now? The practice I would like you to do before going to bed at night, right down what you do in your daily life and see how much of that is actually an investment in fulfilling your heart's deepest longing as an experience. Because, we see some of our actions, when you actually write it down you may see that your actions are not in your own interest. OK prana, yama, I am expansion. There are techniques to direct the prana. We are manually directing the flow of prana in a certain way. We are channeling it and it helps to unlock ourselves, but the process can be a little longer. It is not OK for somebody -- anybody to do under certain intentions. It depends which pranayama we are talking about, but it is very important to balance doing those practices. Whereas, you do not always have to have a balance when we are practicing what we just did.… Your body is shaking and your energy is conscious of it. Actually, no, the mood was imbalanced and it could not handle the (indiscernible) of pranayama. I wanted to see that briefly. Getting back to trauma, it is very important to understand the difference between the pranayama and the (indiscernible). I have gone over this, it is just… This practice that we are talking about is called interoception. The ability to feel sensation. When we are not able to feel the sensation — and I am not talking about trauma but regular moments. Like you cannot feel the texture or temperature of food. Every time I am checking my phone, there is a disconnection. Or, somebody says something and I answer with something just to be polite, but it is not sincere. Keep reconnecting with the pranayama. Burnout, overwhelmed, all of this. All of this is trying to feed your body and to digest them from the pranic flow. Especially in terms of overwhelmed,… Ayurveda is for this as well, but if you are not practicing it for food and lifestyle, it is super important to get that in, OK? I am going to go quickly. Emotions and memory I just explained to you. Energy is the story, memory is the energy. Energy and memory are the story that we tell ourselves to come out on top.… Even by being a victim, because then we come out on top.… "I am stuck because I am a victim." That is what I mean to clarify that. In the role of conditioning in terms of how we experience life. So, when you feel the sensations, many times the experience of what someone said or did is based on your family or cultural conditioning of what is right and wrong. The trim actually occurred, right? But prana got blocked because conditioning said, "This is how it should be." Very quickly going to go into stress cycles. We will finish this in four minutes (Laughs). Actually, you know what? Yes, when we experience stress which is real or perceived, brain and body play a role in it. Before the trigger happens, we feel something wrong in the brain signals the amygdala followed by the hypothalamus and the pituitary gland.… Fight/flight/freeze. Then, he gives a physical symptom. That is where we "feel the pranamaya kosha." It is usually very uncomfortable and we distract ourselves and that is where this energy gets stored in the system. It is not discharged. It is transformed. That is where we fill contraction and prana and trauma. It could be that you just did not eat, this is also a kind of stress. What we do in: implementation which is a tantric process of experiencing pranayama kosha without any experience is that we (indiscernible). OK let us read through the comments. I want everybody to get as much as possible, so please Felix keep an eye on the time for me. Any questions Kevin? Comments? KEVIN KARAS: Yes, Mirabelle. Letting everyone know you can put your questions into the Q&A. Leslie Walker (?) was asking if you could share the meaning of the chant. MIRABELLE D'CUNHA: It is called (unknown term) which is a chant you do before learning and teaching. Because teaching is learning. So it is asking to align with the principles of truth, they energy in that way. And our purpose is to raise our consciousness and living life. So, living in raised consciousness as opposed to just feeling it, in a session. It is so beautiful because it is a constant reminder, as you know the ego gets very activated very easily. "I am a teacher, I need to prove a point.", "I am a student I need to prove that I know this." So I always start with that. KEVIN KARAS: Beautiful. I love this, the student/teacher prayer there. Another question, and you did answer this quite a bit, you mentioned moving closer to curiosity and they are wondering more about what that meant. I know you tapped into that but if you want to speak any more to it? MIRABELLE D'CUNHA: Yes, that just means to fill your heart and let your heart be open. If your heart feels closed and tight? Yoga is a practice that includes the belief in God. Invoke that energy. It doesn't matter what name or form, just say "I am not able to do it, I want my heart to be open. Can you help me?" It is curiosity. And it means that no matter what happens in my life I am never going to let my heart close to experience. To me, that is what curiosity is. It is courage. I will go over the last slide again. The last slide is, when we feel the symptoms of stress, physiological symptoms, we have maladaptive coping which is distracted. And then we have (unknown term) coping which is just in the moment, and we can be using breathing like 4-4-5, but if you can be alone with yourself afterward going through the process that we did today where you go through the biofeedback process, and if you truly feel it, that which we feel we are freed from. So, just allowing yourself to go over that. I didn't get to go a lot over the neuroscience, but I'm just going to link in case you're interested. There is a neuroscientist, (Unknown name), at Mount Sinai in New York and he and I are going to be sharing a course in the neuroscience of meditation. We will be sharing about interoception, which you can look up, or just look her up because her work is amazing. We are talking about the intersection of plants and animal practices because it is more important to have these experiential (indiscernible). Does that help with the last slide? OK I will invite you to listen to the first side of this recording. (Types) Savanah Vavatu. Some invite you to go into the recording, and it will be (indiscernible)… Sometimes I don't feel like doing it and I go to my teacher. If you need to reach out for help, just fill your pranamaya kosha as you bring awareness to your breath. Actually, you can call meditate with your child. You can lay down or hold hands or even if they are in the flurry of a stress cycle, you can ask them to track sensations in their body. Like, "I feel you are being partial to my brother!" OK, "How does it feel in your body?" When I asked my body, she shows me her physical reaction. But, you need to become yourself to be able to do this. If you are not regulated, it does not work. Then you can co-regulate. But first facilitate that for yourself before you help your child. (Laughs) But, zoom more and more into the discomfort, fall in love with it, it is really a practice of discovering something. I think that is all we have time for! KEVIN KARAS: Yes, I do want to thank you, Maribel, this engaging and wonderful session. We really appreciate you being here today. Thank you for everyone who has been able to attend this workshop. Just a reminder it will be posted 2-3 days on our website. And to check out the events we have @yogaalliance.org where you can sign up for more of our workshops. So thank you, and have a beautiful day! MIRABELLE D'CUNHA: Thank you as well. Live captioning provided by AI-Media (End of webinar, 2:01 PM ET)