Recently I noticed a physical change, which is that, in addition to being able to do nauli (have done that for many years), I can move the muscles around my stomach in such a way that if, for example, I’ve just taken a big sip of water, it can be clearly heard sloshing around. This seems an extension of what I guess is “whole body mudra”–an ability I’ve gradually developed to sense and move muscle groups connecting all the way from the head and throat down to the pelvis. It is a bit like nauli, but more extensive, and includes the ability to make the chest more concave, etc.
Hopefully this means I can get the “nectar” cycle going soon. Right now it is more just “interesting” than particularly pleasurable to feel like I have more awareness and control of my digestive system or something. If I overdo it it can create (mild) heartburn, however, a problem I have also read Yogani suffered with during a particular stage of his kundalini awakening. I am trying not to overdo it.
Besides reporting this development, I am curious in this post to hear about other physical changes people have noticed. I have heard of a sweet-smelling, oily substance on the skin (ojas?) possibly associated with amrita production, as well as something ash-like (vibhuti?). Yogani has also mentioned somewhat enigmatically that the body becomes more “porous.” I am not sure if this sort of thing where I feel like areas previously out of conscious awareness and control become part of conscious awareness and control, along with some tendency for air to move through them, sometimes exerting a pleasurable sort of pressure as with e.g., kumbhaka is part of that.
One other change I notice is that it is easier to coordinate the whole body for purposes of e.g., Taiji practice, in which you are supposed to exert a spiraling force up from the ground. This is probably attributable to greater bodily awareness and/or removal of nervous “blockages” preventing muscles working together.
What kinds of physical changes have you noticed over the course of your yoga practice?
If you have not already, you may want to check out the lesson linked below, and also the one before it that gets into the finer points of pranayama, the nectar cycle and kundalini awakening.
No need to rush the process. Good things are happening.
Thank you for the message. Yes, I have seen the lesson about air in the digestive system, though I had not read the previous one about breath suspension drawing up sexual essences in some time. It is interesting to think about the lack of oxygen and connection to sexual energies in the pelvis. In fact, there seems to be some natural impulse to suspend the breath when sexual energy moves.
Actually, I found today the air in the digestive tract can be pleasurable, as it gave me a sort of mildly orgasmic feeling in the heart region. I guess the “inner alchemy” that eventually produces amrita, etc. occurs as a result of these various elements meeting–air coming down and sexual energy moving up? I still don’t perceive the bladder very clearly, although I sometimes see evidence of semen in the urine despite no genital orgasm. Perhaps that will be the next stage where this process will lead (though it is still kind of mysterious to me how the sexual essences connect to the digestive system–I suppose it is on a pranic level more than a physical level?). Thanks again!
Yes, from the bladder up everything starts happening on a pranic level. There is a one- way valve between the kidneys and the bladder so everything physical can only go from the kidneys to the bladder. In fact, the process can be mostly pranic even below the bladder with sexual energy being taken from the sexual glands in the pelvis, and from the ovaries in the case of women and from the testes in the case of men.
Thanks so much. It certainly makes sense that urine and/or sexual fluids would not travel back up the ureter toward the kidneys (nor would we want them to!).
I am curious then: Yogani has said that soma is made by a mixture of air, food, and sexual essences in the digestive system. It seems this may refer more to the prana/qi/energy of those things than their gross substance, though of course food and air have a gross substance that physically passes through the digestive tract.
Subjectively, then, although the physical sexual essences cannot go up further than the bladder, does it feel as if their prana rises up toward the kidneys? Or into the intestines? Is it in the intestines/manipura area where combination of air, food, and sexual essences occurs? I have felt a minty sensation in that general area on occasion, but it is just a fleeting sensation and not obviously a result of any mixing of food, air, and/or sexual essences I can yet perceive.
Yes, the mixing that happens in the manipura region is a mixing of prana that is taken from air and food in the stomach, and prana taken from sexual fluids. The movements of these pranas follow etheric pathways in the body (nadis), so are not moving specifically to physical organs, such as the kidneys. I am not aware that the kidneys play any role in the nectar cycle.
And yes, we can feel some things at times, and not other things, so there can be a lot of guessing going on as to what is really happening in the body! It also does not matter so much, as all we need to do is to continue with our daily practices and let the process unfold.
Thanks! As so often happens with such questions, no sooner do I ask than an answer of sort presents itself: while performing mulabandha, I felt an energetic connection between the perineum and heart that I had not felt before. This reminds me that I have sometimes felt orgasmic feelings in the heart area, especially during e.g., kumbhaka, so this seems like it these are both probably examples of pranic elements of sexual essences connecting energetically with higher centers. It seems like, as you’ve suggested, this can sometimes be correlated with physical movement of sexual fluids, but not always.