SoHum in Spinal breathing

[boris]

Hi,
last year I have been doing only Sohum meditation.just relaxed intoning So on the natural in breath and relaxed intoning Hum on the natural outbreath.This has more or less become an very effectve natural way to breath up an down in the spine by itself.So it feels more like av VERY effective way of pranayama/Kriya yoga than an meditation.
The So and Hum have become a very strong tool to help connecting to the breath and prana so it creates a really powerful and natural prana movement up and down in the spine.I think there is no way I could move energy like that without So and Hum
I did AYP DM and SB before but spinal breathing seemed to mess up my energy in the spine such that DM would not work at all after.It really did not feel good and natural.But I miss the IAM meditation.
My question is if I could do the AYP Spinal breathing exactly as instructed by Yogani,only adding the mental intonation of So and Hum on the in and out breath?
Or maybe I could only do 5 min of SoHum meditation before DM?
Hope you see this question Yogani or Christi

[yogani]

Hi Boris:
See this from Lesson 59: https://www.aypsite.com/59.html

The reason we don’t use the mantra in pranayama is because we are already building many other habits of practice relating to spinal breathing. Spinal breathing is an advanced practice, and becomes more advanced as we add on the other things that we do during pranayama. There are breathing mantras like So-Ham that people use during pranayama. That is fine as a beginning practice when the attention is not going up and down the spinal nerve and also building the other habits that are necessary for advanced yoga practice. Because we begin with spinal breathing in these lessons, we skip the beginning practice of breathing mantra. Instead, we do pranayama first and meditation second. In these lessons we don’t do both at the same time.

Variations on the AYP baseline system of practices are the practitioner’s experiment. The variations are endless and it is not possible to predict results, especially when adding things on that could double up on similar practices already in AYP, such as using mantra in both spinal breathing and deep meditation. Imbalances can come as a delayed reaction. If using AYP, then sticking with the baseline system is recommended, where results and methods of self-pacing and grounding are well known. If you are using another system of practice and it is working for you, then stick with that. Mixing systems of practice is not advised. See Lesson 384 for more on modifications to baseline systems of practice: https://www.aypsite.com/384.html
When using AYP, if any of the practices, like spinal breathing pranayama, are causing energy difficulties, then it will be wise to self-pace the time of practice, or delay taking them on until later. If deep meditation by itself is good, then stick with that for a while. If you try to build your own version of spinal breathing before deep meditation, based on another system of practice, it might lead to difficulties later on. It cannot be predicted, so is your experiment.
All the best!
The guru is in you.
PS: It should be mentioned that our experience during deep meditation is not the measure of the practice. How we feel during the day between our practice sessions is the measure. Spinal breathing increases the power of deep meditation, and that may be what you experience when doing spinal breathing properly before deep meditation. If you find too much energy in deep meditation, then see Lesson 15 on how to deal with that: https://www.aypsite.com/15.html
Make sure to take a good rest before getting up from deep meditation.

[AYPforum]

Moderator note: Topic moved for better placement