Kriya Yoga Examples

[Marion Georgi]

Surrenderfelt threatening. I was scared, and still am sometimes, of the lack of control that comes when we truly release our resistance to the flow of life. But this lack of control is present whether we accept it or not. Surrender is in opposition to control. It is not, however, at odds with taking action and having agency in our lives. We can, and should, take actions and make decisions that allow us to feel prepared and safe to surrender. Then, we must surrender.

Ishvara pranidhana is the last component of kriya yoga (the others being svadhyaya, or self-study, and tapas, or effort). It can be translated as surrender to the divine, but also understood as surrender to the highest quality you contain and wish to embody. For many of us, this is love.

Love is the feeling that allows us to feel all the others. Beyond a quality, love is a verb, it is a daring act. The good news is that the more we surrender, the more love we emit and accept. Then, the more difficult it becomes to stay stagnant and the easier it is to have an internally active life.

According to the Hatha Yoga pradipika, there are six yoga kriyas. The examples below are featured in the version by Swami Vishnudevananda. The three examples of Dhauti are from one of my yoga philosophy classes, not the book.

Yes, kapalabhatih is a kriya, not a pranayama exercise! This one involves exhaling forcefully and is often known in yoga as the shining skull exercise as it brings a glow to the practitioner and is supposed to remove any phlegmatic diseases.

In his book, Yogananda says that kriya yoga is the most effective practice in yoga for personal evolution by increasing access to subtle energy (prana) and channeling it in more direct ways. However, it was only intended to be taught on an individual basis to students who had received proper kriya initiations by an established guru through an unbroken link (or, basically, a kriya yogi master).

For this reason, you are not likely to find many books with kriya practice teachings. However, as interest in kriya yoga continues to grow, there are more and more resources and teachers available online to learn with.

In fact, according to yogis like Paramhansa Yogananda, this ancient technique was known and practiced even by Jesus Christ and St. Paul. Any disciple of God, they say, had a daily practice of kriya meditation that was paired either with a certain breathing technique, a mantra, a yoga posture (asana), or all of the above.

While traditional yogis would dedicate their entire lives to the 8 limbed path, most of us in the 21st century prefer to create a daily practice that is based on kriya yoga tradition (more on that in a minute).

In addition to the 8 limbed path of Ashtanga or Raja yoga, there are other effective systems of yoga to help us achieve universal consciousness. Many of these practices like hatha, vinyasa, or restorative work with the energy of the subtle body indirectly, whereas the practice of kriya yoga is much more direct.

Curious about Ayurveda and your doshic constitution? Check out What is the Ayurvedic Diet to learn more about the principles of Ayurveda, the doshas and to take a dosha quiz.

My path of kriya yoga is embodying those three principles. This is the magic combo for your life. My Yoga for Self Mastery course is all about how to embody these three skills specifically and how you can act out each of these in the world as a modern human.

You can look at it through the paradigm more derived from the Gita and Yogananda: a system of breath mastery and meditation techniques to accelerate spiritual development and channel up your spine to transcend the body.

Good question! Any practice can be dangerous without proper knowledge and preparation. Many kriyas include mudras (hand gestures or configurations of the body) and may require knowledge of the bandhas (energy locks). Many kriyas are built upon more advanced practices, so learning the proper techniques often requires personal instruction.

Furthermore, kriya yoga is a powerful practice that allows practitioners to work with energy directly. Some kriyas require great preparation before practicing as well as grounding and integration after. This is why it is so important to find an experienced teacher to guide you if you are new to this ancient yogic practice.

If you are a yoga teacher interested in teaching kriya or any style of yoga, I always recommend to the students in my online yoga teacher training programs to embody its practice before teaching it.

Kundalini Yoga is any form of spiritual practice whose aim is union with God through the awakening of Kundalini, the coiled one at the base of spine who is the goddess Shakti. Kundalini can be very dangerous if one has not already attained the immutability and unshakeable stability of the masculine principle who in this context is the god Shiva. The intention of Kundalini Yoga is firstly to awaken this feminine radiance and then to facilitate its unfurling through the energy centres of the body until the two principles of Shiva and Shakti meet in blissful union at the Ajna-Chakra. Beyond this is the Sahasrara-Chakra or the Thousand-Petalled Lotus which however is not really part of the subtle body.

If you were feeling brave and explorative you could try mixing them together, using Kundalini practices to awaken the divine fire of liberation and using Kriya to still the mind and master your mind and breathing. Just remember that you are playing with fire!

The trouble is that the practices of Kundalini Yoga are designed to heighten sensitivity and awaken within the body itself a liberating and burning fire of transcendence. Any remaining complexes or human attachments (samskaras) will be drastically inflated by this process, making them now much harder to overcome and much more dangerous. Remember that Kundalini and even the general Tantric model of the subtle body (Chakras, Ida and Pingala, the Nadis) were highly secret teachings.

I hope this answers your question! It is worth pointing out that my path has been rather heterodox and combined numerous different elements. Someone else on here might be able to speak more precisely about Kundalini specifically.

Personally, I had already been on the spiritual path for a few years and had a single awakening to God as Divine Love before I started practising Kundalini Yoga. It is only a vain personal digression but in a way my whole life felt like a preparation for the awakening of Kundalini. It is possible that the practitioner will be called to the practice when they are ready for it. For example, I have always liked music with an evocative and liberating character. This Sonata by my favourite composer Scriabin very much captures the feeling of Kundalini moving through the body:

@Oeaohoo Thanks for the honest and straight forward answer, I expected as much. The reason I asked in the first place was because through meditation I am now experiencing a build up of energy in my head, which becomes much more relaxed when I guide it from the top of my scull down my spine. I also experience a warm sensation along my spine when I meditate and thought I could use that for further growth.

@Aimblack That sounds like an interesting opportunity because it has emerged naturally through meditation as opposed to being forced through bodily practises. Given that it has emerged naturally it is quite possible that it will resolve itself naturally but it might be worth researching ways of using this energy for spiritual ends. I know, for example, that serious Kundalini practitioners seek to force this energy to explode beyond even the head into the infinite blissfulness of the Sahasrara-Chakra. Naturally, this has certain dangers from a human perspective!

This reminds me of something I forgot to mention above. It would be very useful for anyone working with Kundalini to have a good understanding of the principles of polarity and balance. This is actually an extremely rich and complex area because there are so many different levels and areas of life (and more-than-life!) to be harmonised simultaneously. It might sound a bit odd but I think for me it was useful that I had many years of experience as a musician before getting involved in Kundalini: after all, music is essentially composed of consonance and dissonance and tension and release, the task of the composer being to harmonise these into a beautiful whole.

Additionally, I think I might have overstated the difficulty of engaging safely in these practises today. In a way, the present time is a very opportune one. There is more information than ever readily available to anybody who needs it and residual spiritual influences are likely to guide the serious seeker towards the appropriate material for their growth. However, every so often you will come across somebody saying how Kundalini has ruined their lives so it is always best to proceed with caution.

That sounds like an interesting opportunity because it has emerged naturally through meditation as opposed to being forced through bodily practises. Given that it has emerged naturally it is quite possible that it will resolve itself naturally but it might be worth researching ways of using this energy for spiritual ends. I know, for example, that serious Kundalini practitioners seek to force this energy to explode beyond even the head into the infinite blissfulness of the Sahasrara-Chakra. Naturally, this has certain dangers from a human perspective!

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