Harmonizing the prana and apana, enjoy the eternal bliss.

"Harmonizing the prana and apana" refers stabilizing in one steady inbreath rather than any longer breathing the two internal (non-air) breaths. Prior to this the yogi will breathe the two breaths (prana and apana), though wholly on an internal basis. The Bhagavad-Gita makes a glancing reference to this in the verse: "Some yogis offer up their inbreath to their outbreath." This refers to the breath, after first being two but subtly experienced, then becomes one and not two. This answers a perplexity and questions practitioners of Yogananda's first kriya will have. Nityananda further clarifies (later) that the one final stabilized breath should be an inbreath.

The seat of breath is the truth. It is the internal space (chidakasha). In the eternal space is the tower of eternal bliss. This tower is the seat of eternal peace.

The seat of breath is the truth" refers to the fact that God as both Isvara and Brahman exist at the place from which movement of breath originates. The "eternal space" refers to akasa, or infinite space. Experience of bliss is synonymous with meditation on one of Brahman's first evolutes, space. The "seat of the breath" is the space between the breaths, where the breath is neither moving in or out, i.e. the kumbhaka. The Upanishads, which are loaded with references to esoteric yogic truth, refers to this in 2nd Katha Chapter Two, Verse Three:

Note: Once White Europeans of Christian heritage understand Yoga and Vedanta they have a great many tools with which to flummox or toy with modern day atheism-believers who rarely even bother to specify which definitions of God they are rejecting. When the ignoramus atheist asks an educated Christian or yogi "Where is God?" the educated Gentile can simply say: "I experience God nightly in both dreams and deep, dreamless sleep." Or they can even say, "God is consciousness. I am experiencing consciousness this moment, so I am experiencing God." Or further they can say: "In my religion God is defined, partly, as bliss. I have experienced bliss thus I have experienced God. What, you have never experienced bliss? Sad creature!" The Upanishads and Vedas teach that each of us experiences God and God's bliss-nature nightly in the sleep states, though not fully conscious.

In the state of deep, dreamless sleep we are then only pure consciousness, yet still ignorant because of sleep. The religious man seeks to attain this state without sleep or any unconsciousness. The "Crest Jewel" verses continue to elucidate this:

In yoga, which is essential religion, realization of the state of prajna while awake is considered the only true waking. By comparison ordinary people of the waking world are asleep. This yogic ideal was known by Jesus Christ, the sat-guru of the White Europeans. However, that state of His is little represented in the recorded scripture.His life fit the ideal of Vedantic yogic asceticism. But the scenes recorded feature Christ in the ordinary state of out-turned consciousness, in which siddhis manifest for samadhi yogins. What is recorded are Christ's active, outward-turned states in which siddhis manifest for the ascetic. at times recovers consciousness and enjoys the fruit of an infinity of meritorious deeds.")
You can see now, wonderful yogins and yogesses, how much is compacted into any one random utterance by Nityananda.

Fixing your attention on breath, sleep.

Nityananda is confirming that his state was the state of "sleeping while awake" extolled by the Yoga-Vasistha and Sankara's Quintessence of Vedanta and other scriptures. Nityananda was one of those sages abiding in one of the two samadhi states. Again, in our state of deep, dreamless sleep (called prajna in this religious knowledge)one experiences the bliss of God as Atman but is unconscious of any worlds, but is still ignorant because of sleep.

In the states of savikalpa samadhi one experiences the bliss of the dreaming state while conscious, but is unconscious of the gross outer world. He is conscious of himself, desires, likes and dislikes, then increasingly can remember the gross outer world. In this state the religious person knows the glories and bliss perceptions of the dream world while more aware than in normal dreaming.

In the state of nirvikalpa samadhi one has risen above the dream world and only knows a "sense of I." One is conscious primarily of Brahman and infinite bliss, with a bare awareness of this gross world and some ability to function in it. Both are of these samadhis are forms of sleeping-while-waking.

Nityananda is confirming that the two states of sleeping-while-awake can be attained by meditation techniques that employ concentration on the breath. The sentence is terse. He is not saying "Fix the attention on your breath, then get in bed and go to sleep." He is saying: "Concentrate on your breath in the manner that I do, and attain the state of sleeping while waking."

In the case of Nityananda, who appeared to be awake, his "sleep" was not inert like savikalpa but the state of nirvikalpa samadhi, also called kaivalya, and dharma-megha-samadhi. It is not a small thing!

Were the majority of people to understand this goal and purpose of genuine yoga, they would find it disturbing intellectually. Truly, when actually presented with the prospect, all fear it because all fear the death of their individual ego. However, the people enjoy being around such personages because such personages are boon-bestowers wherever they reside. In brief, know that whenever scriptures or saints speak of attaining "sleep," they refer to the attainment of one of the forms of samadhi. It is not conventional sleep, but sleep while waking. It is awareness of the higher realms, and in the case of nirvikalpa, awareness of the earth and all realms at the same time.

In this line Nityananda also makes clear that the "sleeping in wakefulness" state can be attained by fixing one's mind on the breath in the manner in which he has done, which is the same technique taught by Yogananda as the "first kriya," and the technique most amplified in the Vijnana-Bhairava, and which the Siddha-Yogi Lahiri Mahasaya stated gives stated Should you become chaste and develop bhakti for the God-man or the Lord as a mere idea, as the White Europeans did with their great bhakti-yoga of Christianity, you will understand all this. Practice of the Christian anjoli mudra (hands together and raised), which raises up the bhakti attitude, will assist when speaking to God (Saguna Brahman) about any such desires. Aum.

Perform the natural japa of the inward and the outward breath.

Nityananda defined the heart space as the space in the head, especially at the third eye. He specified that it did not mean the chest or the organ in the chest. Neither did it refer to emotion, romance, or human love. Nityananda always called the kutastha or "3rd eye" the "heart," and recommended that all attention and focus be there. He is saying that liberation is there, in the head and through the third eye.

In the heart-space is Shiva-Linga.

He is saying that Shiva or pure consciousness is at the third eye.

It is self-existence. This is also called the prince-prana.

There is one particular form of prana, among the five forms, that he is referring to as the "prince prana." That is, prana per se or the inbreath. This is the most important prana, in Nityananda's view. He is also saying that this prana is abundant and available at the higher center, or the third eye.

This is the “upward breath.”

He confirms this and says that the inbreath, and the subtle prana associated with it, is the "prince prana."

This is known in yoga as prana. Prana is the ONE. Prana is the ONE in all. Prana is existence.

"The One" here appears to reference Nirguna Brahman. But it could also reference Saguna Brahman, or both. Nityananda was undoubtedly familiar with both concept. He is giving us, as all wonderful yogis and gurus do, a simplified metaphysics. He is advising the religious person, or the yogi, to view the Lord as synonymous with prana. He is advising us to associate prana with Nirguna Brahman (Pure Consciousness) or Saguna Brahman. In scriptural metaphysics, prana is an evolute or creation, and is only associated with Saguna Brahman, or the Creator personality as Isvara, or whatever the name. Because prana (subtle life energy) is in fact one of The Lord's basic evolutes, the approach is valid. In a sense Nityananda reveals that he is a bhakta and devotee of the knowable God with attributes or Saguna Brahman because he is praising prana. It is a characteristic of great yogis to simplify Hindu metaphysics as well as to forge their own conceptual path, which will found effective and auspicious for at least their devotees.

This is known only to those who have practiced yoga. Those who have not practiced yoga are not aware of this fact; they being bound by desires.

Real things are attained by yoga which is renunciation of sense pleasures, chastity, meditation, and devotion for the thought of the Lord. We need to get with it and do a little sadhana in order for our continual suffering and confusion to be attenuated.

So, cut asunder the bondage of desires and hence attain salvation.

It Salvation or, in Indian parlance "moksha," is a Christian concept as well as Hindu. The Christian concept of moksha has been trimmed back and reduced and should be reconstituted by White European men interested in God, restoring Christianity, and the knowledge of the Aryan Vedas.

Realize the one Tattwa, i.e., Paramatman. Realize Him by the internal eye.

Again Nityananda advocates focus at the point between the eyebrows, justs as did Yogananda, Muktananda, and Jesus Christ.

Without a rope, water from a well cannot be drawn up. In the body, breath is the rope. Drawing the inward breath harmoniously is like drawing up the water from a well.

Now Nityananda goes back to discussing kumbhaka and attainment of the astral breath. When he refers to the breath drawn up "harmoniously" he refers to that inner breath (in which no air moves, and the nose and mouth could as well be plugged). He says that should be harmonious, in other words, just as easy and smooth as ordinary gross breathing. The "water" that he refers to drawing is pure prana, which is drawn in better and in greater plenitude through connecting the gross material inbreath to the act of pure pranic drawing, then finally making it purely conceptual. I am leaving out a great deal here, because it is not proper to speak of these yogic things in a public document, which is one of the reasons I feel that the publication of Nityananda's utterances was ill-conceived.

In order to make planks of a wooden beam, it should be sawed up and down. Similarly, breath should move upwards and downwards in the body. 

It should be led into buddhi and made always to move in an upward direction.

Notice how the two verses above contradict each other, in one he refers to the two motions of breath up and down. In the other he says to breathe in one direction. The first verse simply refers to the basic work; using the breath as a meditation technique, as we all start out. The normal breath goes in and out, up and down, and for a long time that's all the yogi will do. But that's sawing the wood, getting the work done.

When making progress in Yogananda's first meditation technique the yogi comes to wonder what to do with the two breaths when they do not seem to need to move any more. Nityananda is answering, for the avid yogi and religious person. One should learn to rest in one constant, eternal inbreath. No more sawing up and down.

To take a stone uphill, requires great effort but to bring it down by the same route is not difficult. So also, going up is difficult but coming down is easy.

This is one of the most interesting utterances by Nityananda, and one of the most helpful if understood correctly, also showing the avadhuta's caring love for humanity. I will interpret it for White European men, and women, who strive for chastity and cherish the remembrance of God in all forms.

In the first instance his stone-uphill metaphor refers to the difficulty of experiencing the pranic inbreath, or the difficulty of finding one's self sated or adequately fed by it. In the second instance, and this is it's deeper meaning, it refers to the difficulty of accomplishing pratyahara.

Nityananda is referring to the obvious fact that when we try to breath in (in normal life) and our breath is blocked (such as by a hand or suffocation situation), when we pull on the inbreath, nothing comes to us. If you put a straw in your mouth, plug up the end of it, and try to breathe in, you simply get stoppage and resistance to your attempt to get breath. This is the "carrying the stone" up the hill. The yogi is seeking to have that very inbreath (the pull with no air moving) satisfying and nourishing like the material inbreath. He is trying to get the inner inbreath, which is an inbreath in which no air moves or flows. He is acknowledging the difficulty of this initially or the slowness of its development for the yogis.

Further, he is referring to the fact that the yogis, when doing the breathing techniques of Yogananda and Nityananda, feel the subtle inward breath but find it difficult to make it fuller, make it move, make it satisfy unto kumbhaka. This is the difficulty he is referring to, and describing as carrying a stone uphill.

Our "downhill" slide has been breathing the material breath. The "uphill battle" is learning to get enough from the subtle pranic inbreath that we can attain kumbhaka and savikalpa samadhi which comes automatically on that attainment.

The metaphor is not a perfect one, because the yogi should not make visualizations -- regarding the inbreath he seeks to imbibe -- that make it seem difficult or at all blocked. The battle to become established in the subtle inbreath is largely psychological relating to our thick conditioning relative to breath. Positive visualizations about the astral inbreath are much more helpful than negative ones. However, Nityananda was just speaking of the fact that the pranic inbreath requires time to fully develop and master. It is not so easy for most and takes time. Thus it is work, like carrying a stone up hill while the normal gross inbreath is easy, like a stone rolling downhill. And this is, he means, synonymous with the conventional world of material engagements. That is the stone rolling downhill. It involves no effort while meditation and learning the pranic breath require effort.

Now, the deeper meaning is that pratyahara is difficult, or like carrying a stone uphill. Pratyahara occurs synonymously with the mastery of the inner breath. The two go together. Pratyahara is when the life force reverses course up the spine and back to Brahman as occurs nightly in sleep. Instead of going down the spine and out, illumining a "world" (like a movie projector directed to a wall, in fact) it goes up the spine. Then the world is no longer erected or seen and one experiences the higher worlds like in sleep.

The interest, attention, and entanglements we have with the material world (egged on by karmic impressions) are a powerful force, making pratyahara difficult. This attention and engagement with the karmic world during the waking state is based on the power of the life force when flowing one way. To reverse that flow is comparable to reversing the direction of a river or stopping a train and sending it the opposite direction. Nityananda uses the simile of "carrying a rock uphill" instead. It is going against the flow.

First the yogi must cognize the two inner breaths going on associated with his meditation. Then one must effect stabilization in one inner breath, an inbreath. This is synonymous with attaining pratyahara and pratyahara or life-force reversal ensues automatically.Nityananda is saying: "developing the felt, nourishing inbreath is difficult; reversing the life force is difficult." His metaphor of carrying a rock uphill compared to letting it roll down is a very apt metaphor for the pratyahara challenge, but not so apt for describing the development of the inner breath. As the yogi or yogess develops the inner breath he should not visualize any heavy labor at all, any blockage, or difficulty. Such thoughts work against the progress. The ideas or notions "I am suffocating, where's the air?" are enemies to developing the inner breath. The thoughts when developing it should be "This is easy, there is an opening, I trust something's there, the pranic breath flows in me fully."

Visualizations concerning the pranic inbreath should involve openings, circles, expansion, the rush of air and sound of the in-rush of air, wind, food, and receptivity.

The beautiful thing about the Nityananda statement above is that he showed love for humanity. He was acknowledging that the path is difficult and slow and empathizing with that. He was saying "This isn't easy! It's a lot of work!" Not to discourage, but to encourage. But to even speak of these things, bringing us into his knowledge, he was transmitting that all can have his attainment and the yogic attainments. Speaking of the difficulty of it is what a father does to gird up his sons, get them to strive harder, and increase their patience and fortitude. So his "rock up the hill" metaphor showed love of humanity.

However, one should not think that breathing the pranic inbreath is difficult. In fact, the better visualizing for the pranic inbreath would be "I am breathing this full load of nourishing, satisfying prana in as easily as a rock rolls down a hill. It is easy."

It is difficult for the prana to leave the body. To receive a thing is easy but to return it is difficult.

This is similar to the above statement. Nityananda is indicating that the mastery of the pranic inbreath, which then releases the jiva from the body in the state of savikalpa samadhi, is difficult whereas getting a body (a human birth) and breathing the gross material way is easy and takes no effort. We were given a human birth, plus normal breathing, by God's grace. It is hard to go back to God without great effort. Freedom from the body and delusive duality take tremendous work.

Those men who do not return what they have received are not worthy of the name of “men.” The are merely animals; they have no virtue.

We should try to return to God. We should try to interact with Him through the breath and give our breath to Him. The truth is, God is breathing in us constantly and giving to us our very inbreath, but we do not even acknowledge Him or interact with him. God gives us breath for free, always loving us, but we give nothing back. Nityananda is actually referring to the interaction between devotee and Purusha that takes place when one follows his meditation path and tries to master the inner pranic breath. It is an interaction with God, and a giving back. But the giving back is of ourselves, our acknowledgment, our responsiveness, and our receivership. We can't give anything material to God, but we can give him our devotion, conscious awareness, true relationship, and feminine receivership as devotees. The technique Nityananda describes here is a place and method whereby those are done.

(It is impossible to describe the pangs of death).

Nityananda mentioned this because by advocacy of this yoga, by advocacy of mastery of the subtle breath and kumbhaka, one can be spared the worst pangs of death. He is trying to warn the listeners to develop in yoga.

Jnana is attained by subtle thinking. So breath should be controlled.

This can be interpreted two ways. On one hand Nityananda may be saying that divine knowledge comes with a thinning out of thoughts (and making thought more subtle). Since breath retention (pranayama) controls thought, that should be pursued. Subtle breath = subtle thought = Jnana.

Nityananda may be, on the other hand,making a slight diss of the "thinking yoga" of Sankaracharya as described in his Quintessence of Vedanta. That is, he is making reference to the dry jnana path which involves a lot of thinking and analyzing. He is basically making a statement that the control of breath is just as good and just as important. The sentence could be presented like this:

"You Jnanis say jnana is obtained by subtle thinking and discrimination. Even so,you should practice pranayama."

Nityananda, like Ramakrisha, was more bhakta and yogi than a Sankara-like analyzer or thinker. Here he may be paying respects to that jnana path of intellectual analysis but advocating, and with understatement, that pranayama is of 'equal' importance and validity, bringing all that is sought in the jnana path.

The mind should be merged in the sound.

Nityananda has suddenly mentioned here the inner sound of Aum. When heard, the religious person or devotee should try to merge his mind in it. This is a vast subject.

Those who do not breathe through the nose, have no desires of any sort. Their breath is purely internal.

Again Nityananda is emphasizing that the "breath" he is teaching about is indeed not material and does not involve an air-flow through the nose, mouth, or other orifices. One of the absurdities about other online "commentary" I have seen is that the writer cannot comprehend this simple and obvious fact. The breathless state of kumbhaka is real, and not a poetic metaphor. The yogic state of kumbhaka is, in fact, what is under discussion here. Nityananda was a master of it. That state involves mastery of an inner "conceptual" breath or two inner postures that are synonymous with the postures we continually take when breathing the gross outer breath, but more subtle and all within.

They concentrate their breath in the brahmarandhra where the ida and the pingala meet. They have realized the Paramatman;

This practice progresses best when visualizations concerning it take place up in the head, a the devotee aspires for God as prana, bindu (light), sound, all-sufficiency, all healing, all-provision, all grace, purity, and bliss.

they look upon all things as self.

This state has been discussed above. Yogananda was more of a bhakta and preferred the savikalpa state of duality and "a world" to save, etc. The difference between Nityananda and Yogananda was that Nityananda wanted to abide in the nirvikalpa state; Yogananda enjoyed his play of the "saved and the unsaved" and did not wish to abide in the Nirvikalpa state. But they were really the same Person.

This is swarajya (self-government).

Samadhi gives the true power and control.

What is swarajya is jiva’s true place.

Swarajya was a political party in India that promoted Indian self-government. That is, is wanted more power and control than heretofore for the Indians, i.e. self-government. Nityananda is saying that this ideal of full power and control is the natural inheritance of the individual soul or jiva.

The light of life is prana vayu.

Vayu is the element wind, or the air in general. In Hindu thought that elemental force is also personified as a god, which is as metaphysically valid as any other thought constructions. The wind god is Vayu.

Prana, always associated with the breath in the study of pranayama, is conceived in five forms in creation. The form called vyana is spread around everywhere like the broad air of the world, which blows everywhere and resides between earth and heaven. The prana in the distributed state vyana is often indeed associated with the wind god, Vayu. That spread-everywhere state of prana is sometimes called "prana vayu." Nityananda is really saying that this prana and all lights are the same substance. This includes the sun, which he called "the light of life." The substantive point is that all lights, including the sun and stars, are forms of prana.

I am not certain but in Hindu metaphysics I am not aware that the particular form of prana called vyana has the key association with the sun. I am fairly certain that the prana-form associated with the sun is straight prana (prana proper) and not it's alternate forms. I think Nityananda stated this in a feeling of bhakti. Among his many bhakti feelings he has bhakti for the wind God vayu, and enjoys calling the vyana "Prana Vayu" after the wind-God. Such bhakti attitude toward the various pranas, toward the elements and God's creations, are in fact auspicious and beneficial in the yogic realization under discussion by Nityananda. He also has bhakti for the sun, and wanted to associate Him with the wind god Vayu. We can learn much from Nityananda in these utterances. Bhakti attitudes open many occult doors including success in the inner subtle breath.

Prana vayu is the capitol of swarajya government.

He is revealing that this state of empowerment or "self government" is provided by contact and engagement with prana. Prana gives all power. He specifies that we make contact with prana in it's state of vyana. He reveals that for gathering the inward breath he prefers to think of the prana in the form of prana-vayu, the far-flung form like the wind. Prana-vayu, says Nityananda, is the great lake or great sky from which any yogi can breathe big draughts of prana, catching big gales of it.

Atman is the lord of the swarajya government.

Atman is the Lord Brahman with a reference or orientation to the individual soul and essential spark of eternal, luminous, untouchable consciousness that animates each of us. It is our inner atman, the inner Lord, who can genuinely empower us as "Swarajya" government. He is always the true Ruler in the first place. The yogi comes to know That and merge with That. Fools see problems with such teachings because they think that those who get close to God become absurd, or would remain egotists and game-players like themselves.

Swarajya is one’s own energy.

That power and full efficacy is our own birthright and our own connection to prana.

This energy must be kept under perfect control.

By continence, dispassion, and meditation for the stilling of thoughts one gets a grip on prana which otherwise does what it likes.

What is swarajya is not a hill; it is not gold. Keeping under control both desire and anger is swarajya.

Chastity and dispassion (including ignoring the wicked) is the path to this empowerment or "self government." Thus the prana responds to his mind and becomes more servant than master.

A man must say what he does and do what he says.

Not doing so insults the prana and weakens one's engagement with it. The prana-sakti requires truth, virtue, and continence to make it's home with us in the way that yogis and religious saints know.

If you hold nose and mouth tight, you are not able to talk. Similarly, a thing that does not breathe does not emit sound. Just as water goes on diminishing in a well in summer, so also, the power of breath goes on diminishing in the body.

Nityananda returns again to his discussion of the inner pranic breath, which he obviously considers to be very important in his path and in yogic dharma and development. In order to make sure his audience knows that, yes, he is talking about an astral breath known completely within, and not the conventional air-breath of oxygen and other gases, he speaks of the holding of the nose and mouth. He is also saying that we, in our conventional state, are utterly dependent on the gross physical breath. He is referring, rather gently, to the state of anxiety and death that follows the closure of our orifices, how we can't even participate in life (make a sound), if any of them are shut. He is bringing up the pathos and limitation of this situation.

Next he makes a statement about how our capacity to breathe or carry on the life processes decline as we age. Again, he is pointing up the unattractiveness and limitation of our dependence on the ordinary gross breath.

When the water is moving, the air moves along with it. You can live without food or without drinking coffee for five days. But you cannot live for five minutes without breathing.

Again making the same point: Conventional humans are absurdly dependent upon the gross in- and outbreath of air. He wants to advise that religious people and devotees pursue and learn about his subtle breathing, mastered by siddhas including Yogananda and Lahiri Mahasaya, who was in a constant state of no breath and no heartbeat during his later years, even while active. He continues on speaking of our conventional situation:

The highest of all powers is the power of Maya. A dead body and so also a stone are unable to talk. Likewise, if air does not act, fire cannot burn; i.e., if breathing is not regular, the fire of digestion will be impaired. When the digestive fire does not act properly, the phlegm in the lungs becomes hard. Fat increases in the body. The food that is eaten remains in the stomach undigested. If there is any obstruction in the pump, water will not flow out properly. Similarly, if the [ordinary] breathing becomes difficult, fever, thickening of the mucus, are caused. By this, all diseases are caused.

Nityananda is not trying to give advice here about diet or health. It would be absurd to think that he is. This is more exposition of the ordinary state of breathing worldlings and many difficulties they face. "Ordinary" was inserted in brackets above to make this clear.

Those who do not practice pranayama have no yoga.

So now the solution to all of these hassles: Pranayama. Pranayama is no ordinary breathing at all and no ordinary experience of the breath. This is where all these troubles end.

It is impossible to draw water from a well without a rope.

You cannot draw to yourself a surfeit and plenitude of intelligent and healing prana, which makes a man all-sufficient, unless you practice pranayama. That is, you must learn to use the breath (the inner breathing or "rope" for the well), to pull to yourself more all-satisfying, all nourishing, and all healing prana. Get going on pranayama.

Puraka is drawing the breath up. Kumbhaka is retaining the breath. Rechaka is the exhaling of breath slowly from within. Many sorts of cakes are prepared from the same rice. So also, by breath everything is accomplished. The functions are different. What is called pranayama is all internal working. The same is Shivashakti in man. When this shakti is guided to brahmarandhra, it is communion with Godhead.

Here Nityananda finally speaks of pranayama for average people, explaining some of the basic terms used. This same puraka, kumbhaka, and rechaka continue on in exactly the same manner with the subtle breath, so the terms will remain useful.

Samadhi means controlling one’s energy. Samadhi is the upward breath.

Quite clearly, all everyday people have upward breaths, but it does not give them samadhi. Nityananda is saying that the state of samadhi is synonymous with mastery of the fixed, eternal inbreath. (In these scriptures the "upward breath" means the inbreath, since the air then moves up over the chest toward the nose.) When a yogi becomes finally fixed in the eternal inbreath, the heart automatically stops beating, happily, and has rest. Then savikalpa samadhi automatically dawns. This is all very well explained in the lessons printed by Yogananda's organization SRF, for devotees of Yogananda. However, fixation in the inward breath is not explained in those lessons and is probably not understood by most functionaries of SRF. Nityananda, who is an aspect, helpfully explains this and what do do when the outer breath no longer wants to move or toggle. Kumbhaka should be established with an eternal inbreath.

The upward breath is what is called the Taraka Brahman. When the upward breath has become perfect, the whole world is within you.

"Perfect" means when full kumbhaka dawns plus the state of samadhi. Then the world world can be seen, and other worlds, with the speed of thought as with conscious astral travel. Vision of all creation as one sight sometimes also appears, as in the Oglala Sioux story of Jumping Mouse. This is religious knowledge.

This upward breath is the same in all creatures.

Here Nityananda is referring to the inward breath both in its conventional form and the subtle or non-air form. His point is that the basic posture or movement of the inward breath in found in all creatures. That is, they cycle into an inner posture of drawing, seeking, opening, and pulling which is the essence of the inbreath. All creatures have some form of breathing in and out, and both the material forms of breath and the subtle mastery of it is the same essential action of drawing, pulling, receiving, and opening.

A Raja Yogi is one who has realized the one, indivisible. He is one with God when he is talking or sitting or walking. Raja Yoga is like sitting in an upper story and looking around below. Raja Yoga is so called because it is the king of all yogas. When our intellect becomes one with God, the same is known as Raja Yoga. It is all peace; it is formless, qualitiless. Bliss has no characteristics whatsoever. This is known as jivanmukti.

"Raja" means royal. Raja Yoga is elegant and complete. Raja Yoga is the religious knowledge that includes all of the powerful forms of knowledge: 1) meditation technique, 2) bhakti, 3) metaphysics and mastery of natural laws of the mind and matter, 4) Philosophy and the non-dualistic views of Vedanta, 5) austerities including chastity and the right direction of sexual energy (either into procreation or sublimation in God-worship). Christianity, if one takes the experiences of the Christian saints, is like raja-yoga. If Nityananda is praising raja-yoga we can assume that he considered himself a follower of raja yoga. That means that he was a bhakta, understanding the significance of devotion like Yogananda. It also means that he understood the non-dualistic views and analyses of Sankara. It also means that he pursued meditation technique.

Just as there are the gutters on both sides of the road for the water to flow freely, so also you must allow the breath to take an upward course freely. It requires great effort to carry a stone upwards. But without the least effort on our part it suddenly comes down.

Again he returns to the subtle breath. He is advocating to the qualified listeners that the inner inbreath should become as easy to access, with as little obstruction, as water flowing down street gutters.  Again, "you must allow the breath to take an upward course freely" refers to that subtle, non-material breath and not the ordinary breath. All people breath freely and let that breath take its upward coarse. 

First there is light perception of the inner, nourishing, all-satisfying pranic inbreath. Then one increases the satisfaction it gives and tries to hew to it. Finally it flows as fully as the water down the two street gutters. We are  dependent upon the gross outer breath because we believe we are dependent and have a great deal of psychological and karmic conditioning centering around that belief. Psychology is very important both in entrapment by the gross breath, and mastery of the pranic breath. Thus Nityananda is giving us a helpful visualization: The yogi should imagine that pranic inbreath as something that flows as well as rainwater down  street gutters. 

He mentions the stone-carrying again as a metaphor for the work of getting this attainment. At the same time he turns the "stone rolling downhill" as the sought-for way we should attain the pranic breath. This verse is therefore confusing, and some of that is likely due to the accuracy of its notation.

Similarly is concentration. It is easy to take birth; but it is very difficult to leave this body.

Concentration itself is very difficult. So is leaving the body while conscious and alive. Leaving the body is essentially what the yogi is doing when he masters the pranic inbreath. Calming the breath, cognizing the subtle breath, are as difficult as leaving the body while awake. But through right technique, guru-devotion, and God-devotion, it can be all done.

We must discover the source of a river.

Nityananda is referring to the true source of the breath. More exactly, he is referring to the satisfaction derived by breathing in, which is really from the infusion of prana. He is bidding the listener ponder where that satisfaction, i.e. that satisfying prana, really originates from. What is the true source of the satisfying fulfillment we get each time we breathe in? The reason that a yogi can develop kumbhaka and learn to live solely on the pranic breath like Lahiri Mahasaya and Nityananda is by finding the true source of that satisfying feeling, which is prana and mental conceptions concerned with pulling "something nourishing." The act of breathing is nothing but a mental conception of gathering and pulling at "something" hoped in faith that will satisfy. That mental act of pulling and gathering is the true source of the river of prana. The yogi must learn that.

After it joins the sea, there is no use in seeing the river.

After samadhi and mastery of the inner breath there is no use breathing in the normal way any more or even being involved with the gross breath. This is an astounding state of the nirvikalpa sage.

To a tree, its mother root is the most important; all other roots are subsidiary. 

And likewise the inner breath, the "true source of the river," is the important thing that the yogi doing this technique must focus on. We can get everything from that. The "source of the river" within is the only necessity.

When we raise a chair, our breath goes upwards.

Following right after the "mother root" saying, he gives the practical instruction to lift a chair and notice the inner position we take. This inner position is where we find the "river" and the "mother root of the tree."

Truly, this is a significant verse and could be a breakthrough verse for many yogis doing Yogananda's first kriya with progress. Nityananda gives this helpful instruction to help devotees fix on the inner posture of the inbreath. When a fellow or a lady leans over and picks up a chair, he goes into the inner posture of the inbreath. It is that inner posture or inner pull and posture alone that finally pulls and opens into the pranic inbreath, and not anything else such as the movement of lungs and air, etc. All the sincere bhaktas, brahmacharis, and yogis and yogesses of the White Europeans -- and all peoples and nations -- will love Nityananda just for this one sentence  he spoke somewhere long ago. 

Is it possible to know this pranic inbreath without chastity, guru-bhakti, and meditation technique all three? Highly unlikely, except in dribs and drabs. Without effort at the first, better not to even try. Chastity is the ground of this knowledge-unto-realization. Guru bhakti and God-devotion are the water on that ground. And meditation is the work.

That is the seat of prana.

That inner posture of opening and drawing is the seat of prana, or where it comes into us.

When we are cooking, flames of fire have an upward course; so also the smoke takes an upward course. In the lighted chimney the course of the heated air is upwards. Similarly, in the heart-space the course of breath is upwards.

This has two aspects: He is giving us another lovely and homely visualization; and he is revealing that the soul has a natural preference for the occult inward breath (inner inhalation) and a tendency to get established in it. He is giving permission and advice to concentrate on that aspiring breath as you go along in your practice. The metaphor is tied up with the Indian practice of calling the inhale the "upward breath." We in the west, who have long ago looked into the body and are well aware of it's inner parts, tend to think of the inbreath as going "down" into the lungs. This can make the Indian literature confusing. We think of our inbreath as taking air down; breathing it down. The less technological Indians, thinking only of the movement occurring outside the body, developed that other convention. So in the western mind there is a kind of mismatch between the "chimney smoke wafting upwards" metaphor and the inner breath. (Unless we view the breath moving up our chest as chimney smoke.) Notice too that the metaphor is quite different than his "carrying the rock uphill" simile. I stated that this refers to the difficulty of leaving behind the old gross breath and our addiction to matter, not to the easy-and-natural inbreath itself. Leaving aside the physical conundrums of the metaphor, he is really saying that the inbreath is natural for us to do, just as natural as smoke rising up from a cooking fire. In cultivating the inner breath, we can use his beautiful image to convey to ourselves how easy this to get the subtle inbreath. We can also imagine ourselves rising up, within -- just like that chimney smoke -- into spacious skies where there is more than enough of God's air available for our increasing in-spiration.

Our joy is caused by the motion of the air (vayu). Without this air motion there is no blood circulation. When a water canal is dammed the motion of water has come to an end. So also in this body, such a dam is vatha, pitha, and kapha (the three humors or tridoshas).

The avadhuta is pointing out the ordinary state of affairs in which circulation and movement are a part of health, positing conventional ideas and situations. But he is relating this idea to the inner  airs  and inner movement he wants us to attain. We must have that circulation. The average person has little joy even though all these material things are circulating. The original word as he spoke was probably ananda (bliss). He is saying that just as in conventional physical life circulation is necessary for health or basic well-being, this circulation of the inner breath, in the devotee, is very blissful and gives him ananda. Nityananda may also be saying that just as our material forms of circulation are founded upon the vayu, ananda has some connection to vayu likewise. (If so, this would be a new idea I'd not seen elsewhere.) If it were so, the yogins and yogesses getting the inner breath going would therefore feel much bliss, and I can vouch for that.

Those who do not concentrate on breath have no aim, no state, no intelligence and no fulfillment. So concentrate and think.

Nityananda is extolling his particular meditation technique -- rather adamantly God bless him. This was Yogananda's first meditation technique, the one that Lahiri Mahasaya said gives "all realization."This is no doubt true. For one thing, the 2nd technique comes naturally through assiduous application to it, and Aum will be soon heard with open ears. True intelligence comes from chastity and application to God. True fulfillment come from putting the mind on God and becoming part of His sat-chit-ananda. By "no aim" he means there is really not much point to musts of their doings and undertakings; that those doings will not give them true happiness. "Concentrate and think" is undoubtedly a flaw in transmission. The meditator must not think, but concentrate on the meditation vehicle. Nityananda was a tremendous advocate and lover of this ancient meditation technique, the one discussed in most detail by Shiva in the Vijnana-Bhairava, and which Muktananda called a technique of siddhas.

Concentrate on the indrawing and outgoing breath.

This is one basic feature of the technique.

Draw the breath in properly. Breathe, concentrating on the sound the breath produces. Concentrate on the sound which is produced internally. Have faith in the internal sound and breathe. Breathe in.

A central secret of the meditation technique that Nityananda refers to , and which was central to his own life, is to think of the sounds made by the in- and outbreaths, in every possible dimension. Can you hear the inrush of air, in all its dimensions, in your mind as you go into the internal act and posture of the inbreath? That will assist you greatly. Lying beside anybody who's sleeping, whether they are breathing through nose or mouth, you hear the sound. "Produced internally" means that you find the two internal acts and internal "sounds," as it were, associated with the acts. "Have faith in the internal sound" means to let those two internal thought-of sounds, or enacted sounds and positions, become your breath, your whole breath. This is the pranic breath. Nityananda has done a great deal of in-depth teaching about here and explained the technique very well. Nowhere else have I seen it revealed in text. He mentions faith in letting this become your true breath, which is key to this whole yoga.

Breathe deeper and deeper. Breathe in so that the internal sound may be audible to the ears.

Nityananda is revealing a lot here about the meditation technique. 

There are two aspects to this statement. First, Nityananda is exposing the central technique, which is to hear well the sound of the two breaths in your mind while continuing to engage in their basic actions while the ordinary breath is stopped. "Audibility" to the ears is likely a clumsy translation of what was said, that is, that you learn to "hear" the two breaths in your mind. 

He could have also been referring to preparatory techniques in which the sound of the breath is increased, emphasized, and listened to. This is so that the mind can learn to cognize the breath as a sound- act, then later a mental sound-act with residual physical play-along or ghosting. (Continuing to lift the lungs up, move the diaphragm, make a slight "pull in" etc., the body doing all the things it's conditioned to do relative to the breath, except for actual intake of air.) This brings me to a discussion of some well known pranayama techniques, how these really work to assist the devotee, what they actually achieve, and why they are actually recommended by the rishis.

The sitali and sitkari pranayamas, in which air is forcefully drawn in through the curled tongue or through teeth (with the tongue near the teeth) accomplish the two aid objectives: Making the devotee newly aware of the breath including its sound; and making the devotee newly aware of the essential two breathing acts.

By doing such pranayamas as sitali and sitkari, the God-seeking person comes to get to know the breath again and it's nature as sound. The in-rush of the air making a pronounced ssshhhh sound helps him to get that sound firmly in his mind for breathing the mental breath. The pronounced "pulling in," additionally, makes clear to him the inner posture of the inbreath. (Just as bending over and picking up a chair, as the avadhuta advised.) These goals just written are, in fact, prime and central purposes of these pranayamas,  unknown to most. 

The very same is true for the alternate nostril breathing that is routinely used in so-called yoga studios, spiritual retreats, and general yoguh. It is simply a milder version of sitkari and sitali. The purpose of the one-nostril breathing is to make the yogi newly aware of the breath. The one nostril produces a little more sound. (That one-nostril inbreath will ultimately become the fixed in-breath of Nityananda's state.) Then also, because of the reduction of the breathing channel one must pull all the more, thus one becomes more aware of the essential inbreathing act.

This is the real purpose of alternate nostril breathing, the mildest form of this, as well as the others. It is not necessary to do very many of these pranayamas, however, on occasion they will give you assistance in locking onto the inner acts. The sitali and sitkari -- also called tongue-hissing and teeth-hissing -- are more pronounced versions of alternate-nostrils. The noisy teeth-hissing is particularly good for grasping the sound. Visualize and here that Shaaaaa! Live on it! This is Nityananda's message.

Should one like to develop, he can also breath through increasingly smaller straws, the shorter the noisier. In this second interpretation, all these accomplish Nityananda's advice above of "breathing in so that the internal sound may be audible to the ears. But the real goal is to be able to hold the sound in your mind while engaging in the two airless inner actions. Perhaps your old granny has an old narrow lamp stem setting on her table back in Des Moines? Practice drawing air in through that. Try not to wake her! Use your imagination and get free of the gross breath, thus samadhi. 

Do not think of anything else. Eating and drinking, coming and standing and eating, these do not elevate the soul.

The yogi should become devoted to the inner breath, loving to stay in it as much as possible. As he comes to love it, he cares more about staying in this breath than about eating, drinking, or going places. He does fall in love with the inner subtle breath.

Cook for yourself; do not desire to eat what others have cooked. O mind!

Find out all this yourself by testing and doing. Only personal effort and experience will show you. Don't simply read about it. Prove it to yourself. Eat the divine bliss of bhakti, chastity, faith, and meditation -- yourself.

Do what you do with faith.

Notice that Nityananda has brought up simple faith throughout his utterances. Simple religious faith is the real ground for walking on, when it comes to the occult attainments of the Indian yogis or the same occult attainments of the Christian saints. Nityananda is saying that all the yogic actions, meditations, concentrations, and pranayama play should be done with an attitude of faith, expectancy, and belief.

Prana is like a rope. When exhaling and inhaling it moves harmoniously.

This likely refers to the fact that the breath moves on its own, the two breaths continually connected; that it does as it likes and takes care of itself as always, even in this technique. "It moves harmoniously" was probably Nityananda speaking of the wisdom of the breath to develop this process on its own, or "it moves with its own wisdom." This relates to his meditation technique itself in which one allows the breath to do whatever it likes. (It is the kundalini-shakti that leads the devotee to kumbhaka states because this is the divine state and that's where the kundalini-wants to go.) In reality as one watches the breath in this technique, the breath is not necessarily smooth at all. It changes continually, can get frisky or extreme, and even erratic as the disciple watches it. Trying to keep the breath even or according to a certain ideal,  to control it, is antithetical to the technique Nityananda used, in which the breath is allowed to do as it likes, with the religious person simply watching and giving it it's song. What the above comment references is the natural connectedness of the two breaths, like segments on a rope, one always following the other. He may be also referring to the "single pranic inbreath" state that was his final breathing goal.

Prana is indivisible, it has no difference of time. Prana feels this difference when it is coupled with the gross.

Prana is synonymous with akasa (space) and is one of the first evolutes of Isvara, the creating Lord. It is pure, intelligent, and effective. Everything is indeed permeated by prana and made of same. Nityananda is saying that just like the Lord, prana transcends time. That means it can do things in the past as well as the future, and is not ruled by the past or pre-existing conditions.

Prana should be tied down by the rope of faith.

This is one of my favorite statements by Nityananda. He is revealing that the mastery of kumbhaka finally relies on faith. Thus faith should be cultivated at the beginning, the middle, and the end as one pursues yogic attainment. Likewise it is very beneficial when children learn to cultivate faith early through the wisdom of the mother and father. This sets the ground for them later to attain renunciation, meditation, kumbhaka, and liberation to bless themselves and others. An inner heart of faith is really the engine of the yogic attainment of direct God-knowledge (samadhi), just as faith was the engine of enlightenment for the Christian saints. Faith is the rising up of instinctive divine knowledge that motivates our aspiration and effort.

Let prana attain moksha by its upward direction.

He is saying that in the end the yogi lets prana itself, in its natural "upward" (inbreath) direction which the yogi finds as his "seat," give him liberation, as an eagle might let warm canyon winds loft it up into higher skies. The kundalini and the prana want to bring the disciple to moksha of themselves. He is saying let the prana do so. "Upward direction" refers to the devotees aspirational inner opening and receiving. He is saying it is part of the evolution of this process that the aspirant seeks this posture more and more.

Liberation from the sensual ties is moksha.

Spiritual liberation is synonymous with destruction of all addictions and hankerings after sense pleasure, pre-eminently including sex for those with any mind to hear. It's another of Nityananda's many statements dissing sensuality, like where he says there should be no awareness of any place below the neck! (Sorry Los Angeles yoguhs and "tantrikas.") The avadhuta of Ganeshpuri was a classic renouncer and renunciation of all sensual bodily pleasure is central to that. The very word "avadhut" refers to a person of sublime detachment from the material world. Have no doubt that Nityananda was no playboy, so-called "tantrik," pleasure maven, or sexer. Nityananda was a classic renunciant who cultivated dispassion from all of the lower sense pleasures, as specified in the Yoga-Sutra and Bhagavad-Gita. Nothing he knew and none of the attainments he speaks of here are possible without chastity. 

Then comes peace. O prana! Enter the abode of peace. Have under control both this world and the next!

When samadhi is finally attained, we have arrived at the other shore and our troubles are over. And when we attain heaven her, we will have it there. "Abode of peace" is one more beautiful way to refer to the heaven states of religious development., knowable in this life, after, and in-between. The blessings of savikalpa and nirvikalpa samadhi give mastery both in this world and the higher worlds.

Such souls will attain Satchitananda. They have no attachment to the results of karma.They are eternally liberated from bondage. They are eternally one-minded. They have conquered the qualities of the jiva.

"No attachment to the results of karma" has two meanings: 1) The religious person becomes disinterested in the karmic goings-on, and 2) The bondage-link between his life and karma becomes severed. "Qualities of the jiva" likely refers to the the jiva's involvement with the "three gunas" (qualities) of prakriti, of the Sankhya philosophy. When prakriti and her three gunas are conquered, all of nature has been conquered.

Just as small rivers enter the sea, our attention must be fixed on the internal breath.

He is saying to give all attention to the inner breath and become thoroughly addicted to the inner breath, and to the yogic kumbhaka that attends it. Instead of thinking of the thousand-and-one things, keep the mind on the breath. In other words, do the central technique. Like a kindly grandfather Nityananda is bringing us back to basic meditation ideas. He is probably also broaching one of his own visualizations in meditation, that of giving up one's breath to a divine sea, and also drawing upon that divine boon-bestowing sea. One of his more favorite visualizations, based on his many references to it, was that of breathing the inner sky which he called the "sky of the heart." The sky of the heart, in Nityananda's intention, is actually in the head at the kutastha (3rd eye) and the upper head. It is likely that Nityananda sometimes visualized that as a beneficent sea as well.

In the next section I show how the state described by Nityananda fully comports with the Yoga-Sutra, is definitely indicated in the Yoga-Sutra, and is in fact the central goal of yogic pranayama techniques.

The Yoga-Sutra On Kumbhaka and The Breathless State