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Nauli kriya

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Nauli kriya is a practice that massages inner

organs by isolating the rectus abdominus muscles and

kind of rolling them around. It can be broken down

into four parts: pulling to the back is actually

uddiyana bandha (one of the three locks used throughout

Ashtanga practice), pulling to the left side (vama nauli),

pushing out in the center (madhyama nauli), and pulling

to the right (dakshina nauli). It can take awhile to

get the hang of isolating the muscles. It is quite a

sight to see someone who has mastered it perform this.

For some reason this does not appear in any of the

Ashtanga books, except the Its Yoga manual. It would be

cool if the Ashtanga crowd would put out a little more

info, rather than just the strict set of postures. I'm

pretty sure that most experienced Ashtanga teachers will

be aware of this practice and probably use it

themselves. You can find descriptions and pictures of nauli

kriya in a lot of the older books on yoga. For

instance:<br>Integral Yoga Hatha - Swami Satchidananda<br>Yoga A

Scientific Evaluation - Kovoor Behanan<br>Hatha Yoga - Theos

Bernard<br>Asana Pranayama Mudra Bandha - Satyananda

Saraswati<br>Light on Yoga - BKS Iyengar<br>Yoga Systme of Health

.... - Yogi Vithaldas<br>Complete Illustrated Book of

Yoga - Vishnudevananda<br><br>Perhaps, like pranayama,

this is considered by the Ashtanga authorities to be

an advanced practice to be taught later. But since

it is extremely beneficial and takes a long time for

most people to learn, why not teach it?

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Noticed you are in Norman - I just moved<br>from

OKC. Do you teach? Where do you practice? I<br>truly

miss my old Iyengar teacher (Yoga Studio,<br>Nichols

Hills), but am enjoying Richard Freeman's<br>studio. He

is absolutely amazing - mind and body;<br>astanga is

a whole new ballgame and I'm

addicted.<br><br>Thanks for the info regarding the bandhas. I

have<br>Light on Yoga and will look that up this evening.

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So you're studing with Richard Freeman? I guess

everyone agrees he is THE Asthanga Yoga teacher in the US.

Does he teach any other pranayama than ujjahy when

practicing?<br><br>And about the bandhas, should us really keep mula

bandha for the entire practice (near 2 hours to TRY to

do SOMETHINGS FROM the whole first

series)...?<br><br>Thanks!

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Not a teacher. I consider myself a beginner. I

went to Andrew Eppler's classes in Norman for 4 years.

Have been investigating other types of yoga for awhile

now, since developing some problems with hands and

wrists which make it difficult or impossible to practice

Ashtanga for the time being. Learning a lot. A friend of

mine is building a house in Colorado and has been

going to Richard's studio for classes whenever he is up

there. Sounds like a cool place. He also checked out

some Bikram classes up there just for fun. Yeah, the

Yoga Studio people in OKC are cool, Laura and Diane.

You might ask Freeman or someone at his studio about

Nauli Kriya. Get someone to demonstrate, your eyes will

pop out of your head when you see it.<br><br>If you

haven't seen my little website, check it out, I have lots

of yoga info

there:<br><a href=http://www.ionet.net/~tslade/yoga.htm

target=new>http://www.ionet.net/~tslade/yoga.htm</a><br>Mainly just a bunch of

links, but a cool list of books.

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I was recently advised by a teacher to practice

the naulis and was shown each but don't know how many

repititions. I have been doing about three of each. Do you

know what is recommended? Thanks, K.

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I don't know that it would accurate to say I

study with Richard Freeman; I HUMBLY go to his classes

and absolutely absorb everything. He and his students

are the only Astanga teachers I've had, and the

studio is immensely encouraging and energetic. I have

the utmost respect for him and his teaching. (Never

have I seen anyone's sitting bones separate so much in

Adho Mukha Svanasana - good lord!)<br><br>Other types

of pranayama - not in Level I classes. I've just

started with Level 2 and will keep you posted. And Mula

Bandha held for the duration, the question hasn't been

posed yet. I'll ask during our next class. I try to

keep awareness there during my practice but notice

it's a work in progress...

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We would do nauli kriya three times, meaning

empty the lungs and do as many rolls as you can, three

times. This could be up to 100 rolls total, with equal

amount each direction. <br><br>In the video clip that

Tiber66 referred to in post 6167, Lino does 4 rolls each

direction. It seems like I see this done in various sitting

positions in books as well as standing with hand on thighs,

which is how we would do it.<br><br>I assume that this

is one of those things that maybe was once taught

with primary series and no longer is, like the

bastrika breath in tolasana (see post 6169). I think the

reason for all these minor differences in how Ashtanga

is presented by various teachers probably has to do

with the fact that PKJ is constantly refining the

teaching. And there are teachers who first learned Ashtanga

yoga 10, 15 or 20 years ago. This is probably one

reason that a requirement for teacher certification is

to continue to study with PKJ. See

<a href=http://www.ashtanga.co.uk/teachers.htm

target=new>http://www.ashtanga.co.uk/teachers.htm</a><br><br>It seems like some

postures have been added or

omitted over time. Also I've heard that postures were

once normally held for 10 breaths, then 8, and now 5.

<br><br>I just updated my little document comparing primary

series as presented in the literature to include John

Scott's book.

<a href=http://www.ionet.net/~tslade/pricomp.txt

target=new>http://www.ionet.net/~tslade/pricomp.txt</a><br>(just for whatever

its worth)<br><br>Personally, I

don't think any of these minor differences are any big

deal, although I can understand the effort to refine

the practice and to keep it pure and standardized.

But it should certainly be noted that there has been

constant change in PKJ's teachings.<br><br>And of course

Ashtanga yoga is meant to be learned from a teacher. So it

makes sense to have a standardized one-size-fits-all

version, which is then adapted to the student as

appropritate, including gradually learning the basics and

gradually adding some additional refinements.

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