Clever Meditation

Clever Meditation, Yoga & Pranayama Tips for Busy People – Part 1

Most of us live very busy and hectic lives.  If you are married, have children, have a job, you are going to be busy and even if you don’t have all these commitments, you are probably busy nonetheless.  Throw in other activities you may be participating in, such as higher education & training, a fitness routine, other hobbies & interests, sports, blogging etc., and 24 hours starts to seem like awfully little time per day.  Unfortunately, what seems to often get sacrificed in keeping up with the rat race is the one thing that should not, your daily spiritual practice.  So in this series I will give some handy tips on how you can get more Yoga and Meditation practice into your busy lives by doing some clever multitasking.

Of the many many yoga pranayama breathing exercises there are, I think the following 2 stand apart:  Breath of Fire Yoga Pranayama & Kapalbhati Yoga Pranayama.  These 2 pranayamas have an encyclopedic list of benefits and what’s best about them is that they are both simple to do and easy to incorporate into your daily life… specially when you are driving!

Clever Meditation

Yes that’s right… driving.  Obviously DO NOT do these breathing exercises if it at all affects your driving, but, generally speaking since driving is mostly automatic for most of us, it provides the perfect opportunity for getting in some additional spiritual work.

A car really is pretty conducive for such pranayama practice.  You are already sitting up, so just straighten your spine (use a lumbar cushion if you need to), you have music available so put on some inspirational tunes, you have a clock to time yourself and you even have a fan to stay cool.  What more can you ask for?  If you have family in the car with you, great, you can all practice together… why not :-).  Both Breath of Fire pranayama and Kapalbhati pranayama breathing exercises that activate energy pathways within you and increase your energy, so there is no risk of them making you sleepy or drowsy.  Really, no significant modification is needed to practice either pranayama while driving so take advantage of this time and give it a try.  

If there are other pranayama exercises you are doing, they too might be suitable to do while driving.  So be creative and see if driving is conducive to incorporating them.  In the next part of this series I will share more multi tasking tips to help you meet your Daily Yoga & Meditation Practice.  Till then keep breathing!

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19 replies
  1. ss hinges
    ss hinges says:

    The biggest confusion to a novice who although has full faith on Yoga but doesn’t know were to start with,this article gives a good helping hand

    Reply
  2. anitha
    anitha says:

    Hi,
    Superb website.many thanks to you. I have a question what is the best exercise to lose weight at yr arm areas

    many thanks

    Reply
  3. Anmol Mehta
    Anmol Mehta says:

    Hey Chris,

    Breath of Fire takes a bit of practice. My senior students, who don’t have my proximity blindness yet, advise other students to practice it daily for a few minutes to help get it down.

    Always glad to inspire and always looking forward to your blog posts.

    Cheers,
    Anmol

    Reply
  4. Chris Cade
    Chris Cade says:

    I’ll have to give these a try. I just now tried the Breath of Fire and it was more challenging than I thought it would be to maintain a consistent rhythmic pace.

    When I was studying at the Berkeley Psychic Institute, I really liked how their meditation techniques were focused on “real” life… not some thing that people have to sit down for 30 minutes in silence for, but the kinds of things that people can do while driving.

    Practically, anytime we can provide people an opportunity for self-growth while multitasking something they’re already doing, there’s a greater potential to impact their lives positively.

    You’ve now inspired my next blog post! Thanks, Anmol :)

    Reply
  5. Anmol Mehta
    Anmol Mehta says:

    Hey KL,

    Yup shower is a chance to get in some more spiritual work or other activity perhaps ;-). In any case, I prefer doing the stretching in the heat (as I indicated in part 2 of this series Clever Yoga Tips Part 2) rather than pranayama, although I have done Sheetali Pranayama in the shower before.

    You do have to watch out about overheating when doing Pranayama for sure.

    Thanks for you contributions.

    Best,
    Anmol

    PS: I got the Subscribe to Comments working finally :-D.

    Reply
  6. K-L Masina | Be Conscious Now
    K-L Masina | Be Conscious Now says:

    After giving it a go… I can see that the hands-free alternate nostril breathing will take some time to master…

    Another time-saving yoga device… practicing pranayama and meditation in the bath. Meditating in water adds a womb-like feel to the process… but I’m not sure about the combination of water and heat on pranayama…

    Reply
  7. Anmol Mehta
    Anmol Mehta says:

    Hey KL,

    You continue your unbeaten streak of mentioning exactly that which I left out of the article… its really getting kinda scary :-P. I was going to mention Alternate Nostril Pranayama, whose final mastery requires it to be done without the hands but instead with mental control of each nostril! But, I didn’t include it as this needs immense concentration and felt it might pose a risk when driving.

    Thanks for your other suggestions and feedback.

    Best,
    Anmol

    Reply
  8. K-L Masina | Be Conscious Now
    K-L Masina | Be Conscious Now says:

    This is a great tip Anmol!

    I’d dearly love to be able to do alternate nostril breathing while driving, but of course the hand position required makes it impossible.

    I do however practice Ujjayi breathing when I walk. i find it makes an enormous amount of difference to the way the walk feels, and I can feel my lungs expanding. After the walk, I find I can breath right up my spine – such a great feeling!

    As for yoga, on days when I don’t do a ‘mat practice’, I do squeeze in postures here and then when I can – tadasana is great for waiting in queues, and forward bends are awesome while waiting for the jug to boil…

    Reply

Trackbacks & Pingbacks

  1. Tips for Yoga Pranayama | Power of the mind. | Programming The Mind says:

    […] Clever Yoga Tips for Busy People Beginner’s Guide to Yoga Pranayama […]

  2. […] As you can see from the popular series, Clever Yoga Tips for Busy People, yoga can be done while walking, driving and even taking a shower, and yes, there is also something called Chair Yoga, which you can do while sitting comfortably in your office or cubical as well .  The credit for the inspiration for this article goes to my cousin and close buddy Ashim.  He emailed me this morning and said he was enjoying Chair Yoga using the pranayama techniques taught in the Free Online Yoga Breathing Exercises Video series.  This is really a great way to incorporate some excellent breathing techniques into your busy life, and in this article I will give you a nice condensed set of pranayamas to get you started with your own Chair Yoga program. […]

  3. […] Previously, in the series Clever Yoga Tips for Busy People, I gave some handy tips on how to incorporate some useful yoga techniques into your everyday life.  These included doing the wonderful Kapalbhati Pranayama for Weight Loss and Health while walking or driving, and doing Toe Touches (Padahast Asana) while in the shower.  But, today I want to share with your some very good tips which you can easily integrate right into your yoga routine, in order to get a whole lot more out of it.  After all, you are doing your practice anyway, might as well get the most out of the time you spend on the mat. […]

  4. […] The yoga set below could well have been part of the Clever Yoga Tips for Busy People Series, as it is quick to do and can be easily done anytime you have a few free minutes to spare.  If you have more time you can repeat this set more than once if you like. […]

  5. One In All and All In One » Meditation In Motion - The Grounding Cord says:

    […] Recently I was reading this blog post by Anmol Mehta, and I particularly enjoyed the fact that he presented two different meditations that could be done while driving. For those of us who live busy lives and/or spend a good deal of time in the car, meditation while driving is a great way to kill two birds with one stone. […]

  6. Clever Meditation, Yoga & Pranayama Tips for Busy People - Part 2 at En Route to Mastery says:

    […] Previous in series Date posted : October 19th, 2007 by Anmol Mehta Last Modified : October 22nd, 2007 / PRINT THIS POST Filed under : Feeds, Health & Longevity / Report a Concern Navigate : Previous post / Next post / Top of Page You might also be interested in this: […]

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