Breath Works Through Kaballah Meditations:
One of Abulafia's simplest practices, popularized by Aryeh Kaplan, involves a series of head movements and breath, combined with pronouncing the Divine name.
The shortest version works by sounding out different Hebrew vowels together with the tetragrammaton (Y-H-V-H). When you do the practice, you'll want to sit comfortably in a place where you will not be disturbed, and allow the eyes to close. One begins with the first letter of the Divine name, Yood, and pronounces with the yood the vowels Oh, Ah, Ay, Ee, and Oo. Each vowel has a corresponding head movement, which resembles the way the vowel mark is written in Hebrew: with Oh the head moves up and back to center, Ah to the left and back to center, Ay to the right and back to center, Ee down and back to center, and then Oo forward, backward, and back to center. Move your head with the breath: on each inhale you move away from center, then on the exhale, pronouncing the sound, you move back. So, it looks a bit like this:
Inhale - move head upward
Exhale - move head back to center, pronouncing Yoh
Inhale - move head to the left
Exhale - move head back to center, pronouncing Yah
Inhale - move head to the right
Exhale - move head back to center, pronouncing Yay
Inhale - move head downward
Exhale - move head back to center, pronouncing Yee
Inhale - move head backward
Exhale - move head foreward, backward, center, Yoo
You then repeat that process with the letters Hey, Vav, and then Hey again.
As you repeat the process, make sure to breath deeply and inhale all the way to your diaphragm.
after each inhale hold your breath for about 3 seconds and then exhale with the proper letter twice as long.
This process allows the Ketherian Chakra and the Heart Chakra to be united leading to greater levels of happiness and unification inside the body which leads to Yikhud.
There are many layers to this practice. On the esoteric level, notice that since you're permuting each letter of the Divine Name with each vowel, somewhere in there you have pronounced the ineffable name of God. On the more practical level, the complexity of this practice really focuses the mind. You can be thinking about mortgages, tests, and kids when you start, but in order to keep it straight, those thoughts just have to leave. Moreover, this is just the simplest level of the practice. As you develop, there are more and more complicated versions. One is to visualize the letters and vowels as you pronounce them. Another is to combine Divine names, such as YHVH and ADNY ("adonai"), and rotate through the vowel-sequence with the two names. You can even do one name backward and the other name forward.
Now, if this is approached as a sort of parlor trick, it's not very interesting or uplifting. But look closely at what Abulafia is doing: focusing the mind, and training the mind and body to work together. And all in a system that expertly pushes distracting thoughts away.
The results can be amazing. For example, there's a version of the practice above in which you rotate through the vowels on the exhale. Instead of just inhaling, you pronounce a vowel and move the head on the inhalation. So it sounds like "Oh-Yo... Oh-Yah..." etc., then "Ah-Yo, Ah-yah," then "Ay-yo, Ay-yah," and so on. The practice takes about twenty minutes, if you don't rush. Usually, when I finish it, I've really got YHVH in my head -- I can imagine the letters of the name imprinted on whatever else I'm seeing: trees, people, traffic jams. And that is the truth, isn't it? That the trees and people and cars are just the skin of the Divine? Isn't that the simple truth we've been trying to wake up to?
If you are interested in learning more about Abulafia, there is no substitute for practice. You must experience with the breath first.
However, don't get too fancy too fast. Try the above practice first, perhaps setting aside twenty minutes each day for a few weeks. Observe what happens to the mind; see how you feel afterwards. If you find the practice has become too easy, add one of the extra layers suggested above until you really have to concentrate in order to do it. Again, with only the introductory practice, it's not as if you're going to attain prophecy overnight. But it's a start.
 Universal Chakra Chart by Shahin and Tania Jedian TM |
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