Silently intone a word ending in ‘ah.’ Then in the ‘hh,’ effortlessly, the spontaneity.
- The hinge: reverse the habitual emphasis. We actively inhale and merely tolerate the exhale; this technique reverses that — you exhale fully (throw the breath completely out), let the body inhale by itself. The body’s own wisdom regulates intake; you need only release.
- Why ‘AH’: outgoing breath = death; incoming = life. Every word ending in ‘AH’ forces a complete emptying. When the breath is fully out, all of life’s problems — anxiety, anger, sadness — have also temporarily ebbed. Death is non-problematic; problems belong only to life.
- The gap is the method: in the tiny interval after the ‘AH,’ before the next inhale, look within. No effort is needed here — hence ‘effortlessly, the spontaneity.’ The spontaneous witnessing being (SAHAJ) is always there, hidden by life’s constant activity; in this death-moment it is briefly exposed. Once tasted even once, this quality of consciousness can be uncoupled from the breath and maintained permanently.
- Use any word ending in ‘AH’ — ‘Allah’ (which reduces through repetition to ‘Lah,’ then ‘AH’), or simply ‘AH’ alone — as a portable mantra: on a bus, walking, at the office. The involuntary sigh of exhaustion and the involuntary ‘AH’ of overflow joy are the body’s own evidence it already knows this.
- Sustained exhale-emphasis has physical and psychological effects: constipation dissolves (the miser-body that only inhales and never releases), heart disease eases on exertion (emphasis on exhale opens the system), possessiveness and clinging weaken. The same root-pattern that grips breath also grips possessions.
- Pitfall: we cling to the inhale from fear of death. The technique works precisely because it welcomes death — ‘one who is ready to die can live.’ Resistance to exhaling is the same resistance that blocks the technique.
- Children breathe naturally through belly-exhaling; the belly rises and falls. When the emphasis shifts to chest-inhaling, the child has become tense and old. Two-thirds of the lung sacs (four thousand of six thousand) are never cleared of stale gases in chest-inhaling — the chronic mild poisoning sustains chronic mild anxiety.