It's not hard to realise that we are in constant states of change throughout the day. Sometimes were are up and sometimes we are down, we feel high or low. These fluctuations in our energy are caused by many different things, not the least of which is what we spend our time thinking about. If we become constantly concerned with all that is wrong all of the time we will make ourselves miserable and our energy will be very low. If we just keep looking at things that make us happy all the time we will avoid some major information, we will be out of balance. So according to this idea we must try to find a way that is 'more' balanced.

I often hear people say. "I must try to get more balance into my life". But trying to do anything at all, let alone trying to get balanced, is bound to lead to more stress, and stress is what we don't want, do we? So we try to relax a bit and put our feet up, we breathe through the nose and try to let go of the things that keep us pre-occupied, we try to let go of our mind stuff. We may do a bit of asana practise and some pranayama, after we have done these things usually we feel better. What has changed?

I would say just the mere fact that you have changed the focus of you're attention away from thinking and more to feeling and breathing will make a big difference to you're energy. When we see a child upset, for example, we may try to distract it away from it's suffering in order to calm down the situation a little, then we can see things a bit clearer, the child may need changing or feeding etc.

So in order to change our energy we now know, (don't we?), that we need to breathe deeper at least, and if possible we do some asana practise. But still the situation we are in is the same as it was before, so what has changed in us? To be frank, breathing more oxygen into the brain via the blood stream must alter consciousness to a certain extent. Anyone that has ever had a pain and taken a pain killer knows that the chemical we put into our body will change our perceptual outlook to an extent. After a few drinks of alcohol for example we may see the world in a very different way. We have changed our body chemistry that's all, the world is still the same as it was before but we now see it a little differently. This is exactly the same thing that happens with asana and pranayama, well not exactly, but you know what I mean don't you?

It's all so simple isn't it. Now if we add to this the staggering fact that the whole of the 6000 year old yoga experience is a science dedicated to the changing of our consciousness it could blow our mind, if we let it! The 8 limbs of Raja Yoga are a manual for learning to navigate you're own nervous system. But instead here we are all caught up in our little world of neurosis, we love to have a good worry. We have been trained to worry about everything from the moment we first met another human being more or less. The modern world is all about worrying, if you are worried then you are scared and if you are scared you cannot be happy it is impossible. So going back to putting up you're feet and letting go, how can you do that if all you're going to do is feel fear? You cant let go because you are fearful. You're body is tense because you need to hold all of that fear in place. If you even begin to think about relaxing all of that stuff you are holding in may start to rise up to the surface and scare the bejasus out of you.

That is exactly the reason we have yoga. If you are not putting yoga practise at the top of you're list of priorities, I could tell you nicely that it is because you are not ready yet, and I could also say you are a fool. Oh that nasty yoga man, what does he know about all of the difficulties I have to bear, he must be an asshole! Ha ha ha ha .

"You either is or you ain't ". Charles Farnesbarn Hamilton III.