Welcome to Your Study Space
Thank you for walking more deeply with Light on Prāṇāyāma.
This is your home base for everything in the Study Pack: all the session recordings, PDFs, questions, and references. Come back anytime to continue studying at your own pace.
This Study Companion includes the full reading schedule with page numbers and main themes for each unit, focus questions to guide your reading, reflection prompts for journaling and integration with your practice, practical tools for using this material with students or study groups, all the key Sanskrit terms from Light on Prāṇāyāma with transliteration and explanations, and a curated list of further reading to continue your exploration.
I’ve brought everything together in one comprehensive PDF that you can download, print, annotate, and return to throughout your study.
Whether you’re reading alone, studying with the Yoga Readers community, or preparing to teach, this is designed to be your working document – something you can write in, come back to, and use over months and years as your relationship with prāṇāyāma deepens.
Below are all the recordings of Light on Prāṇāyāma zoom sessions. Note that the recordings will be available up untill 48 hours after each session.
Each has its own page with the full recording, the reading assignment, key themes, and links to the guiding and reflection questions.
You have ongoing access – pause, rewind, revisit as many times as you need.
Light on Prāṇāyāma: Opening Session — Detailed Recap Notes
I opened this session by reflecting on how Yoga Readers began as a simple, practical idea: so many yoga books sit on our shelves, and most of us never truly make time to read them. “When I had the idea… I thought maybe 10, 20 people would be interested… that would commit to reading.” The community grew far beyond that expectation and now includes 2,000+ members across platforms, with the aim of making reading a living part of practice rather than a separate “intellectual activity.”
Yoga Readers now runs through a set of connected spaces: a WhatsApp group for reminders, a private Facebook group for deeper discussion, a twice-monthly newsletter with reading prompts and Zoom links, a YouTube channel with recordings, and a central website that holds study materials and archives.
The community has already completed three major reading cycles:
Note that recordings of previous cycles remain freely available on the Yoga Readers website as part of the community’s ethos of access and continuity.
I introduced my work as a bridge between academic research and embodied Iyengar practice. My academic background includes a PhD in Comparative Religion at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, with dissertation research focused on Iyengar yoga for women, and training in gender studies and comparative religions.
My yoga practice began as a teenager in Jerusalem, before yoga was widely popular. I described the early attraction as an experience she couldn’t yet name: leaving class feeling something “special” had happened, and returning again and again to understand it. Over time, travel and study in India made clear to me that there isn’t “one yoga”—there are many systems, and they feel different in the body. I teache Iyengar yoga in Jerusalem, Israel.
For my PhD research I interviewed 40+ senior Iyengar teachers internationally, including Geeta Iyengar (twice) and members of the Iyengar family. My teaching philosophy is rooted in reciprocity between text and practice: reading clarifies what we experience on the mat, and practice clarifies what a text is trying to say. “When we read about what we practice… we understand logically what we are experiencing. And then when we experience something on the mat, it becomes more clear what the book is talking about. One clarifies the other.”
Light on Prāṇāyāma is part of Iyengar’s major trilogy:
These books are distinctive because of their technical detail, practical orientation, and the attempt to translate embodied knowledge into teachable instruction. I quoted Yehudi Menuhin’s framing of Iyengar’s contribution: Iyengar did for the “more elusive” pranayama what he did for the physical aspects of haṭha yoga—bringing clarity, detail, and method. I also highlighted Iyengar’s own belief that Light on Prāṇāyāma might ultimately surpass Light on Yoga in importance: asana manuals existed, but a comprehensive pranayama manual of this kind did not.
From a scholarly angle, I cited researcher Suzanne Newcombe, who suggests Iyengar’s books are likely to hold a lasting place in the modern canon of yoga texts. Newcombe points especially to the book’s extraordinary detail on digital pranayama—around 20 pages devoted to finger placement and technique, a depth rarely found elsewhere.
A major challenge is that pranayama is a practice you cannot easily “see.” The book attempts to do something almost impossible: use photos and language to convey internal mechanics. I described revisiting the images and noticing the extreme attention to detail—nostrils, skin under the eyes, the subtle signs that try to communicate something inner through the outer body.
One of the key revelations of the session was how Iyengar learned pranayama. Many assume a direct guru-to-student transmission—but in this case, Iyengar was denied: Krishnamacharya told him, “You are not fit for pranayama.”
So how did he learn? Iyengar secretly observed his teacher practicing through a window and attempting to imitate what he could see. But pranayama is not like copying a posture: you cannot observe the internal mechanics of breath control from the outside. Iyengar therefore had to reverse engineer the practice—mapping internal sensation against external observation, slowly discovering where pressure, skin movement, finger placement, and subtle actions were required. Pranayama done incorrectly can disturb the nervous system and emotional balance (dizziness, agitation, anxiety). This is part of the reason the Iyengar tradition treats pranayama with seriousness and caution.
I also mentioned two unusual “teachers” that Iyengar acknowledged as shaping his approach.
First, philosopher J. Krishnamurti, whose concept of “passive alertness” helped Iyengar transform how he approached inhalation: shifting from “taking” the breath (active, potentially aggressive) to allowing breath to flow in with quiet awareness.
Second, a violinist. Iyengar observed the musician’s fingers—how pressing too hard or too softly distorts sound—and this became a model for digital pranayama: the right touch, the right precision, the right sensitivity.
Drawing again on Suzanne Newcombe’s documentation, I described the book’s publication process as iterative and collaborative. Early drafts were rejected by editors as too difficult—“no one will understand this.” Iyengar then enlisted two serious Western female students to test the instructions in practice: do they understand what he means? can the body follow it? where does language fail? The text was refined through repeated back-and-forth between Iyengar, the students, and editors—creating a book that is not a single finished “guru monologue,” but a dialogue aimed at making subtle practice more communicable across cultures, languages, and bodies. Do pranayama instructions land the same way in different bodies? In different climates? In different cultural contexts? What might change, and what is being assumed?
Surprisingly, in many Iyengar studios, pranayama classes are rare compared to asana classes. Even where they exist, they are usually once or twice weekly—not daily. This is not because pranayama is unimportant, but because it is considered advanced and requires more caution. Mistakes in asana may strain muscles; mistakes in pranayama can affect the heart, the nervous system, and the body’s respiratory chemistry (CO₂/O₂ balance). This places a heavier responsibility on teachers, and helps explain why pranayama is taught more selectively.
Pranayama awakened a “new light of inner awareness” that he did not experience when writing Light on Yoga. Pranayama is described as “psychosomatics,” exploring the intimate relationship between body and mind. It may look simple, but “the moment one sits down to practice… one quickly realizes it is a difficult art.”
I explained the logic of the five-month structure: this is heavy reading, sometimes technical, and therefore it needs time. The community will move through the book slowly—about 30–50 pages every two weeks—with flexibility for different reading rhythms. Some will read immediately, some right before the Zoom, some will skim, and some will join primarily for the discussion. All participation modes are welcome.
The first unit is pages 1–31, including materials many people skip: dedication (to Ramamani), invocation to Hanuman (not Patañjali), introductions, foreword, preface, and the contents. I asked participants to notice what these framing sections reveal: the stage of Iyengar’s life, the devotional context, and the way pranayama is positioned in relation to breath (Hanuman as son of the Wind).
I invited participants to read as practitioners: alert, curious, and willing to question. A central exercise is: What is missing? If you were writing the table of contents, what would you expect to see? What is emphasized, and what is not? I encouraged journaling while reading: pause, note reactions, agreement/disagreement, surprises, resistance, questions. “Read it like you practice… be alert. Don’t just take it in.” I also emphasized the communal value of sharing: when one person voices a question, many others likely hold it silently—and naming it helps everyone. I also offered an important long-view approach: questions do not always resolve immediately; sometimes they mature over years. Writing them down is part of practice.
Participants joined from a wide range of locations (Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, Scandinavia, the UK, Greece, India, Dubai, and more). The discussion revealed a range of relationships to pranayama: beginners, experienced practitioners seeking structure, and teachers wanting to deepen their understanding for safer teaching.
Common themes included:
Pranayama requires a paradoxical state—effortless effort. You must release forcing, but you cannot collapse into sleep. This relaxed alertness can allow unconscious material to rise, and there are reasons some things are unconscious. This is why readiness, containment, and support matter—and why some people stop pranayama when practicing alone. I offered a personal example of a student who preferred yoga as “escape” rather than presence. Pranayama, she noted, makes presence unavoidable—often on a deeper level than asana.
I closed by returning to the heart of Yoga Readers: this is not a lecture series, but a shared practice of reading, questioning, and learning together—recreating, in a modern communal way, the same kind of dialogue that shaped the book itself.
I opened our session by saying something many of you had already written to me: this book is hard. And we haven’t even reached the technical chapters yet. That’s exactly why we read together. When we read alone, we think we understand. When we listen to others reflect on the same lines, new layers open. This is collective svādhyāya.
To help us not get lost, I shared a visual map of the unit. We saw how Iyengar builds the teaching in a precise architecture: definitions (yoga, prāṇa, prāṇāyāma), philosophical roots, elements of practice, and benefits and obstacles. Even when it feels overwhelming, the structure is there.
Why Begin with the Golden Embryo?
We spoke about hiraṇyagarbha — the “golden embryo” — which Iyengar mentions at the opening. I shared the article I wrote for this cycle and explained why he begins cosmologically. Prāṇāyāma is not presented as a modern wellness tool. It is framed as something revealed, primordial, woven into the fabric of existence.
That framing shifts our attitude. This is not something we “use.” It is something we enter with humility, patience, and preparation.
What Actually Stops Us?
Before diving into the text, I asked everyone: What modern obstacle interferes with your prāṇāyāma practice?
Time, fear of doing it wrong, mental overload, physical fatigue, and confusion about how to balance āsana and prāṇāyāma all came up. One powerful question emerged from the text itself: Iyengar writes that until posture is perfected we should not attempt prāṇāyāma. So when is an āsana ever “perfect”? We will keep returning to this.
Āsana and Prāṇāyāma
We read Iyengar’s warning against trying to “do everything at once.” A beginner who tries to perfect postures while controlling breath loses stability in both. First steadiness in āsana, then refinement of breath.
But he also reassures us: when āsanas are well performed, prāṇāyāmic breathing begins to arise on its own. Breath and posture are not separate — the question is one of maturity and focus.
Prāṇa Is Not Just Breath
We unpacked Iyengar’s definition of prāṇa as the energy permeating all levels of existence — physical, mental, intellectual, and cosmic. Breath is only one expression of prāṇa. We reviewed the five vāyus not as separate entities, but as aspects of one vital force.
A Map for the Long Journey
I introduced the four stages of practice from the Śiva Saṃhitā: the eager beginning, the stabilizing phase, deep familiarity, and eventual absorption. This map reassures us that struggle, instability, and impatience are not failure — they are part of the path.
One participant wrote this in the chat. I shared my ocean metaphor: watching the sea from afar may seem monotonous, but observing each wave reveals endless variation. The same is true of breath. When attention refines, boredom dissolves.
When Breath Practice Is Too Much
I also shared personally that during periods of intense stress, prāṇāyāma can amplify agitation rather than settle it. Sometimes we must step back, return to grounding āsana, and approach breath gently. This too is part of mature practice.
What Emerged from the Groups
In discussions, many experienced teachers shared that breath awareness begins from the first day of āsana practice. Prāṇāyāma is introduced gradually, not postponed until some imaginary perfection. Several spoke about using simple breath awareness in daily stress, illness, and emotional overwhelm.
We closed knowing this is a long, subtle path. Next session we move further into the inner architecture of practice and Iyengar’s cautions.
I’m deeply grateful for the honesty, courage, and generosity in this community. This is not solitary reading — this is shared inquiry.
In our recent Yoga Readers session, we stepped into what I call the subtle architecture of Light on Prāṇāyāma . These chapters mark a turning point in the book. We are no longer simply discussing breath as a physiological function or even as a refined practice. We enter a map of the inner terrain — nāḍīs, chakras, kuṇḍalinī, the guru–śiṣya relationship, and the psychological and ethical responsibilities that accompany prāṇāyāma.
We began by returning to the image that opens the book: Hanumān. Many readers are surprised to encounter him there. We may be accustomed to Patañjali as the invoked sage, and yet here stands Hanumān — vāyu-putra, son of the wind. His presence is not ornamental. Hanumān embodies devotion, strength, steadiness, humility, and above all, mastery of prāṇa. His legendary leap across the ocean is not merely mythic geography; it is a profound metaphor. Breath, too, moves between worlds. It connects inner and outer, body and consciousness, effort and surrender. Prāṇāyāma requires the same disciplined devotion that Hanumān exemplifies.
From there, we entered Iyengar’s discussion of the nāḍīs . The text describes an intricate subtle distribution system through which prāṇa circulates. Three channels are primary: Suṣumṇā, the central axis; Iḍā, associated with cooling and lunar qualities; and Piṅgalā, associated with heating and solar qualities. Rather than reducing this system either to literal anatomy or dismissing it as pure symbolism, I suggested that we treat it as a functional model. Just as the nervous system distributes electrical impulses, the nāḍī system distributes vitality. Prāṇāyāma refines and regulates that vitality.
But here the text becomes clear: vitality must be guided. When prāṇa is intensified without preparation, imbalance follows. This is why Iyengar moves directly from subtle anatomy to the guru–śiṣya relationship. The expansion of vital force demands discernment.
We read passages describing how the teacher studies the student and how knowledge matures only through prolonged tapas and direct experience . Transmission is not the passing on of information. It is the transformation of the student’s interior landscape. I shared three classical metaphors that illuminate this relationship: the kitten carried gently in its mother’s mouth, the young monkey clinging actively to its mother’s back, and the fish swimming independently in the same waters as its teacher. Each image reflects a different mode of discipleship and a different degree of responsibility.
Our reading then moved to obstacles. Iyengar draws from Patañjali’s list of impediments to yoga. What struck many of us was that only a small portion of these obstacles are physical. Most are mental. Doubt, distraction, overindulgence, instability of attention — these are far more obstructive than bodily limitation. This reorients responsibility inward. Prāṇāyāma is not prevented primarily by stiffness or weakness; it is hindered by the untrained mind.
From there we explored lifestyle. Iyengar’s discussion of food is not limited to digestion. Food shapes consciousness . In our conversation, I invited participants to reflect on non-physical nourishment. The responses were beautiful: walking in forests, sea swimming, sunlight, reading, silence, asana practice. Everything we take in — sensory, intellectual, emotional — influences the subtle body. Prāṇāyāma does not stand alone as a technique. It is embedded in a wider ecology of living.
We also addressed a difficult passage concerning sublimation and male-coded language. Many Haṭha texts speak explicitly of semen and the male body. It is important to situate this historically rather than read it prescriptively. Women practitioners are not absent from yogic history, though textual language often centers male ascetics. The underlying principle is refinement of desire into awareness — a process not confined to gender.
Finally, we read Iyengar’s descriptions of the effects of prāṇāyāma. He compares it to a divine fire that purifies organs, senses, mind, and intellect . He writes of daily practice dissolving fear of death and stabilizing consciousness in the present. These are not casual claims. They are reminders that breath practice touches the deepest layers of human experience.
What we encountered in this session was not merely theory. It was a call to seriousness. Prāṇāyāma is powerful. And power demands preparation.
In our recent Yoga Readers session, we entered what I consider a pivotal threshold in Light on Prāṇāyāma: the movement from philosophy into embodiment. Until now, we explored subtle anatomy of the nāḍīs, prāṇa, the inner architecture of vitality. But in these chapters (11–13), Guruji brings us back to the body: anatomically, precisely and responsibly. And I find this shift deeply moving. Because prāṇāyāma is exacting and requires structure, it demands alignment, and it asks us to grow up.
Why So Many Instructions About Sitting?
Guruji dedicates an entire chapter to the art of sitting. We read how he describes vertical and horizontal alignments. He names three crucial internal points: the perineum, the sacrum and first lumbar vertebra, and the ninth thoracic vertebra with the sternum.
In our session, I asked: Which part of your spine feels most awake when you sit? And the answers varied from lumbar, dorsal, to upper thoracic. And this is why I think Guruji offers multiple seated postures. Padmāsana may be the “king,” but it is not the only gateway. Different bodies require different geometries in order to awaken different regions of the spine.
One of the most important distinctions we explored is the difference between sitting for meditation and sitting for prāṇāyāma: In meditation, the head remains upright, while in prāṇāyāma, Jālandhara Bandha is essential. It is protective and guruji is unequivocal: practicing prāṇāyāma without Jālandhara Bandha can disturb the nervous system. He compares the body to an electrical circuit. Without transformers, fuses, and insulation, energy becomes dangerous. Thus, prāṇāyāma is the conscious intensification of vital force. And without containment — through bandhas — we risk agitation rather than integration.
The Three Bandhas: Valves, Diaphragms, Thresholds
We read the effects of Jālandhara Bandha, Uḍḍīyāna Bandha, and Mūla Bandha. Guruji calls them essential. Without them, prāṇa disperses. With them, energy is directed, refined, elevated. In our discussion, we asked: Do you experience the bandhas physically? Energetically? Conceptually? Or do you practice them in trust?
This question matters because yoga is not blind obedience, but neither is it ego-driven experimentation. There is humility in practicing something before fully understanding it. And there is maturity in sensing when technique becomes experience.
Preparing the Mind: Not Mechanical, Not Forced
Perhaps my favorite line in these chapters: “Prāṇāyāma should not be mechanical.” The spine must be stable. The mind must be still — but alert. Backward bends alone are insufficient.
Forward bends alone are insufficient. Thus, balance is required.
In our session, we reflected on how posture affects mental clarity. How time of day shapes preparation. How group practice differs from solitary practice. How easily quiet becomes dullness — and intensity becomes force. The mind cannot be bullied into silence. It must be invited into steadiness.
Recently, our Yoga Readers community had the privilege of hosting a special session with senior Iyengar Yoga teacher Stephanie Quirk. Stephanie is internationally known for her deep work in Iyengar Yoga therapeutics and for the decades she spent studying and working closely with the Iyengar family at the Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute in Pune. For more than twenty years she observed, assisted, and learned directly from B.K.S. Iyengar, Geeta Iyengar, and Prashant Iyengar.
Our conversation followed months of collective reading of Light on Prāṇāyāma. Like many readers, we encountered passages that raise subtle and important questions:
When is a practitioner ready for prāṇāyāma?
Is readiness determined by time, technical skill, or something deeper?
What distinguishes breathing exercises from true prāṇāyāma practice?
Books can take us far in our understanding. But yoga is also a living tradition, transmitted through experience, observation, and dialogue with teachers who have spent decades immersed in practice. This is why I invited Stephanie to speak with our community. Listening to her was a reminder that yoga knowledge does not live only in texts—it lives in people, practice, and experience accumulated over many years.
When Is a Student Ready for Prāṇāyāma?
One of the questions we discussed is familiar to anyone who has studied Iyengar’s writings: Guruji repeatedly emphasized that prāṇāyāma should grow out of a stable foundation in āsana.
But how does a teacher actually determine readiness? Stephanie’s answer was refreshingly nuanced. There is no universal formula. Some teachers might say six months of practice. Others might say a year. Some might look for the ability to perform headstand and shoulderstand. But in reality, these markers are only rough guides. What matters more is the quality of the practitioner’s relationship to practice.
Has the nervous system begun to settle?
Has the practitioner developed the capacity to remain steady in a posture?
Is there a growing sensitivity to the breath and its effects on the mind?
These questions cannot be answered by counting months or poses. They require observation and discernment. In the absence of a teacher with Guruji’s extraordinary insight, teachers must rely on signposts. In the Iyengar method, the ability to practice inversions often serves as a baseline indicator. Reaching that stage usually means the practitioner has already explored the major categories of āsana and that the body’s systems—circulatory, respiratory, and nervous—have been gradually prepared.
Yet even this is not absolute. Stephanie reminded us that in the medical classes in Pune, Geeta Iyengar sometimes guided people through gentle prāṇāyāma even if they had never practiced inversions at all. These were ordinary people from the city, coming with illness or difficulty. The emphasis was not technical mastery but the qualitative effect of breath on the heart and mind.
The Art of Practice
One of the most powerful ideas that emerged in our discussion was the distinction between the science of prāṇāyāma and its art. The science involves techniques: inhalation, exhalation, retention, ratios, and sequencing. But the art lies elsewhere—in the subtle relationship between breath and awareness.
Stephanie referred to a verse from the Haṭha Yoga Pradīpikā, often cited in Iyengar’s writings, describing the intimate connection between mind and breath. Wherever the breath moves, the mind follows. Whatever state the breath assumes, the mind reflects. Prāṇāyāma is therefore not merely about increasing lung capacity or controlling the breath. It is about cultivating a refined sensitivity in which breath and awareness begin to inform one another. From this perspective, the real maturity required for prāṇāyāma is not technical accomplishment but the willingness to enter into practice itself as a formative process. Practice is not simply something we perform. It becomes something that shapes us.
Breathing and Prāṇāyāma
During the discussion Stephanie also mentioned a useful distinction that Prashant Iyengar sometimes makes between Śvāsāyana and Prāṇāyāma. Śvāsāyana refers to breathing exercises—methods that work primarily with the mechanics of respiration. Prāṇāyāma, by contrast, concerns prāṇa, the subtle life force that animates the body. The difference is not merely semantic. A practitioner may perform breathing exercises for years without touching the deeper dimension of prāṇāyāma. The transition occurs when awareness becomes sufficiently refined to perceive the subtle movement of vitality within the breath. In other words, prāṇāyāma begins not when we manipulate the breath more skillfully, but when we become attentive to the life within it.
Teaching Prāṇāyāma
Another fascinating part of our conversation addressed the inner state of the teacher. When guiding others through prāṇāyāma, the teacher cannot rely solely on technical instructions. The teacher must remain deeply connected to the lived experience of the breath. Stephanie described how both B.K.S. Iyengar and Prashant Iyengar often taught with their eyes closed. They were not disengaged from the students; rather, they were anchoring their instructions in their own internal experience. To teach prāṇāyāma, one must enter inwardly. The teacher speaks from memory—not intellectual memory, but the memory embedded in the body and nervous system through years of practice. Only from that place can instructions become meaningful rather than mechanical.
Learning from Living Teachers
For me, moments like this conversation are a reminder of why I created the Yoga Readers community in the first place. Reading yoga texts together is a powerful way to deepen understanding. But equally important is the opportunity to encounter the voices of teachers who carry the living tradition forward. When we listen to people like Stephanie Quirk, we glimpse not only techniques but the culture of practice that developed around B.K.S. Iyengar and his family in Pune. We hear stories, observations, and insights that rarely appear in books.
These conversations help us understand that yoga is not simply a collection of methods. It is a continuum of learning, transmitted across generations through practice, dialogue, and reflection. I am grateful to Stephanie for sharing her experience so generously with our community, and grateful to all of you who continue walking this path of study and practice together.
In our recent Yoga Readers session, we entered what B.K.S. Iyengar calls the art of breath. We explored several chapters of Light on Prāṇāyāma that discuss the three fundamental processes of breathing: puraka (inhalation), rechaka (exhalation), and kumbhaka (retention of breath). What struck me most during this session is how Iyengar transforms something we do thousands of times a day into a refined and deeply conscious practice.
Iyengar speaks about breath as the movement of prāṇa, the vital force that sustains life. In this view, inhalation is not simply taking in oxygen. It is the drawing in of cosmic energy into the body. When we read these passages together, I felt how carefully Iyengar constructs the practitioner’s attention. Every part of the body participates in the act of breathing: the diaphragm, the ribs, the spine, the skin, the senses, and ultimately the mind itself.
One of the passages that moved many of us during the session was Iyengar’s metaphor comparing the relationship between consciousness and the breath to the relationship between a mother and her child. In āsana practice, the mind can be curious and playful, like a child exploring the world. In prāṇāyāma, however, the practitioner must adopt a different quality of attention. The breath becomes like an infant that requires patience, tenderness, and constant care. This metaphor completely changes the emotional tone of the practice. Instead of controlling the breath, we begin to care for it.
From there we examined the technical instructions for inhalation. Iyengar describes puraka as an expansion that begins deep in the torso, rising through the diaphragm and rib cage while maintaining stability in the spine and chest. The lungs receive the breath as the soil receives water, quietly absorbing the energy that enters the body.
But inhalation alone does not complete the cycle. Exhalation, rechaka, is described as the art of calming the nervous system. Iyengar instructs the practitioner to maintain the lift of the chest even while the breath is released. This subtle detail prevents collapse in the body and creates steadiness in the mind. During our discussion we explored an interesting question: Where does exhalation truly begin?
Some practitioners described being taught that the exhalation originates from the chest, as Iyengar writes in this chapter. Others shared teachings in which the exhalation begins deeper in the pelvis or abdomen. Rather than trying to determine a single correct answer, we explored the question experientially. These conversations reminded me that prāṇāyāma is not only something we read about. It must be investigated through practice.
The heart of the session was our discussion of kumbhaka, the retention of breath. Iyengar describes kumbhaka as the moment when breath is suspended, like water held still in a vessel. This pause is not forced. It emerges from the natural rhythm of breathing and gradually expands as the practitioner becomes more refined in practice.
What fascinated many participants was Iyengar’s description of the tiny pause between breaths. At the end of inhalation there is a subtle moment when breathing has not yet turned into exhalation. Likewise, after exhalation there is a brief stillness before the next inhalation begins. In the beginning these pauses are almost imperceptible, as thin as a hair. Yet as awareness deepens, they become gateways into a profound inner quiet.
Iyengar also warns us that kumbhaka must never be practiced aggressively. The bandhas, especially Jālandhara Bandha, serve as safety valves that regulate the flow of energy in the body. Without them, prāṇāyāma can disturb the nervous system instead of stabilizing it.
Toward the end of the session we reflected on a beautiful metaphor Iyengar uses to describe the inner state of retention. He compares emotional turbulence to mountain torrents and steady intelligence to rock formations. When these forces balance each other, the water becomes still like a lake reflecting the mountains. In that stillness, the practitioner glimpses the deeper nature of consciousness.
In this session, we focused on Chapters 19 and 20 of Light on Prāṇāyāma, where Iyengar introduces Ujjāyī and Viloma Prāṇāyāma. We began with the etymology of Ujjāyī. We moved into the structure of the chapter. I pointed out that Iyengar begins with lying down as a methodological choice, since in the supine position, the back body is supported, and the breath can be observed without the effort of holding oneself upright.
We looked closely at his instruction that all prāṇāyāma begins with exhalation. Before expansion, there is release. I invited participants to reflect on their own experience, and many shared that exhalation is more difficult than inhalation. I found this very interesting. I said that this reverses our common assumption that inhalation is the active phase and exhalation passive. In practice, letting go is often more demanding than taking in.
We then examined the table of stages in Ujjāyī. I acknowledged that these tables can be confusing. I said that they meant to be understood as patterns of variation: normal breath, deep breath, prolonged breath, and eventually retention. I also addressed the question of sound. Iyengar clearly describes a subtle sound in inhalation and exhalation, yet in modern practice this is often exaggerated or misunderstood. I suggested that the sound should not harden the throat. It is not something we impose, but something that emerges when the breath is guided with sensitivity. Another point that drew attention was Iyengar’s description of the sinus pathways. I said honestly that this is difficult to perceive. I invited participants not to force an experience, but to remain curious. Sometimes understanding comes through practice over time, not through immediate recognition.
We then moved to Viloma Prāṇāyāma. I explained that loma relates to the natural direction, and vi-loma suggests going against or interrupting that flow. I said that Viloma introduces interruption into continuity, and that this has a profound effect on awareness. I also shared an analogy Iyengar gives: climbing a ladder. In Viloma, we ascend step by step, pausing at each stage. This transforms breathing into a process of articulation, rather than a continuous wave.
I ended by reminding us that reading alone is not enough. These texts are meant to be practiced, questioned, and lived. The conversation between text and body is where understanding deepens.
Which nostril is more open right now?
I opened the session with that question. I offered no explanation, no theory. Just: pause, feel, notice. Some of you reached for your phones and breathed on the screen to see the condensation. Veronica had a cold and laughed at the timing. I asked everyone to remember their answer and check again at the end of the hour.
That small experiment carried the whole point of the session. Working with the breath begins with learning to listen to it.
What the text says and what we were taught
We read chapters 21 through 24: Bhrāmarī, digital prāṇāyāma, Bhastrikā, Kapālabhāti, and the cooling breaths Śītalī and Śītakārī. Before diving in, I asked Ruti to demonstrate Śaṇmukhī mudrā live on screen. She showed us what most of us know from class: thumbs in the ears, fingers fanned across the face. Then I read the technique aloud from the text, which prescribes something quite different: a precise arrangement in which the middle fingers draw the upper eyelid down, the forefingers cover the space above, the ring fingers narrow the nostrils, and the little fingers rest on the upper lips to feel the flow of breath.
The whole group paused. Maria noticed it first: the photograph and the text diverge. And the anatomy itself creates its own difficulty. It is genuinely hard to reach the upper lip with the little finger.
Here is what I find meaningful about this: within the same chapter, Iyengar already offers an alternative. Wrap a cloth around the head and over the ears and temples. He was, I believe, already aware that the full hand position would be difficult to sustain, and he gave us a way to reach the same inward quality of attention through simpler means. I learned Bhrāmarī in Pune with Geetā using a bandage. Veronica said the same. Barbara too.
What we are taught, what is written, and what is photographed are three slightly different things. That gap is a reality to understand, and exactly the kind of thing that only surfaces when we read together.
The nostrils as an instrument
Nada asked about Svara Yoga, the whole science of working with which nostril is dominant and when. I said: the science begins with the most basic step. Just noticing there is a difference. A pose can shift it. The side you lean on changes it. I mentioned a tradition I encountered in South India that practices asymmetrically, activating one side according to the lunar cycle and choosing strategy over the bilateral symmetry of Iyengar yoga.
The first step is sensitivity. Everything else follows from that.
Playing the flute
The chapter on digital prāṇāyāma opened into something I love. Iyengar compares the sādhaka to a master musician, specifically to Kṛṣṇa charming the gopīs by playing his flute, manipulating and creating a world of mystic sounds. In prāṇāyāma, the sādhaka plays on his nostrils, delicately fingering them to manipulate breath patterns as if playing a flute.
A flute has several openings. A nose has only two. The sādhaka therefore requires greater dexterity than the flautist, controlling infinitely fine and subtle tones and shades of breath.
This image stayed with us. It reframes the entire technical instruction that follows: learning where to place the thumb, how to equalize the width of the ring and little fingers against the thumb, how to make the palm soft, how to hold the wrist so the chin stays level. All of that is the preparation of an instrument.
Bridgette shared that her teacher in London, Alric Newcomb, uses tiny elastic bands around the ring finger and little finger to hold their tips together at the nose. She improvised a demonstration with a cord. Others mentioned the cork that Iyengar himself describes. I find these moments, when the text and the body and the community are all speaking at once, to be the most alive part of what we do here.
Touch, balance, sustained pressure
Act with perfect understanding between the finger tips and the nasal membranes. Touch, balance, and sustained pressure, by the finger tips tracing the flow of breath, will alone lead to perfection in digital prāṇāyāma. And then the sentence that has stayed with me: as we gently take in the delicate fragrance of a flower, practise prāṇāyāma as if drawing in the fragrance of the air.
This image has travelled far into contemporary mindfulness teaching: inhale as if smelling a flower, exhale as if blowing out a candle. The root is here.
I shared something practical: when I first learned digital prāṇāyāma, a teacher always handed us tissues before we began. Pressing on the nasal membranes with too much force or in the wrong location increases mucus. For years I struggled with this. The shift, pressing less and rotating the fingertip slightly up or down against the passage, took me a long time to find. He describes it quietly in the later paragraphs. This is why we need a teacher. And this is why we also need each other.
The prayer that breathes itself
We unconsciously breathe the prayer So’ham: He (Saḥ), the Immortal Spirit, am I (Ahaṃ). Inhalation flows with the sound of Saḥ, exhalation with Ahaṃ. This unconscious prayer, japa, arises without our realising its meaning (artha) or feeling (bhāvanā). When we practise prāṇāyāma, we listen to this prayer with meaning and feeling. When this realisation deepens into nādānusandhāna, the quest in which the sādhaka enters the sound of his own breath, the sādhaka receives the incoming breath as life’s elixir and a blessing from the Lord, and offers the outgoing breath as surrender.
In our previous session we discussed the sound of ujjāyī: do we create it, or do we simply hear what is already there? §36 answers that question more deeply than any technique can. The sound was always there. We are learning to listen.
When breathing becomes forceful
We paused on the warnings about Bhastrikā and Kapālabhāti, the most forceful of the practices we read. On page 179 the text advises women to avoid them: vigorous blasts may cause prolapse of the abdominal organs and of the uterus, and the breasts may sag. Nada asked whether Bhastrikā is still taught to women in Pune today. It is. I shared what I believe is the underlying physiological concern: the pelvic floor, and specifically what happens when the pelvic floor lacks the support of Mūla Bandha and the outgoing breath moves with great force. The note about the breasts remains, for me, genuinely unexplained. I asked the group. Nobody had an answer. Some questions stay open.
I also said something personal here. During periods of intense stress, Bhastrikā can amplify agitation and add heat where the body already has too much. When life becomes very hard, the body calls for a different practice: grounding āsana, rest in Śavāsana, gentle breath. That too is mature practice. Iyengar’s warnings serve as invitations to discernment.
Cooling down
Śītalī and Śītakārī closed the reading. Both cool the system. Both draw inhalation through the mouth. Both, I pointed out, still require digital control: even as breath enters through the tongue, the tables in the book show the nostrils partially closed with the fingers. The technique always involves both tongue and fingers together.
We tried Śītakārī: tongue slightly out, flat, lips slightly apart, breath drawn in with a soft hiss. The cooling is simple. The breath moistens at the tongue and palate, and that moisture cools. Whether through the curled channel of Śītalī or the flat surface of Śītakārī, the destination is the same.
Summer is coming, I said. We will try these again then.
What the nostrils told us at the end
Before we closed I asked everyone to check again. Which nostril is more open now? Several people had shifted. One participant began the session with a blocked left side and found it clearer after an hour of reading, speaking, demonstrating, and attending. The reading itself had become practice.
This is what collective svādhyāya does. It changes the breath even as we speak about it.
Next session we move into Anuloma and Viloma, and toward Nāḍī Śodhana. The structure becomes even more refined. I will send focus questions and reflection prompts as usual.
Thank you for this hour. For the demonstrations, the honest questions, the elastic bands, and the open nostrils. I am grateful for every one of you in this room.
The session recording + summary will appear here 24-48 hours after the session
The session recording + summary will appear here 24-48 hours after the session
The session recording + summary will appear here 24-48 hours after the session
All materials in the Light on Prāṇāyāma Study Pack – including session recordings, study guides, reflection prompts, and written resources – are the intellectual property of Dr. Agi Wittich and are protected by copyright. By purchasing this Study Pack, you receive a personal, non-transferable license to use these materials for your own study, practice, and teaching preparation. You may not reproduce, distribute, share login credentials, or upload recordings to public platforms. If you’d like to use portions of this material in workshops, teacher trainings, or publications, please contact me directly to discuss permissions. Thank you for respecting the time, research, and care that goes into creating these resources.
Agi Wittich is a yoga practitioner since two decades, and is a certified Iyengar Yoga teacher. Wittich studied Sanskrit and Tamil at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, completing a PhD with a focus on Hinduism, Yoga, and Gender. She has published academic papers exploring topics such as Iyengar yoga and women, the effects of Western media on the image of yoga, and an analysis of the Thirumanthiram yoga text.
