Next: 8.3 Why Physical Exercises? Up: 8. Control Of The Previous: 8.1 How to Sit Contents Index
Afterwards practise this without looking, for both hands and feet, and use the mood of it to reverse the currents at times when you may become excited by unusually ``nervous occasions''. I call it ``nerve-fluid continence''. There may be times, however, when you will feel this flow - perhaps even in floods - and some intuition will instruct you to let it go, and some other intuition may even tell you where it is going.
Once you have caught the feeling of relaxation practise it lying down. Stretch yourself progressively, beginning with the toes and feet and legs, then up the trunk, fingers and arms also, to the neck - stretch the neck especially, wriggling it about and entirely loosening it (this is very important) - chin, lips, cheeks and nose, brow, and scalp. As you proceed, let each part in turn sink back into relaxation, until at the completion of the process you give a sigh of physical pleasure which empties your lungs, which then quite naturally start breathing again in a gentler manner and with a slower tempo than before. Now. you should feel a cat-like luxury, with a complete disinclination to rise.
Now you are equipped to set the mood for concentration-breath. First breathe out as fully as you can. Next draw the breath in slowly and evenly through both nostrils, depressing the diaphragm, then, keeping the diaphragm down, draw in more air by expanding the chest. In other words, drink down and fill up in two successive but continuous motions. Hold the fullness a little while and slowly exhale. Do not overdo this in any way. The intention is not to take in more air than is normal when the lungs are reasonably fully used, that is, properly used, but to counteract habits of shallow-ness, irregularity and excitability. One thus teaches the body what good breathing feels like, removes the old built-in wrong feeling and replaces it by the new right feeling, which will soon be ignorable, when it sinks into the sub-conscious, becoming a habit. Do not push the chest out and hollow the back, but rather draw the muscles of the abdomen well in - which straightens and flattens the back - and keep them in while practicing any breathing exercises. Indeed, it is a good thing now and then during the day whether standing, sitting or lying down, to move these muscles up and down a number of times, and finish the exercise with them up, not voluntarily consenting to their dropping at any time. They can in this way become obedient and strong, so that in connection with breathing well one naturally avoids the error of pushing the chest out, and performs the correct action of drawing the abdominal muscles in. One does not then confuse these muscles with the diaphragm. Do not hold the breath so long that you have to exhale rapidly or explosively. Everyone must find for himself the measure for healthy breathing. Slow breathing is conducive to placidity and long life. I think we are all likely to know by the feel of it when to let it go and when to stop it, but have to watch carefully not to mix it with our personal emotions.
Some say you should count, or tell beads - so many units of time for inbreathing, so many for holding the air in the lungs, so many for letting it out. Many old teachers advise a 1, 4 and 2 unit rhythm, but this was for special purposes; probably the average modern person will find about 4, 4, and 4 convenient, with a unit of about I second. Quite a good policy is to practise as you feel it easy and pleasant. For the practice of concentration unusual forms of breathing, such as very slow or long breathing and the practice of breathing up one nostril and down the other, are not required; abnormalities and extremes are to be avoided as dangerous. And never cork the breath in at the throat, under the erroneous assumption that you are ``holding the breath''.
Stand with the heels together; raise the hands reaching high above the head; bend forward to touch the toes without bending the knees; return to the upright position, reaching as high as possible, standing on the toes.
Stand as before; let the hands and arms rest straight down the sides, with the backs of the hands turned outwards from the knees; slowly raise the unbent arms outwards and upwards, until the backs of the hands touch above the head; stretch, rising on the toes and looking: upwards; slowly return.
Stand once more with the hands at the sides, palms, inwards; lean over slowly to one side until the hand sinks below the knee, while the other hand is curled up under the armpit; slowly swing back to the opposite side, stretching the body all the time.
Perform all the exercises with an even movement and concentrated thought, for at least one minute each. Finally stand, raise one foot from the floor by bending the knee; now raise the other and lower the first, and thus run for about a minute, without moving along. In this exercise the two feet do not both touch the ground at the same time. In all these or any other exercises do nothing to strain the heart.
Another good exercise for the neck is to sit with your hands on your knees and slowly roll the upper part of the torso round and round, while having the neck completely relaxed, so that the head also rolls round, but only by gravity. Begin this exercise by leaning forward and letting the head loll forward, pulling upon the back of the neck by its weight only, causing a feeling of stretch. Then move the torso round slowly. As the right shoulder goes down, the head, being relaxed, will roll over on that side, and so on right round. This should be done several times, both ways. A good finale, while the head is forward, is to shake the whole relaxed face - not too forcibly - with jaw, lips, nose, temples and all loosely wobbling in their state of relaxedness. Unpleasant as this may appear to any spectator, you will find the effect very pleasing when you restore yourself to your usual equilibrium.
For the eyes, while you sit comfortably without moving your head, let your gaze very slowly and steadily follow the outline of the opposite wall or some large object, first in one direction, then in another. At every decided change of direction close the eyes tightly for a moment. Go up and down, across and diagonally, as well as round and round both ways. As a variant of this exercise, look at a near object and then to something beyond it, in other words, look from near to far and back again, not jerkily, but with slow motion. In general, for eye health, don't sit in a room where you cannot see something twenty feet away, at which you can look whenever you pause for thought, or, if you must be in a small room, learn to ``look through the wall''. Sometimes children look at the ceiling when the teacher asks a question. Sometimes there then comes an ignorant rebuke: ``Look at me, not at the ceiling; you will not find the answer there'', - making it more difficult for the child to think, and perhaps even harming his eyes.
All the foregoing exercises can be practiced at any odd spare moments. They will always prove time well spent. So precious are they all that I would say to anyone who feels miserable and depressed: ``Just do some of them, and especially the neck exercises, and then see how you feel!''