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SadhanaOriental Meditation and Christian Prayer

To pray with body (taking a breath)

[17] Prayer through breathing: "Inhaling God and relying to God"

  In [3] - [6] of this "praying with body (taking a breath)" section, we learned how to meditate and pray using breathing. Now, let's return to prayers using breathing. First, let's learn the following method.
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 In this method, we take the first five minutes to prepare in the same manner using breathing (Anapana) as we did in the previous sections.
 When we get ready, we proceed to breathing with religious thoughts.
 It goes without saying that breathing is essential and precious.  Keeping breathing is crucial for our life. Stopping breathing means that our life in this world ends.
 The source of our life is God. And it is not an exaggeration to say that we inhale God's life as we breathe. Or, we can even say that we inhale God Himself.
 Let's keep that in mind while praying through breathing.
 When we inhale, we try to feel that we inhale God. We cherish each breath, feeling that we are receiving God.
 Likewise, we feel God's holiness when we exhale.
 First, we feel that we exhale negative things in us. Repeat this many times, feeling that we are exhaling dirtiness, sadness, anger, and envy.
 And we exhale with more faith. We try to rely on God.
 By inhaling in a way to "inhale God" and exhaling in a way to "rely on God," we can deepen our faith through breathing.
 And when the prayer becomes pure, we can do so not in our "mind" but with our "entire heart." Our consciousness is simplified. We can also say "I receive this" and "I rely on you" along with the simplified feeling.

 
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