This guide was made by Nathan Vanderpool after attending an online meditation retreat led by Willow's teacher, Seishin, who graciously allowed the following video to be published.
Seishin wraps up the meditation retreat. Transcripts of parts of the Q&A are below.
Student: I liked when you said PLAY WITH THE BREATH. In a lot of meditation instruction that I've received, they just say make your breath "normal". For me, normal breath is often shallow because of the anxieties and pressures of life. So the permission to breathe deeply and strongly, and to find what makes me relax is good. When I hear words like normal or natural, I think "that's not good for me". I like to breathe deep, and that helps me relax.
Seishin: Play is so important. I heard from some meditation teachers that if you want an energized breath, you should make it as long as possible. I thought that would have been a calming breath. But then I tried it, and I found that it does energize my body. That kind of play and exploration is very important.
Student: I don't intuitively understand ENERGIZED BREATH. Can you speak on that?
Seishin: It's going to be different for different people. Making the exhale very very very long, until there is no more breath in the lungs, and letting the inhale happen naturally ... that brings a sense of energization to the body.
In my case, the uncomfortable journey that I needed to go through was to add a lot of force to my breath and to really expel it loudly. At some point, I felt like I was punching things with my breath. The trouble was that this also brought a lot of agitation to my body, and was not very calm. I needed to learn what that feels like in order to find the balance. So you can just overdo it, and be ridiculous about it, and pull back.
You can also start with a calm breath and gradually see what you can do to make it become more energetic. Just experiment.
Student: What is the CENTERED BREATH getting at? What am I supposed to be doing there?
Seishin: That means that you are not just breathing from the chest, you're actually breathing lower down into your body so that your belly is expanding when you are breathing. A lot of us are chest breathers. I was for most of my life. It's only been the past few years that I've learned how to breathe more with my belly.
You are literally feeling it more in a centered place in your body. That can take time. It felt like I was pushing it down step by step, lower and lower. It's ok if it's a hard thing to do.