By Aanandi Ross

“Time and Timeless” illustrates my experience of timelessness.  One sentence from our November teachings article says it all: “Though you can’t add more hours to the clock, yoga offers tools to free you from the tyranny of time.”  Doing only 20 minutes of Ujjayi Pranayama daily will help you make friends with time; that with this practice, things begin to dovetail and flow… time then is no longer your enemy.  Swami Nirmalananda and Vidyadevi promise that Ujjayi Pranayama makes you the master of time.  Wow!  How amazing and how transformative.

How ironic that “stopping” to practice Ujjayi Pranayama will give you more “time.”  You might think if you stop to breathe for 20 minutes that you’ll lose the time to get 4 or 5 things done on your list.  Or maybe you believe you’ll be in more of a frenzy to make up for lost time.  However, when spending time with timelessness, you feel a shift in perception.  You might even conclude that some of the things you thought were so important on your list are not.  Priorities change.  Life flows in surprising and delightful ways.

Have you had the experience of stopping, breathing and then feeling like a different person afterwards? If so, even more breathing (and especially meditation) will help you to remain in that state, more and more.

I took an “Introduction to Meditation” weekend with Vidyadevi.  When she asked about our meditation experiences, I shared that time had slowed way down.  I felt like I had all the time in the world.  She said, “Yes, there is timelessness in meditation.”  I had felt I was just being, in beingness; alive in beingness.  Experiencing this infinite reality within myself, I became conscious of the “more” within me.  Instead of feeling empty and lacking, I felt full and sufficient.  The timelessness in meditation feels like going to the cosmic time tank.

Over twenty years ago was the first time I heard that if you’re always thinking about the future, you’re not in the present moment.  Still, I often hear people say, “Wow, I can’t believe that September (or summer, or vacation or some other experience) is almost over!”  Yoga gives you a shift of perspective, “Wow, this season (of late summer) is so rich and full.  The breeze is warm (or cool); the colors of harvest are so magnificent (or transforming); this day is glorious, just as it is.”

Make friends with time.  Our Svaroopa^® yoga practices excel at giving you the experience of beingness.  This experience offers you so much.  It’s yours for the taking.  Do more Ujjayi Pranayama.