The Death Breath
The death breath is a cosmic pulse from which our regular breathing patterns externalise in sense. It’s the abstract side of the breath of life, the breathing principle which is forever present beneath the surface awareness. The death breath operates autonomously and when made conscious enables a deepening participation, and for longer periods, with the original state of being. The Hindu religion refers to this breath as Prana, the vital principle of life that permeates all levels of existence.
Breathing is mostly unconscious and only discerned when impaired in some way. For someone spiritually inclined, the breathing apparatus is a valuable source of self-knowledge. The idea is to become accustomed to the breath through self-observation, which assists a deepening connection with the inner space of the body. The lungs and oxygenating of the blood vessels, unless free-flowing, reduce the efficiency of the body system and produce a sluggish response to the challenges of life. In the last moments before someone dies there’s often an audible guttural sound, which is the beginning of the transition between the external and abstract breathing principles. It’s the withdrawing death breath on which the life essence goes on into the reality behind the form.
In making love, the death breath is spiritually intuited as the purity of space. When two people are consciously merged as a unity of the male and female principles, any description in words will be inadequate. To participate in love at this octave of being is not unlike discovering an ability to breathe underwater. Almost but not completely impossible. The idea is to abandon everything, including the need to exist (since I do exist), and to be as nothing except an emanation of devotion and gratitude to that which can never be known. When someone is fearless, the false perception (which creates the world and movement) falls away and life as the pristine idea of existence is perceived.
The earth is a living organism of cosmic origin. As human beings (the intelligence that came from the planetary consciousness) we enter the world on the life breath, the active principle of creation. For most people the sensory experience of living is enough to process without being too concerned with any reality behind the appearance of things. But when spiritually motivated to find a greater truth, what is revealed is the natural pause that occurs between each breath. This minute interruption of the continuity of life is the gap between each frame of existence. The spiritual inspiration draws the attention to focus on this aperture to the invisible side of life, and the area of the body that assists this inner process most directly is the solar plexus. By focusing regularly on this part of the body, the sensory life breath becomes attuned in time with the death breath. This sets in motion the cosmic calling of the inner sun, the nucleus of the being that is God.
Have you ever written a piece on the Solar Plexus Lance? I would so like to read it if you have.
Hello Mary.
Here’s an article that I’ve written on the solar plexus.
Entering the Solar Plexus
The human body is profound beyond the comprehension of the mind. Medical doctors operate on the physical side of existence whereas the inner observer looks through the feelings of experience for the truth behind the form. The psychic centres within the body (sometimes referred to as the ‘chakras’) function as a totality of being. The psychic centre which is the portal to the cosmic levels of mind is the solar plexus; this small but highly sensitive region beneath the breastplate is the doorway to reality. To cross this threshold is to unite with the mystery of life and the secret of death. Love enters existence through the solar plexus and is the place where attraction to the beauty of other forms of life is first registered.
The idea of entering the body in meditation is to make conscious the interior world of the psyche. This speeds up the frontal intelligence, which functions at a reduced level when identified with the movement and objects in the material world. The entry into the solar plexus is helped considerably by attending to any problem areas in the circumstantial outer life that would cause an emotional disturbance in the body. Then it’s possible to put the focus of attention on the solar plexus for longer periods without thought or distraction.
The breakthrough happens when a pulse is registered which is not unlike the heartbeat, only this originates from deep inner space. However there is usually no discernible sensation until entering the body in stillness and humility becomes a regular practice in the life. This is because it’s the part of the body which is nothing that can be described or defined, and yet this apparent absence of feeling is a highly energised soul centre. The difficulty is that the emotions gathered around the chest, together with discursive energies arising from the stomach region, tend to smear the aperture of the plexus centre.
When the frontal intelligence approximates the state of consciousness, the separation between inner and outer realms unites. Immediately, the perception passes through the solar plexus (often experienced as an accelerating at tremendous speed) into the pristine blackness of timeless inner space. This is intuited to be something beyond the normal boundaries of human experience, and is an introduction to reality which inspires the individual to travel onwards into the solar level of mind. The external solar system parallels with remarkable precision the journey of the soul towards cosmic consciousness. However, uninterrupted access into the planetary space through the solar plexus is only possible after having faced and crossed the threshold of the first cosmic body nearest the earth – the moon.
The space between the earth and moon symbolises the subconscious realm, which represents everything that can be known and described by the human mind. As formless life enters existence on the time waves of terrestrial mind, the impersonal subconscious is superimposed with the lunar essence, without which life as sensual existence could not have evolved. The orbit of the moon creates a transcendent ring of celestial consciousness which surrounds the earth as the principle of nature. The lunar plasma engenders a quickening of the vital life force, which breaks down the original matter of the earth into the sap and flow necessary for organic life to flourish. The purpose at this evolutionary phase of life is to exceed the orbit of the moon, not externally in a spacecraft, but inwardly so as to neutralise the gravitational pull for recurrence in the world.
The pull of the spirit is not unlike the medium of gravity, which draws all things back to the source of original power. As cosmic beings, we came out of the solar plexus into the body consciousness and, similarly, would return the same way at death; but this is rare in these materialistic times. The more common exit at the termination of the physical body is through the cranium, which necessitates a further process of purification. Beyond the moon the quality of inner space, having been being divested of past, is infused with the consciousness of the other planets, which creates a spiritual line of power to the nucleus of the sun. In passing through the solar plexus, and then through the solar principle of the Sun, the being is finally united with its alter ego at journey’s end – or the end for now of a particular cosmic phase of mind.
Holding in my arms as he made his transition…. Stands to reason why immediately I choose the death breath to read first. Thank you for expanding my perspective through that experience.
Hi Lance. with holotropic or shamanic breathwork, it is common to experience a transition from the ordinary (oxygen) breath to another form of breath, which might be called ‘energetic’ or ‘planetary’ breath. This breath is much slower than the ordinary breath (slower even then the yogic breath), and very shallow – i.e. it does not involve movement of the chest. This is obviously linked to a deep (altered) state of consciousness. Is that what you are calling the death breath?
Hello Catherine
The way you describe this practice sounds spiritually productive but it’s not what I’m referring to as the death breath. The difference here is that the death breath endures regardless of the body being dead or alive. This remarkable state of reality is currently becoming more accessible within the psyche as a consequence of the new cultural idea of humanity that is gradually rising to conscious awareness. My teaching is a facet of this new wave of consciousness for those receptive to the energy of this next phase of human evolution.