Breath-Energetic Practice of Interaction with the Elements and the Forces of Nature

Message from the Founder

My many years of experience allowed me to formulate one breath-energetic practice, as well as a meditative-spiritual methodology consisting of several levels of study. This practice is part of my method of spiritual technologies, which I use to help people.

This practice uses the spiritual language of energies, imagery, and attention. Experiences are subjective and are not evidence of changes in blood pressure, heart rhythm, or other bodily functions.

You may choose to include images, sensations, and inner states in this spiritual exercise. There is no required intensity or result.

This is an optional spiritual exercise using comfortable breathing, attention, and imagery. Experiences vary; no therapeutic effect or particular result is promised.

Everyone knows: where we direct our attention, energy flows there. Understanding this, it is easy to see why a person often does not have enough energy even to make it through the end of the day: their attention is unfocused, scattered in many directions, and energy is constantly leaving through different channels.

In this practice, we will use not only attention, but also sensations — real sensations on the bodily level. If, at first, the sensations are weak or almost absent, begin at least by imagining and visualizing them. This will help you enter an altered state — a state that a person rarely experiences in ordinary life.

You may notice sensations or changes in attention, or no change. No particular experience is required.

This is one optional spiritual practice among many, not a replacement for other approaches or professional care.

Use this exercise only at a comfortable pace for a brief, optional reflection. Return to ordinary, unforced breathing afterward; there is no goal of making this breathing pattern constant.

Preparation for the Practice

Ideally, the practice should be performed on the shore of a body of water: an ocean, sea, river, or lake. Best of all — standing on the ground so that your feet touch the water. It is desirable that the sun be shining and that it be warm and comfortable.

If such an opportunity is not available, you may also do the practice at home, in a room. It is good if the air in the room is fresh and the space is ventilated, but this is not a mandatory condition.

Stand or sit comfortably. Stop the practice if dizziness begins; sit down safely and return to ordinary breathing.

Stand or sit comfortably. Close your eyes. Imagine and feel that you are standing on the shore of the ocean, on a warm sandy beach. The water gently washes your feet. The earth warms you, gives stability and comfort. The sun is shining on you. You feel a slight movement of the wind, the sea breeze. You may even recall the smell of the ocean.

Enter this state as deeply as possible. Feel with every cell of your skin how your feet stand on sand or small pebbles, how the warm water touches your feet, how you inhale the scent of the ocean, how the sun touches your skin. For now, the breathing remains free.

You may imagine a comfortable place without needing to enter any particular state.

Keep breathing comfortable and unforced as you recall moments by the ocean, in the forest, in the mountains, or in a park.

It is important to remember the very best state you have ever experienced in your life. Let us call it a reference state — a state in which, physically, emotionally, energetically, and spiritually, you were at the highest and most comfortable level. Different memories may arise — that does not matter. Only one thing matters: to enter this state completely and allow it to fill your body.

When you feel that you have entered this state deeply, imagine that you are on the shore of the ocean. Your feet touch the water — perhaps you are standing with your feet in the water, knee-deep, waist-deep, or even chest-deep. Imagine how comfortable you feel. The sun is shining on you. You feel the wind, the sea breeze, or the scent of a forest lake. The main thing is to feel all four elements with which we will work: Earth, Water, Air, and Fire in the form of the Sun.

Before beginning any practice, it is always necessary to greet the forces with which you will interact and ask them for permission to make contact. It is also important to state your kind, open, and positive intentions and goals. After this, we begin the practice.

The First Element — Earth

Feel the Earth as a living organism. As that from which our body is also made. All the elements that exist on Earth are also in us. After physical death, the body will once again decompose into elements and return everything to the Earth.

We are not separate from the Earth. We are deeply connected to it. You may imagine the Earth as a huge battery that charges and nourishes us.

Take an inhalation for 4–6 slow counts. During the inhalation, imagine, visualize, and feel how a stream of energy from the center of the Earth enters your body through the soles of the feet, through the perineum, through the palms and fingers of the hands.

After the slow deep inhalation, make a small pause for 2 counts. Then exhale very slowly and calmly for 6–8 counts.

On the exhalation, feel and imagine how you exhale all accumulated negative energy, thoughts, emotions, pain, heaviness, and tension. On the exhalation, all of this goes into the center of the Earth.

Then make a breath retention for 4–6 counts. Breath holds are optional; do not pursue longer holds or discomfort.

Before the next inhalation, make a few more short exhalations, as if finishing the exhalation of the air that remains in the lungs. Do not force the lungs to empty.

Now direct your attention inside the body. Feel where tension, negative emotions, density, compression, pain, and heaviness have accumulated. And again: on the inhalation, breathe in the Earth's power from its center, fill those places from which you have just exhaled tension and pain, imagine steadiness and support there, without expecting relief of pain or a health effect.

You may imagine the Earth as a symbol of steadiness and support. This is optional spiritual imagery, not a healing intervention.

Repeat the exercise 10–15 times. After completion, be sure to thank the Earth and the center of the Earth for the interaction and exchange of energies.

The Second Element — Air

Now shift your attention to the air. Feel the air as a living energetic structure, without which life is impossible. Feel the atmosphere of the Earth as a living essence that gives us the possibility to exist.

Here it is important to slightly defocus the attention and imagine that the body absorbs the energy of the air the way a sponge absorbs water.

The breathing rhythm remains the same: inhale for 4–6 counts, pause for 2–4 counts, exhale for 6–8 counts, hold after the exhalation for 4–6 counts.

During the inhalation, imagine that every cell of the skin is breathing, and through the entire surface of the body the energy of the air enters within. The body is filled with everything necessary and beneficial.

On the exhalation, you may imagine releasing burdens into Air. Keep breathing comfortable; breath holds are optional, and there is no need to empty the lungs completely.

Repeat the cycle 10–15 times. After completing the exercise, be sure to thank the forces of Air.

The Third Element — Water

Now we move to Water. It does not matter whether you are actually standing by the ocean or are in a room in a high-rise building. The main thing is to feel how the water touches your feet and to feel the entire volume of the world ocean existing on planet Earth.

Within this spiritual imagery, the world ocean represents connection with Water and the natural world.

First, greet the forces of Water and ask for permission for contact and interaction.

The breathing rhythm is the same: inhale for 4–6 counts, pause, exhale for 6–8 counts, hold after the exhalation.

Engage your sensations as fully as possible. Imagine that quiet, warm, clean water touches your feet. You may imagine that you are standing in the water knee-deep, waist-deep, or up to your neck. Try to embrace the entire world ocean with your attention.

Realize that a human being is not a separate unit, but a drop in the world ocean. Try to release the habitual rigid identity of yourself as a separate personality and feel yourself as part of the water element.

Within this spiritual imagery, imagine water as a source of spaciousness and renewal. Keep the image gentle. It is not a description of minerals entering the body or a treatment for pain or organs.

On the exhalation, imagine as if you are a sponge soaked with water and are now squeezing everything unnecessary out of yourself. You may imagine letting go of burdens in the world ocean. This is imagery, not a claim that pain or bodily symptoms leave through the skin.

Sometimes a real sensation may arise that something is flowing down the skin or that something is coming out from certain parts of the body. This is good. Do not be distracted; simply observe.

Repeat the exercise 10–15 times. After completion, be sure to thank the forces of Water.

The Fourth Element — Fire

Now we connect with the forces of Fire. First, greet the forces of Fire and ask for permission to make contact.

The Sun is the main source of fire, warmth, and light on Earth. Without it, life is impossible. It also fills and charges our inner battery.

On the inhalation for 4–6 counts, imagine how from the center of the Sun a ray of energy, warmth, light, and everything luminous enters your body through the crown of the head.

This ray passes through the brain, the muscles, the internal organs, all tense and painful places, and everything where heavy energy could have accumulated.

After the inhalation, pause for 2–4 counts in order to distribute this energy throughout the entire body.

Then make a slow, calm exhalation for 6–8 counts. On the exhalation, breathe out tension, negative energy, and everything you no longer need. Send it back along the ray into the center of the Sun.

After the exhalation, hold the breath for 6–8 counts only if comfortable; breath holds are optional. Do not force the lungs to empty; return to ordinary breathing whenever needed.

Repeat the cycle 10–15 times. After completion, be sure to thank the Sun and the forces of Fire.

The Union of the Four Elements at Once

Now you need to imagine all four elements at once. At the same time, hold in your attention the channel from the center of the Earth entering through the legs, the channel from the center of the Sun entering through the crown of the head, and also the defocused sensation of Water and Air around the body.

That is, you are doing two opposite actions at the same time: you focusedly hold two vertical channels — from below and from above — and defocusedly hold the entire perimeter of the body, through which the energies of Water and Air are absorbed.

Continue to breathe. On the inhalation for 4–6 counts, imagine simultaneously how the energy of the Earth pours into the body through the soles of the feet from the center of the Earth, how the energy of Fire enters through the crown of the head from the center of the Sun, and how the energies of Water and Air are absorbed through the pores of the skin and every cell of the body.

After the inhalation, make a pause and distribute the energies throughout the whole body. Look to see where tension still remains.

On the exhalation, send everything unnecessary at once in four directions: into the center of the Earth, into the center of the Sun, into the world ocean, and into the atmosphere.

Repeat 10–15 cycles, or a number that is comfortable for you. After completion, be sure to thank all the elements and all the forces with which you interacted.

What You May Notice

People may notice changes in attention or bodily sensations, or no change. Keep breathing comfortable and unforced. Breath holds are optional and should not be used to pursue a physiological effect. Stop if you feel dizzy, short of breath, distressed, or unwell. This exercise does not diagnose, treat, or guarantee changes in health.

Rare reactions and precautions:

In rare cases, dizziness, ringing in the ears, pronounced warmth, tingling, a feeling of a brief drop, altered perception of space, or a wave of strong emotion are possible. Usually, this means that the load is too great for the current state; the practice should be shortened, softened, or stopped.

This practice is not suitable for being performed in water, while driving, at height, in pronounced weakness, after alcohol, or after sedative substances.

Special caution or prior agreement with a physician is needed during pregnancy, in cardiovascular diseases, uncontrolled hypertension, arrhythmias, COPD, asthma in an unstable phase, epilepsy, panic attacks with fainting, and any conditions in which breath holding is contraindicated.

It is mandatory to stop in case of chest pain, growing shortness of breath, bluish discoloration, loss of consciousness, severe disorientation, or intense fear.