By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Breathing is a sacred act. Every inhalation is an infusion of Divine energy into your body-mind complex. Breathing is a sacred act.

We so easily see the sacredness of life in nature, in the ocean, lake, river, in the trees, wildflowers, critters. We are used to looking outward to find the sacred.

Yet the sacredness of life is most easily found within. A simple and accessible access point is your own breath. And the pause between your breaths. God is breathing you into being…

The impulse that starts each breath comes from your spine. Technically, it comes from your tailbone and travels, like a flash of lightning, up your spine to trigger your breath to move.

This energy of aliveness moves your breath, makes your heart beat, makes your eyes work, your ears work – it all comes from your spine. Called prana, it comes from Kundalini, the energy of Consciousness that arises within to awaken you to your own sacredness.

Breathing is a sacred act, a sacrament. It pervades your life, which is also sacred. But you are usually oblivious to this. You’re not paying attention to your breath, nor to any of the other sacred realities – inside and outside.

Worse, you compartmentalize everything into categories — not-sacred and sacred. So singing “Halleluia, Halleluia” is sacred, but singing “Row Row Row Your Boat” is not. Sweeping the floor at the Ashram is sacred work, seva – but sweeping the floor at home is chores.

Every religion gives us sacred acts to perform. From the sacraments of Christianity to the samskaras of Hinduism, to the ceremonies of Judaism and the five pillars of Islam – they all say:  “Do these things, they are sacred actions.”

What does that mean?

It means you participate in an outward act, maybe a great event or perhaps a simple lighting of a flame – the outward act is a visible sign of an inner experience, invoking Divine Grace to open you up.

How wonderful!  You can do something on the outside to experience spiritual upliftment on the inside.

In other words, it’s not about the outer action. It’s about the inner experience…