I'd been curious about this DVD for a long time--I think that the concept of the chakras is interesting, plus I own and enjoy Ravi & Ana's DVD Dance the Chakras. Lucky me, I recently found a brand new (non-matrix) copy of A Journey through the Chakras a used book sale. :)

This DVD offers two Kundalini yoga sets, one for the lower chakras and one for the upper chakras. In their brief introduction, Ravi and Ana state that you can do either the entire practice at once or break it up into sections. The set is the plain white studio that was featured in all of Ana & Ravi's DVDs of this era; as always, Ana portrays the exercises, but Ravi does the voiceover cuing exclusively.

The Main Menu of the DVD reads as follows (I've added times and brief descriptions in parentheses):

Play DVD (it its entirety, 92 minutes total)
Breath Primer (4.5m; instruction on long deep breathing and breath of fire, or BOF)
Breath Exercise for Chakra Balance (3.5m; 8-part inhale, focusing on each of the chakras in turn, and 1-part exhale)
Warm-Ups (4m; spinal flexon in 3 different positions)
Set One
Set Two

In the upper-right hand corner of the Main Menu, there is a little tiny menu that says "Set Menus." If you click on it, it will take you to another screen which breaks down the two sets into chapters. I have listed the Set Menus below as well as have provided information on the individual exercises. (Note: When you are on the Main Menu, if you do nothing, the DVD starts playing automatically.)

SET ONE (37.5 minutes total)
*Chakra One-Grounding (9m)--bow & arrow pose and Kundalini tree pose, each held for a good bit of time
*Chakra 2-Expression (5.5m)--crow pose (or alternate frog) w/BOF, butterfly w/forward bend, Kundalini lotus (wide-legged seated balance)
*Lower Chakra Mini Set (9.5m)--frog, camel w/BOF, child's pose, sat kriya (about 3 minutes), brief relaxation
*Chakra 3-Personal Power (9.5)--performed lying on back: criss-cross legs w/BOF, alternate leg lifts w/BOF, repeat criss-cross legs, double leg lifts w/BOF, repeat criss-cross legs
*Meditation #1 (4m)--meditation is "wahay guru sat nam-hari hari ram ram;" first half is repeated while squeezing the rectum, sex organs, navel, and diaphragm, and then the second half while releasing those same areas in sequence

SET TWO (42.5 minutes total; this entire set is performed seated)
*Chakra 4-Love (9m)--seesaw arms, exercise w/one armed raised; finish w/4-minute meditation for navel/heart center: while performing sequence of hand movements, repeat "so hung-har har har har-so hung"
*Chakra 5-Creativity (11m)--move head side-to-side w/arms pumping in & out; seated on heels, do BOF first with head stretched up, then with chin to chest; finish w/4-minute meditation for throat center: repeat sat nam 6x while moving up the chakras, finishing with a wahay guru above the head
*Chakra 6-8-Intuition, Energy, Radiance, Transcendence (9m)--3 moves to focus on final 3 chakras: hands in Venus lock overhead for third eye, hands interlaced overhead, and hands interlaced overhead with index fingers up, adding BOF to last and moving arms out to side
*Deep Relaxation (2.5m)
*Meditation #2 (4m)--repeat the first meditation from the end of Set 1, but add a focus on the upper chakras as well
*Meditation #3 (<4m)--"7 wave sat nam," which involves inhaling to sat for each of the 6 chakras and then exhaling to nam
*Affirmations (2m)--positive closing statements offered by Ravi
*Closing Prayer (1m)--positive wishes to self, other, and world, and a final sat nam

I enjoyed this practice. I especially liked how some of the meditations (e.g., the heart and throat meditations) were worked into the sets instead of all of the meditation work being saved for the end of the practice (as with some of Ravi & Ana's other DVDs). I didn't feel that any of the exercises dragged on endlessly, although the work on the navel center (Chakra 3) was definitely quite challenging. Although I didn't particularly enjoy the throat meditation (it moved VERY quickly, and it was hard for me to keep track of the chakras during the exercise), I loved the meditation for the navel/heart centers, and I thought that the 7 wave sat nam was quite nice also.

Overall, this is a nice addition to my small collection of Kundalini yoga DVDs. I think it would be doable to someone new to Kundalini yoga provided that 1) they have SOME prior yoga experience, and 2) they take Ravi's suggestion to break down the practice into shorter chunks.

Instructor Comments:
As mentioned above, Ana displays the exercises only here; she does not provide cuing. However, as always, she does an excellent job. Ravi does not sound quite like himself here--perhaps he had a cold while they were filming?--but otherwise, he provides voiceover cuing in his usual manner.

Beth C (aka toaster)