yogaNexus - Karl Erb » Featured

Happy New…

Karl — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 22:15:43 +0000

For many this is the time of year when we look forward and look back, wish a “Happy New Year” upon others and ourselves, and reflect upon changes, what we’d like to change in ourselves, or “resolve to improve,” all dipping into the sense of renewal, of fresh start-ness, of a cycle beginning anew. Which is interesting as a cycle has no beginning…

This time of year is rich in intentions to leave behind what no longer serves us and to grow towards what nurtures and sustains us. Sometimes looking forward with hopeful anticipation, or looking back thinking next year can only be better… All over the globe, the drive and intentions are similar though the time of year may vary, indicating there is no intrinsic “right” time for this renewal, simply that it occurs.

Happy New.

All the diverse views, intentions, and sentiments around this annual renewal share two things:

- The seemingly innate drive towards contentment, towards feeling whole.
- The perception of time passing, of time being a factor towards that wholeness.

Embedded in the greetings of the period is the conclusion that everyone wants to be happy. There is no hesitation in offering this salutation, nor any resistance in its reception, across cultures. The resolve to better one’s self is also linked to the desire to be happy, content, whole… accepting of one’s self.

Happy New.

Implied in the desire to better one’s self, to improve upon oneself, is the sense that some action, some external source, internal thought, or behavior, can improve upon my self, and my happiness. Implied in a desire to change is the belief that “I” can be changed, and that the current state is somehow not acceptable to me. Likewise implied in the seeking is the fact that finding myself to be whole and acceptable to me is a reasonable, natural end. We do not seek to be sorrowful, or incomplete, so there is something in happiness and fullness that must be intrinsic to my nature.

The new year, new resolve will bring me closer, over time, to that desirable, happy self I long to be. Associating with desired ends, and disassociating with undesirable ends, dropping past patterns, stories, and habits all reveal my relationship to time. The change will occur over the new year, in a series of tomorrows unfolding one after the other. Such efforts are certainly healthy for sustaining the psyche and body, which undergo constant change, but happiness, knowing myself to be acceptable to me, is something altogether different.

What is changing? What simply “is”?
If we are to exercise choice and will to bring change, it is important to know what changes and what does not. While the the mind, body, senses, emotions and so forth are subject to constant change, to infer that such change can improve upon the “I” that experiences the mind/body/senses is worth exploring. Through chosen actions and thoughts we can bring change to the mind and body, affecting various levels of balance and healing in our physiology, psychology and so forth. I, the subject, am effecting change on the body and heart/mind, both objects of my perception.

Being conscious of my body, my thoughts, feelings, body and thoughts become evident to me through senses and perception, thus “I” am the subject, and all that becomes evident to me are objects of perception. There is only one subject, I. What I perceive cannot be “I”, what I perceive is by definition not the subject. The eyeball does not see itself. To attribute the change undergone by the object, the body/mind, to the subject perceiving the change, “I,” is a flawed inference. If I see a house being painted, I am clear that I am not being painted, and yet with the body/mind/senses we are not so clear. Human tend to attach change of the body (object) to our very sense of self (Subject): The body ages, we say “I am old, I am aging,” the body is female, we say “I am female,” and so on.

Once I know that no external object can alter my essential nature, the challenges, wants and needs of the body/heart/mind are handled in a practical way from a more stable, consistent, steadfast center.

So as we renew commitments to practices that are healthy and sustaining, we do it not from a place of feeling less than, or inadequate, or vain but rather because we seek practices that uncover our essence, our whole, adequate self, practices that disassociate us from identifying with the the body and heart/mind and all their changes.

Now New Happy You.
So we set out in the new year to effect change, to drop certain things, leave behind certain things, and move towards certain things, to improve “ourselves.” And yet memory, habit, nostalgia, sentiment, and comfort in the familiar seem to keep the past affecting us, and the resolve seems to thin, spread out across so many tomorrows. In fact tomorrow never comes, the choice for change can only be today, now, moment to moment. There is only now, perpetually new.

I used language like “leave behind,” “move towards,” intentionally to show that in our perception time is a factor in this newness, and in this happiness, or “becoming” the acceptable self. Change, desire for change, happens in memory of past, or in imagination of future. Yet neither the past nor future exist in any real sense, and are rather constructs in our awareness. An event, person or object of the past is not currently affecting me, rather the thought of the event, person or object affects me, and can color my emotions in the present. The same can be said about events, people and objects of the future. These attractions and aversions in memory and imagination are what fills our heart/mind, our thought-life. Now is seldom in our attention.

Tomorrow never comes, there is only today, new each time. Within today, there is only each moment, now, and in that moment choices are made, not tomorrow. This perpetually new now is here all year round, every day, always new. And if I say I am present in this moment, how long is the moment? Each second can be broken down to a millisecond and so on… So even “now” happens as moments in time, until reduced to simply motion in our thought/perception of time, thus in our awareness. Time becomes evident to me… Century consciousness, year consciousness, minute consciousness… all segments of time are objects of perception, occur in consciousness, in fact are consciousness. “Century” consciousness does not take a century, nor does “second” take a second. “Century” consciousness IS, second consciousness IS and so on…

And if we think of “Now” consciousness, where is the object?
Now is simply consciousness. Consciousness is always now.

So if we reduce “now” to its smallest part, past the milliseconds, we end up simply in awareness, that which makes me, the subject, aware of “now” as an object of my perception. And further still, truly awareness itself is the only and ultimate subject, the only “I,” not the mind aware of time, not the “aware-er,” not the one who is aware. And Awareness is always now, neither young nor old… a “new” with no opposite, no polarity. Now is consciousness.

Happy New.

The non-wanting now self.
Wants and needs, desires and distastes, attractions and aversions all happen in memory or imagination, not in “now.” Free of memory and imagination, all wants, likes and dislikes fall away, our non-wanting self is revealed in “now:” Free of want, free of lack, intrinsically whole, full, not subject to improvement nor to demise. There is no change, no becoming. Always new, in fact outside of new and old, intrinsically happy. Or rather, since “happy” is an adverb qualifying the one who is happy, more accurate to say “intrinsic happiness” that which lights up the one experiencing happiness. Now awareness is happiness itself.

So really all we are dropping is the false inference that anything sticks to “I.”
No amount of changing behaviors, people, situations will bring wholeness to “I.”
There is no “moving towards” where I am.
Happy. New.

The sun needs no light to illuminate its presence, to verify its presence. It is self-illuminating.
All attractions and aversions, likes and dislikes, become evident to me, are objects of my perception or inference.

That “I am” is the only thing self-evident to “I,” the subject who is awareness itself.
Mind, thoughts, emotions, pain, all bodily, sensory, psychological, physiological experience become evident to “I,” and thus cannot be I.
We mistake the field of the known, for the knower; we confuse objects of perception for the subject who perceives, in whose presence all becomes evident, who is self-evident.

Awareness, Beingness itself is free of want.
Now occurs within “I”.
Consciousness is only Now.
Now is Consciousness.
Now is happiness.
I am happiness, the intrinsic non-wanting-ness.

And since there is only now in awareness, awareness is outside of time, not continuous, but timeless, no beginning, no end, like a cycle, always new.

So, Happy New to you.
Happy New is you.
“I am happiness.”
New. Now.

Again and again.
Now.
That’s all there is.

Sat – existence, never negated.
Cit – awareness, basis of all that is known.
Ananda – fullness, outside of time, without limit.

Your thoughts?

* Much of the inspiration here comes from meditation, climbing trees, bird watching, from study of the Bhagavad Gita and the knowledge that colors my experiences from that study. I am grateful to Swami Dayananda Saraswati and others at Arsha Vidya Gurukulam for being the inspiration and illumination behind my understanding. Much of the language is inspired by their talks, writings, meditations, my notes from studying, my experiences in guided meditations and so on.

Kirtan audio: Jai Ma, Ananda Ananda, Om Satcitananda

Karl — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 21:01:18 +0000

FREE audio download and streaming of live Kirtan and solo Vedic chanting. Enjoy for meditation, or to practice chanting and singing. Songs include: Jai Ma-Mata Kalika, Ananda Ananda, Om Purnamadah Purnamidam, Tva Meva Mata and more, even a Winnie the Pooh poem!
–> See Widget to the right to Listen Now, or Free Download.

April 1, 2011, The Yoga Loft
Kevin Cole and I held a sweet Kirtan at the Yoga Loft Friday, April 1st, 2011, right before I went into another round of chemotherapy, it was a rich moving experience that sent me off to healing with love and celebration. Kevin plays tabla or Indian drums.

Jai Mai-Mata Kalika audio: Listen Now, or FREE download
Scroll down for audio of Jai Ma/Mata Kalikai song we did, settle in, enjoy, it goes thru various changes, about 14 minutes long. Enjoy, use headphones or good speakers (not a laptop if you can help it). About midway the group keeps singing, and I go into improvisations and varying the call and response.
Audio Widget Below
Download audio or listen now from the widget below.
Please feel free to share.

Saturday, April 16, Yoga Tree Castro
Scroll down to or use widget to the right to listen now or download audio from Sat. 4/16 with Katchie Ananda and Yari Mander at the Yoga Tree Castro benefit for my cancer treatments and healing wishes. We did a “Satcitananda” chant like we do in class, but slightly different, into a lively “Ananda, Ananda” and then the “I just want to Celebrate” which we’ve done in class sometimes.

The widget below has both Kirtans and more: some solo recordings, including Twa Meva Mata, Om Purnamadah Purnamidam.

Kirtan is a call and response practice of singing names of the divine, and non lyrical sound to clear your head, lift your heart, and cleanse the body of stresses, to immerse in Beingness, your own essential nature. Kirtan is expressive, emotive and touches the nameless breadth of human emotion and experience. A centering, entrancing practice. No experience necessary. Kirtan is a repetitive style, intended for deep immersion.

Yoga as Coaching: Personality, temperament, samskaras and change

Karl — Sun, 01 Aug 2010 20:50:26 +0000

Are we innately inclined to certain temperaments? Am I “Just the way I am” or is there choice in change, discernment in action and impulse? Both Yoga and Science explore these questions and arrive at similar conclusions. The persistent nature and nurture interplay continues to evolve in our understanding. A recent article in Psychotherapy Networker discusses personality, temperament and a 20 year study begun in 1988 by Jerome Kagan into the biological drives for key personality traits like extroversion, introversion and other forms of sociability.

“To be yourself in a world that is constantly trying to make you
something else is the greatest accomplishment.” – Emerson

“It is better to strive in ones own dharma (duty, work, calling) than to succeed in the dharma of another”
~ Bhagavad Gita III:35

Yoga is a field delving into attentiveness, discernment or viveka in relation to our mind’s tendencies and behaviors, our body’s cravings and impulses. In particular the Yoga Sutras and the Bhagavad Gita go into some depth around our intrinsic nature, and our moving through our environments adapting and responding to nurture.

The Yogic Model
Prakruti:
The Yogic and Ayurvedic model refer to one’s individual nature as prakruti, one’s own constitution and proclivities. The dance in yoga is to bring balance to that nature through work with a teacher or practitioner to help us understand that nature, its qualities and thus practices to bring balance to that nature.

Samskara:
The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali also teach about samskara or tendencies, imprints left by experience. Samskara are also then personality traits, things we tend to do again and again. Again, bringing balance is the richness of practice, learning through discernment which samskara are to be reinforced, and which to be curtailed, held in our control. Not being controlled or controlling, or repressing, but having tendencies and temperament well in hand. Heart and Mind are not separate in the yogic model, each in constant interplay.

Karma:
There is a rich model and vocabulary in Yoga providing tools for change and self-care and balance through attentiveness of heart/mind. One more term for the purposes this article is karma, an oft misunderstood term in western circles, and a concept I seek to understand with ongoing study and inquiry. One’s Karma is all wrapped up in one’s prakruti. Karma is a collection of laws of action and reaction, action and results of action. The key point being we only have authority over our actions, we do not have a say in the results of our actions (Bhagavad Gita II.47), and some results are coming from actions long ago, even past lifetimes, inherited in our makeup to unfold in our life based on our discernment and choices.

Taking prakruti, samskara and karma together we see a rich complex interplay of predisposition, or ‘one’s make-up’ alongside strong practices for discernment, attention and value based living. We also see the malleability of the human animal, the adaptability, the resilience and ability to change and choose.

Yoga is Whole Person Coaching
Yoga is a practice of change over time. As students of yoga, as teachers coaching students through the mirror of themselves, understanding the interplay between what is nature, what is choice and discernment and the practices that bringing balance mentally, physiologically, emotionally and physically is key. As a practitioner, I seek to collaborate with nutritionists, expressive arts therapists, life coaches and others to offer long term Whole Person Wellness programs bring various aspects of our makeup into the mix to find our calling, or as the Gita says “To do our OWN work, not seeking to do the work of others.” Or finding a home for our temperament, walking in balance.

Personality and Temperament
In Marian Sandmaier’s article in the Psychotherapy Networker, “Do our personalities Pilot the Way We Live Our Lives?” she explores the rising role temperament is having in psychotherapy and the interplay for the project of human change.

The field of temperament is dramatically enlarging in scope. The new science of behavioral molecular genetics, which seeks to identify genes associated with particular human traits has lately exploded with reports suggesting that our very cells may be imbued with tendencies toward extroversion or shyness or novelty seeking or distractibility.

She asks what I ask in relation to yoga: “What does it mean for the human project of change?”

Studies in the 70′s unhooked the biological proclivities from any notions or pathology or inferiority, as yoga also does not imply judgement or better than when discussion constitution or one’s nature. The key is knowing enough about one’s own temperament to find the best niche to be, what Emerson celebrated as does the Gita as ones “true calling.”

So come 1988 and Jerome Kagan seeking to map brain markers, variations in amygdala excitability in response to various stimuli for different temperaments seeking to come closer to solvign the predisposition puzzle. He followed 100 healthy 4 month olds in to adolescence monitoring how some strayed or did not from their temperaments seen as infants. By age 7 roughly half were responding the same way, thus roughly half had in some way morphed their temperament. By teen years many who were excitable remained so, prone to anxiety, while some had adapted socialization skills; nonetheless when interviewed the underlying temperament remained.

Part of temperament is physiological response. Some had “more reactive sympathetic nervous system, higher levels of muscle tension and greater cortical arousal.” Thus managing one’s physiology is part of understanding one’s own temperament. Hmm… what does that make you think of? Yoga Asana, meditation, pranayama all are tools requiring consistent training and practice to manage and keep at equilibrium.

“An individual develops a persona over time,”
says Kagan. “But time doesn’t change the anima.”
Sandmaier’s article goes on to state in her article that

“… we do, in fact inherit distinctive neurobiological profiles that contribute to particular, relatively enduring emotional and behavioral predispositions.”

Sandmaier interviewed Kagan recently and found how the long term research has settled into his worldview. Says Kagan today:

“Temperament is never the whole story, [Kagan] says now. “But if you don’t take it into account, you won’t understand what it is to be human.”

Thus the biochemical roots of temperament are more and more seen and accepted as part of the story of being human. This is not as deterministic as it may sound, and in fact many genetic researchers havae aken pains to explain that no gene causes a behavior or emotional state. Temperament, Kagan believes is a bit like birdsong, in a quote I find quite beautiful and true as a passionate lover of birds, their nature and their wondrous diversity.

Kagan says “Knowing that a bird is a finch rather than a meadowlark allows one to predict with great confidence the songs it will not sing,” he wrote in his 2004 book, the Long Shadow of Temperament “but permits a far less certain prediction of the particular song it will sing.”

Finally, Marian Sandmaier, a shy, awkward person in teens and twenties asked Kagan what he would have told the despairing 21 year old college student to offer a bit of hope he replied “I would have told you the world needs all kinds of people, I would have encouraged you to find a life niche in which your temperament would be a good thing.” He paused for a moment thinking it over, “Then I would have urged you to find a good therapist.” We all need a guide in this unpredictable road where even our own steps are not predictable or understandable, and often others see our path more clearly than we can ourselves.

Sandmaier says:

“As individuals thrash about in their own temperamental thickets, therapists can serve as wilderness guides, following rough cleared paths and pointing out elements of nature that are usually hidden from view.”

She adds a more personal note : “To understand that there things about me that can’t be undone or transformed by any amount of psychic digging or repair work — that a part of me is simply pre-psychological — has come as a profound relief.”

The Yoga Guide through our private wilderness
The Yoga Teacher, when yoga is taught in the whole person practice, beyond just asana, is such a wilderness guide. Texts alone cannot be such a guide as we filter them through our nature. To see Samskaras, Prakruti and Karma parts of the landscape to learn to navigate, not as limitations, or immutable forces is key to delving into the practices of yoga. We do need guides

From Emerson’s imperative to “find one’s true calling” to the Bhagavad Gita’s verse on “Do your own work, not seeking to do that of others” we find ongoing validation to find a niche for our temperament, and not be in situations that raise to much friction, allowing each to manage the prakruti towards balance and equanimity, let this be a relief.

Beyond Tribal: On Empathy, Wholeness, Yoga & Vedanta [books, J. Rifkin, video]

Karl — Sat, 17 Jul 2010 21:03:39 +0000

“Somewhere beyond right and wrong there is a field. I’ll meet you there.”
~ Rumi

There are no others.
~ Ramana Maharshi

For some years now I have been pondering ‘identity’ as I study and seek to practice Yoga and Vedanta. Identity meaning sense of self – in community, in society, in relation to spirit and divinity, in relation to our apparent tribal nature.

Yoga and Vedanta teach the nature of Wholeness, brahma vidya, knowledge of Brahman, and the practice of karma yoga. Brahman, or the limitless sustainer, and karma yoga (see blog post on Karma Yoga), or action as offering and graceful acceptance of results or our actions are unfolded through dialog, question and answer, and practice. Brahman is that which sustains all and is self-sustaining, that which is our source from whence we come and to which we return; that understanding which helps reveal the nature of Wholeness, of shared source. Seeing and practicing this essential teaching of Yoga and Vedanta can help us cultivate a view beyond I, me, mine, beyond ‘us’ and ‘them’, beyond tribal, beyond modern yoga brands created for business and narcissistic indulgence.

Yoga is for all tribes. Whether you practice Bikram, Iyengar, Anusara, Cowabunga Yoga, Yada Yada yoga, My Special Sauce Yoga… can we not see the shared source, the unifying teachings? Cliques build walls and instill perception of ‘others’, rather than diluting perception of ‘other.’

Recent studies in neuroscience, psychology and behavior point to empathy and compassion being strong biological drivers; the ability to feel what another is feeling, to see ourselves in the reactions of others is a biological experience says Jeremy Rifkin in his new book “Empathetic Civilizations” (video animation and lecture with J. Rifkin and book links below).

I have been a deep student of world mythologies all my life, as a child, in high school, in college and since. I have taught greek mythology and literature to high school, studied Welsh and Celtic mythologies, as well as native and middle eastern texts. So when I came to deep study of Vedanta (knowledge of the Vedas in the Upanishads and the Bhagavad Gita) in 1996 with Swami Dayananda Saraswati, I was steeped in language of archetypes, cosmologies, and mythos, both classical and indigenous. I was a big fan of Jung, Joseph Campbell, William Blake, Jacob Needleman, Parabola Magazine, Emerson, Thoreau, Robert Graves, Norman O. Brown (my teacher at UCSC), Evangeline Walton, Robert Bly, Ovid, Starhawk, Mary Renault, native ceremony and politics and more. Meaning to say I was steeped in our human tribal stories.

The message in Vedanta, the teaching of the Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads, is ‘you are the whole, and this is to be understood, not believed.’ Meaning we are manifestations of, made of, our source – whatever language in which one describes our source. The Maker and the material are the same. Wholeness is Wholeness, there is no American Wholeness and European Wholeness. We don’t speak of ‘American gravity’ or ‘Spanish thermodynamics.’ Infinity is infinity. Language can help us as we seek to understand what we cannot experience, but language does not change the nature of the force being studied. Vedanta shows us an understanding beyond me and you, beyond us and them, beyond tribal. Just as with gravity, thermodynamics and other truths, the truths in Vedanta are not culturally specific or time dependent. We explore which verses bring this understanding to the surface in our Gita study groups .

A common misunderstanding is that such a conclusion must mean that at the same time Vedanta, or statements emphasizing shared values, diminish diversity or individualism. Rather there is a recognition of a partial truth, a dependent truth in our tribalism, or in our individualism. The part is dependent or more accurately defined by the Whole, or Source. A pot is both a form or shape and clay. If I say “Here take the pot, I will keep the clay” what do you have? The truth of the pot is dependent on the deeper truth of the clay. The pot is mithya in sanskrit, or a ‘dependent reality.’ The clay is akin to sarvam or ‘truth’ in this metaphor. Meaning I can see me and you, and I can see ‘Us’ without creating a ‘Them.’ Most times when we create ‘us’ we create ‘them.’ A community creates outsiders, those who don’t belong. The story of religious and then national wars through the ages, true? There was no ‘white’ race until there was a desire to distinguish from a ‘red’ or ‘black’ race; before that there was a multitude of nationalities, English, Saxon, German, Celt, French and so on…There was no ‘black’ race until the meeting of a ‘white’ race, and so on. Identity can be made up of multiple inclusive tribes and identity shifts or is redefined when encountering one perceived as ‘other’.

If, when we see others, we see ourselves, what happens? If ‘I’, the pot, see clay rather than another pot when I see others, what happens?

10 Minute Animation of Jeremy Rikfin’s lecture

In fact, as Jeremy Rifkin goes into quite some depth in his new book “Empathetic Civilizations”, we are biologically wired to see our feelings in feelings of others, to empathize with their response. When we do not respond empathetically, meaning from competition or aggression, it is because sense of self is threatened in some form and thus sees ‘other.’ Books like “How Yoga Works” (HYW) (see blog entry on HYW) show how empathy is intrinsic and central to yogic teachings, and that personal practice means by definition consciously cultivating compassion, accomodation, acceptance and selflessness in relation to likes and dislikes. Rifkin claim it is recent research that shows humans are biologically wired for empathy, and does an amazing sweeping view of psycho-analytic, behavioral and socio-biological research over the last 75 years or more to refute claims of innate aggression, competition and sexualization of everything.

I see Jeremy Rifkin’s book, the recent neurological and behavioral research, and the rising popularity of communities of yoga as signs that he has his pulse on current trends in human development. Rifkin’s conclusions raise the importance of making conscious and willful the movements towards shared values, caring for each other, sustainable interdependence (urban gardens, local economies), and collaboration in business rather than competition and domination.

Tribalism has served humanity for millenia. I believe in our times of global crisis and global communication that is no longer the case; and in fact, our tribal nature leads to as much conflict and separatism as it does inclusion and community. This is not to say we need or will lose our local, cultural and spiritual affinities and identities – rather that if you belong to another we don’t have to start a war, or I don’t have to take what you have. Think ‘Beyond Tribal,’ what do you see?

Somewhere beyond ‘us’ and ‘them’ there is a field. I’ll meet you there.

Empathy ~ Interdependence ~ Collaboration. It’s time.

Jeremy Rifkin on KQED’s Forum

Jeremy Rifkin speaking at Google. Good context on social technologies. 50 minutes or so.

Top 5 Tips to Jumpstart your Home Practice

Karl — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 16:44:59 +0000

We all want to, but it just doesn’t seem to get off the ground, or out of the bed. An essential pillar in yoga is congruence in heart and mind, thought and action. There is what Swami Dayananda Saraswati calls the ‘knower-doer split.’ I know I want a home yoga practice, I know it is good for me, I know I like it when done… the doer says “Mañana. Tomorrow.” Internal conflict is a seed that grows, as is establishing new patterns.

A home practice is a challenging pattern to put in place and support. Here I offer some brief tips to help catalyze and support. Of course the tips start from the place there is an assumption of a desire to practice in the first place. Whatever your stripe or tribe of yoga, Anusara, Iyengar, Flow, Glow, Cowabunga, whether seeking to practice meditation, pranayama or the postures… to feed that passion is a glorious thing.

1. There is only today, not tomorrow.
We come back jazzed from a retreat or class or workshop and think, ‘wow, I gotta do those series more often!… I’ll start next week.’ Or when I clear a new space, or get a new mat, or finish this thing at work. This week is just too full. There is only today; am I practicing, yes or no? Granted once a routine is in place, if erratically then helping make the next morning’s practice is a sure unhindered thing comes next.

2. Remove all obstacles; lose interest in your excuses.
Obstacles internal and external are irrelevant and an abdication of will and choice. Set up a nice space the night before. Post a list of poses, sequences, notes from class on the wall the night before, so there is no ‘hmm what should I practice today?’ Use a timer. Plan monthly cycles: first week standing poses, second week backbends, third week twists, fourth week forward bends with inversions practiced throughout. Outhink your mind before it gets to can’t.

3. Practice what is being taught as it is being taught.
For a long period I start classes a certain way to help support learning through repetition and to offer various practice starting sequences over time. I often get questions at the end of class asking what to practice at home, and usually my first response is what was just learned. So yes, it would be a good idea to start practice waking up the legs in upavista konasana with a block behind to wake up the chest, the heart and upper spine. The pose and set up alone are not enough, one must retain the action taught. Legs must be working to support upper body lifting, and not to persist of lower back is not lifting and the legs can’t hold the weight rather than the spine. We used to make notes after class immediately, while fresh, before changing or right outside, quick sketches and notes for actions and props to spark the memory later. Tomorrow.

4. Weave yoga practice into existing routines.
In dialog with students once about practice one person said “It’s so much easier for me to get up for a walk than it is to practice yoga.” So get up 15 minutes earlier, or trim your walk a bit and do some yoga when you get back in. Start nibbling a space to fit it in. If you have a pattern of something you do for yourself already you’re most of the way there. Start weaving in your practice to what you already do.

5. There is no doing it wrong.
As Master Yoda says “Do or do not. There is no try.”
Either we are doing or not doing. Either we are doing our best to be mindful in iterative refinement of action in the body each breath, each moment – or at that moment mind was elsewhere. And we notice. And come back to now, in the body and breath. The refrain of “I’m afraid of doing it wrong” or “It just isn’t like in class” is just not relevant. See Top Tip number two.

All we can do is our best, and that is always glorious.

book: strong recommend. Good Story, Yoga Sutras and Great Teachings – “How Yoga Works”

Karl — Mon, 31 May 2010 18:14:37 +0000

I am reading a wonderful book a friend brought to me when I was in the hospital. The book, “How Yoga Works” has inspired me greatly in practice and kept students in mind as well. This book is perhaps the best I have ever read on Yoga, due to its genuine accuracy and truth of teachings of yoga, and that it truly teaches yoga, not a writing ‘about’ yoga in an academic sense.

Consider it required reading for any who have studied with me for more than a year. If you read one yoga book this year or two, let it be this one. Few are as valuable.

One key reason for this is in the format of the story itself: a young Tibetan girl ends up teaching an Indian prison captain in 1100 as she crosses over the border into India. So the book is a dialog between teacher and student, a key form for all source texts that actually teach. She carries with her Patanjali’s sacred texts the Yoga Sutras, or ‘short book on yoga’ written on palm leaves as was the practice of the time. All key yoga shastra or sacred source texts that actually teach yoga are written in Question & Answer format: The Upanishads, the Bhagavad-Gita… See Frawley article I will post on how The Bhagavad Gita is source yoga shastra, whereas the Yoga Sutras, which came much later are not. Rather the Yoga Sutras are a summation, an expository, concise collecting of the body of knowledge in yoga shastra that preceded them. Thus this book does not simply offer a translation of the Yoga Sutras, as so many do, rather a teacher to unfold the meaning in a teacher student relationship, in dialog format, as all the yoga shastra do. Beautiful. Let me know if any of the things the young girl says to the captain sound familiar .

I strongly recommend it to keep your practice fruitful, to keep the feeling that you have a teacher with you, and for the simple joy of a compelling story.

“I was really proud of him, my first real student, because he did the one thing that every successful student of anything has to do: he took what I had taught him home and practiced it there on his own, modestly but very steadily, to the best of his personal capacity. I could not have asked for more.” ~ How Yoga Works, p. 93

Daily it inspires and uplifts me, and keeps my heart focused on being well to teach again. The title “How Yoga Works,” is an accurate but unfair title as it is a great engaging story; but it does indeed unfold how yoga works in all the rich and most subtle and powerful essences of the practice, way beyond asana or the postures. I see how she learned from her teacher, and how she learns from her students and smile as the path is so familiar. The sacred glory of the teacher student relationship is well depicted here, and I think of of each of you as I read. It keeps our classes fresh in my mind and close to my heart. Enjoy.