Spacious Yoga https://spaciousyoga.com/ Ashtanga Yoga in Bali with Iain Grysak Mon, 30 Dec 2024 04:05:45 +0000 en-US hourly 1 The Energetic Dynamics of Ashtanga Advanced A (Third Series) – Video and Discussion by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/the-energetic-dynamics-of-ashtanga-advanced-a-iain-grysak/ https://spaciousyoga.com/the-energetic-dynamics-of-ashtanga-advanced-a-iain-grysak/#respond Mon, 16 May 2022 04:10:52 +0000 https://spaciousyoga.com/?p=2870 On September 23, 2020, I decided to turn on the video camera, along with a few more lights than usual, and film my Third Series Ashtanga practice. The video takes place in the dark early morning hours of 2:25 - 4:15 am, at home in Kenderan, Bali, before going to teach my Mysore class [...]

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On September 23, 2020, I decided to turn on the video camera, along with a few more lights than usual, and film my Third Series Ashtanga practice. The video takes place in the dark early morning hours of 2:25 – 4:15 am, at home in Kenderan, Bali, before going to teach my Mysore class at The Seeds of Life Cafe in Ubud. 

The video is not meant to be a perfect demonstration, but rather an accurate documentation of what an average practice looks like for me, as it is and as it has been each and every day since I began to practice the Ashtanga system of Asana in 2003. I chose not to select my “greatest hits” (scripted performances of my best asanas) nor did I edit out any mistakes or weaknesses. There was no staging, editing, retakes, music, enhancements, or anything else. This is real and raw practice.

The video above is the entire Third Series from Surya Namaskar A to Utpluthi. I made three cuts in the video – editing out a toilet break, a break where I had to chase the dogs out of the room when they decided to play around my mat (the brighter lights usually aren’t on and it seemed to make them more active than they usually are at this time of the morning), and lastly I cut out the section of Fourth Series postures, so the video jumps from the last posture of Third Series to final backbending. Aside from those three cuts there are no further edits. 

I also cut the video up into six separate segments, and over a period of several months in late 2020 and early 2021, I posted those segments to my Facebook page, along with an extensive commentary for each section. I have now collected all of those commentaries and posted them below, alongside each of the video segments, so the entire series now has a home as a collected whole here on my website. Each commentary focuses on some of the fundamental principles of the energetic dynamics of the Ashtanga system. The principles that I discuss in each section are inspired by that particular section of Third Series, however they are also principles which apply to the Ashtanga system as a whole, and therefore should be of interest and relevance to practitioners of all levels. 

Part 1: Surya Namaskar A & B + Standing Sequence

00:00 – 5 x Surya Namaskara A

06:52 – 3 x Surya Namaskara B

12:41 – Padangusthasana – Padahastasana

14:10 – Trikonasana A & B

16:12 – Parshvakonasana A & B

18:03 – Prasarita Padottanasana A – D

21:29 – Parshvottanasana

In the Ashtanga system of asana practice, we always begin with 5 repetitions of Surya Namaskara A, 3 repetitions of Surya Namaskara B and the Standing Sequence, regardless of which series we are going to practice on that day. These first 25 – 30 minutes of practice are the same for all practitioners, regardless of whether one has yet to complete Primary Series, or whether one has been practicing Third or Fourth Series for decades.

I’ve begun my daily practice with this 25 minute sequence each morning for the past 19 years. The repetitive nature of the Ashtanga system and the simplicity of this introductory section of the practice is a feature which some aspiring practitioners consider to be boring. The necessity of working through this initial aspect of self-encountering (the tendency to become distracted and bored while craving for gratification through novelty) dissuades them from delving deeper into the system. At my shala in Ubud, Bali, I frequently receive inquiries from practitioners with varied backgrounds who are interested in giving a trial to the Ashtanga practice. For someone who does not already have an established, daily Mysore style practice, the minimum requirement to join my class is one week of daily practice. One week of practice is actually not enough to begin to experience the essence of the Ashtanga practice’s influence on the human organism. A more appropriate initial trial length would be one month. Due to the transient nature of travelers passing through Ubud, I make a concession for one week. This requirement of time commitment is still enough to dissuade many potential students. It weeds out those who are not interested in cultivating focus and commitment.

Those who do commit to join for at least one week encounter the next requirement – which is the ability to memorize the vinyasa sequences of Surya Namaskara A & B and the Standing Sequence, before they are moved on to begin learning the Primary Series. In today’s era of fragmented attention and instant gratification, memorizing this 25 – 30 minute sequence proves to be a challenge for many new students, and they often do not accomplish it within one week. Those who consider themselves to already be accomplished and advanced asana practitioners from other systems of practice – and who perhaps expect to be practicing hand stands, arm balances and advanced backbending – sometimes find that being asked to repeat the Standing Sequence three or four times (or until mistakes in memorizing the sequence are resolved) and then to lie down and take rest is not very gratifying for the ego. They often do not return for a second week of practice.

For those who persevere, and apply themselves to this style of learning, a rich universe of authentic practice and self cultivation opens up for exploration. Surya Namaskara and the Standing Sequence become the cornerstone of a lifelong practice. It is the ground and the roots upon which we build the structure of the core series of asanas. It is the foundation that we can always return to in order to stabilize and recalibrate when the transformative process of the core series of asanas become overly intense or overwhelming. This is ground zero of Ashtanga practice.

Surya Namaskara A & B introduce the fundamental process of coordinating the movements of body and breath in the vinyasa system of practice. For a true beginner, this alone can be enough to grapple with for at least a few days. The key postures Chaturanga Dandasana, Urdhva Mukha Svanasana (Upward Facing Dog) and Adho Mukha Svanasana (Downward Facing Dog) are introduced here. The sequence linking these three postures together is often repeated 50 times or more in a full series practice, so it is imperative that we cultivate some degree of experiential understanding and ease in these three postures.

During the practice of Surya Namaskara, we can focus on the three core postures without the added complication of the other postures of Primary, Intermediate or Advanced series. In particular, it is important to cultivate some degree of comfort in Chaturanga Dandasana. For those who begin the Ashtanga practice with a lack of strength, or with certain injuries or disabilities, we can certainly modify Chaturanga in the beginning stages. In the majority of cases, I prefer that a student applies himself to develop the ability to practice Chaturanga properly (without the knees or belly on the ground) before I begin to teach them the seated asanas of Primary Series. I’ve had students join my shala who have been taught full Primary Series, and yet they cannot perform Chaturanga – Upward Dog – Downward Dog without touching their knees or belly on the ground. Cultivating a 90 minute full Primary Series practice of movement and flexibility without a corresponding cultivation of strength is an extremely imbalanced way to go about progressing through this practice, and I deem it to be incorrect. Also consider that asking someone to begin to cultivate a proper Chaturanga at this stage – when they are already practicing it in a modified way 50 or more times per session – would be overwhelming and destabilizing. It is much more appropriate to cultivate it properly from the beginning. The same philosophy applies to jumping. It is fine for beginners who lack confidence, strength and control to step forward and back – rather than jumping – in the beginning stages. However, by the time one is working on the first seated postures of Primary Series, I do expect at least a rudimentary form of jumping to be attempted.

The importance of the Standing Sequence is often overlooked. This sequence of postures is stabilizing, balancing and therapeutic in nature. Although the postures are basic, there are infinite layers of depth to be found within them for one who practices with a commitment to embodied awareness and an attitude of exploration. After 19 years of practicing this sequence each morning, I still regularly experience new insights within these postures. The way that I experience them within myself continues to evolve and and change over time. The Standing Sequence is often the most enjoyable part of my practice. I appreciate the relaxed stimulation of my body and breath opening up and aligning in a gentle way, before the more intensive postures of the core series exert their effect upon me. The way that I feel during the Standing Sequence is also an important indicator of the constantly changing state of my body, breath and nerves on each particular morning.

A fundamental skill which is essential to cultivate in the Standing Sequence is the ability to harness the force of the earth and to channel it throughout the entirety of our body and breath. This is the core alignment which is common to each and every asana that we practice. It is also known as “Mula Bandha.” Mula Bandha is experienced when the part of our body which is in contact with the ground is able to press down into the earth with firmness and stability, while we simultaneously release tension in order to allow the resistance that comes from our engagement with the earth to spread and reverberate throughout our entire body. In essence, Mula Bandha is the experience of a continuous and unbroken energetic connection between ourselves and our surrounding environment. A tree drops its roots into the ground, while growing and spreading upward and outward into the space surrounding it. Similarly, our body and breath extend themselves downward into the earth, while simultaneously expanding outwards into the atmosphere around us. For me, asana practice is a cultivation of the fluidity of my relationship with my environment to the extent that the boundaries between myself and my environment are blurred. Bandha is a process of working with the ground and space as if they are extensions of one’s own body and breath. Refining the way that we respond to the ground beneath us and the space around us – at an intuitive and phenomenal level of experience – is the key to cultivating efficiency and fluidity in our movement patterns. I have written in greater detail about this process in my article “The Tree of Bandha.”

Standing on the ground, and cultivating the ability to harness the earth’s energy through the soles of our feet is the appropriate place to begin to cultivate the process and state of Mula Bandha. Those who fail to learn how to harness the earth’s energy through their feet in the Standing Sequence, will most likely not be able to do so with other parts of their body in the more complex postures of the core series of asanas. I’ve seen practitioners who manage to get through Primary Series and some of Intermediate Series based on flexibility alone, without cultivating strength and stability through a solid connection to the earth. At some point in Intermediate Series, these practitioners become stuck and they aren’t able to move forward until they learn how to cultivate the foundational element of deepening their connection to the ground beneath them, so that effective and efficient movement can blossom from this base.

The grounding and stabilizing aspect of the Standing Sequence is also therapeutic in nature. When the structurally transformative process which is induced by the more intensive postures of Primary, Intermediate or Advanced series becomes overwhelming, and the body and nerves become destabilized and excessive pain is experienced, my advice is always to continue to practice at least the Standing Sequence – returning to ground zero – until things begin to stabilize and the system is able to manifest a certain degree of dynamic balance again. Once this balance is re-established, we can then move back into the core series of asanas.

Part 2: Advanced A – Lateral extensions and Leg Behind The Head Variations (Visvamitrasana – Durvasana)

00:00 – Visvamitrasana

01:25 – Vasisthasana

02:33 – Kasyapasana

05:18 – Chakorasana

06:50 – Bhairavasana

08:51 – Skandasana

10:53  – Durvasana

Third series can be divided into four distinct sections on the basis of energetic dynamics. Each of these four sections can be further divided into subsections, but the boundaries that delineate the four main sections are the most noteworthy for me and they mark distinctive turning points during my embodied experience of third series.

The first two sections of the series are deeply apanic in nature, while the concluding two sections are pranic in nature. Prana and apana represent opposing, but complementary forms of energetic movement within the human organism. Apana governs exhalation and the movement of energy in the downward direction, while prana governs inhalation, and the movement of energy in the upward direction. An intention of practice should be to cultivate a dynamic and balanced relationship between these two movements. If we are successful in nurturing harmonious communication between these two energetic patterns, we experience a state of bandha.

In the previous section on the Standing Sequence,  I characterized the phenomena of bandha as an engaged relationship with our environment. In this context, apana is responsible for the ability to press downward with whichever part of our body is in contact with the earth. Those who are unable to engage firmly with the ground need to cultivate more apanic energy within themselves and their relationship with their environment. Apana is also responsible for the various elimination processes. Defecation, menstruation, and the release of stress and tension through a deep exhale or a heartfelt sigh are all examples of apanic energy movement. The apanic energy pattern is cultivated through postures which stretch the back part of the body (i.e. forward bending) or move the body toward the ground. Vinyasas which are apanic in nature are always executed with an exhalation. In terms of working with the breath, learning how to press the breath down into the root of the belly and the pelvis at the end of the exhalation will improve our proficiency in working with apana. Mastery of the apanic pole of the breath has been attained when we are able to feel clear contact between the end of the exhale and the pelvic floor.

Prana governs the complimentary response to the downward apana movement. It allows us to lift and spread upward. Apana allows us to tap into the energy of the earth (gravity) and prana distributes our response to the earth’s energy throughout our body. Those who are unable to feel a natural ease in lifting the ribcage up and away from the pelvis, and who frequently feel heavy, as if they are sinking down into the earth, need to cultivate more pranic energetic movement within themselves and their relationship with their environment. It should also be noted that prana requires resistance from the ground to manifest effectively. Asana should always be practiced on a firm surface for this reason. A rubber mat and thin cotton rug is usually firm enough, but anyone who has attempted to practice Ashtanga on a plush carpet, or loose sand has experienced the impossibility of overcoming the sinking feeling of excessive apana. I also recommend that seated meditation be practice on a firm surface, for the same reason. A folded wool blanket is the maximum softness which will allow for effective resistance to stimulate pranic lift in the body. Standard meditation cushions are too soft and will lead to compression in the spine due to excessive apana. Those who experience a backache after sitting in meditation for long periods of time should experiment with a firmer meditation cushion.  A similar philosophy also applies to sleeping mattresses. A night spent lying on a mattress which is too soft will result in a feeling of compression in practice the next morning.

The qualities of expansion and vitality are governed by prana. Asanas which stretch the front part of the body or lift us upward and away from the ground cultivate the movement of prana. In the Ashtanga system of practice, we execute these types of vinyasas with an inhalation. When working with the breath, we can maximize the expansion of prana by cultivating the ability to inhale into the entire thoracic cavity, including the top of the chest, between the scapula, and the sides of the chest below the armpits. When we can expand the inhalation freely and without restriction into these areas, we have mastered the pranic pole of breathing.

As one matures in the Ashtanga system of practice, a realization tends to occur: The entire practice is designed to enhance and refine the way that we engage with the complementary movements of prana and apana within ourselves and with our environment. Bandha is both a process and result of fluid, stable and dynamic relationship between these two forms of energy, and is a defining feature of mature practice.

There are various methods through which the dynamic balance between prana and apana is cultivated within the Ashtanga system of practice. We can first examine the energetic structure of the ordering of the vinyasa sequences. All of the vinyasa sequences – from Surya Namaskara A to the postures of Third and Fourth Series – follow a similar pattern of oscillation between pranic and apanic movements. For example, in Surya Namaskara A the vinyasas Ekam, Trini, Pancha, Sapta, and Nava are all pranic in nature and executed with an inhalation. The vinyasas Dve, Catvari, Sat and Astau are all apanic in nature and executed with an exhalation. In other words, we alternately stimulate prana and apana, from one vinyasa to the next, for the entire duration of our practice. The net effect of this continuous oscillation is an interwoven communication between prana and apana, which builds a state of bandha over the duration of practice.

We can also examine the balance of prana and apana within each posture. Most postures can be characterized as either predominantly pranic or predominantly apanic in nature. To maintain dynamic balance between prana and apana – and to experience bandha – we must consciously cultivate the pattern that is opposite to the predominate natural pattern of each posture. For example, in a naturally apanic posture such a forward bend, we will predominantly experience the apanic pattern of the back of the body stretching and the movement of the body toward the ground. Yet, to maintain a balanced state within the posture – and thus to experience bandha – we should also consciously cultivate some pranic movement by maintaining spread and opening in the chest and lengthening the crown of the head towards the toes. We should also inhale deeply into the entire back of the rib cage. If we don’t add these pranic elements to a forward bend, and instead allow ourselves to flop over with the entire spine completely flexed and relaxed, the posture feels lifeless. By adding active and engaged pranic movements to a forward bend, we experience the flow of life force and the state of bandha due to a more balanced internal pattern. It is worth noting here that I don’t advocate the “yin” system of asana practice as a complement to the Ashtanga system. Ashtanga is not a “yang” practice, which needs to be balanced by a separate “yin” practice. The yang and yin – or prana and apana – can and should be experienced together within each posture, each breath, and across the energetic experience of the practice as a whole.

We can also consider a counter example of the same principle:  In a naturally pranic posture or movement, such as backbend, we must consciously apply engaged apanic patterns in order to bring about the desired state of balance and bandha that we are attempting to nurture. Backbends tend to feel exhilarating and energizing as they lift us away from the earth. If we overindulge in this phenomena, our internal experience can resemble a manic high, which is neither sustainable nor balanced. At some point later on we will crash and experience a “backbending hangover.” I’ve witnessed practitioners drive themselves deeply into imbalance and pathology by repeating this process over a long period of time. In order to experience the positive benefits of backbending in a balanced and sustainable way, we must add apanic elements to these postures. Pressing the body downward into the earth and consciously cultivating stability in both body and breath is the most effective way to do this. In Urdhva Danurasana, for example, we must actively press the feet down into the ground. The next time you practice backbending and dropping back and standing up, see if you can do so without moving your feet from their initial position on your mat. This will give you a sense of how grounded (or not) your backbends are. Those who are not able to maintain a solid apanic connection to the ground are not yet energetically prepared to integrate the pranic stimulation of deeper backbending.

Another important aspect of the dynamic balance between prana and apana to consider is the long term psychological and physiological tendencies that we carry. We’ve discussed how most postures have a natural pranic or apanic bias to them. People also have an innate structural bias towards either pranic or apanic energy as their natural baseline state. Those who have an anteriorly tilted pelvis tend to have a pranic energetic bias, while those who have a posteriorly tilted pelvis tend to have an apanic energetic bias. The preceding statement is a gross generalization, and each individual experience is subtle, complex and nuanced, but our natural biases are an important factor to consider. Understanding our personal pranic – apanic biases will help us to understand why some postures, movements and breathing patterns feel more natural and comfortable, while we struggle with others. This bias will also shift and change over time, as the practice shapes and alters our innate structure. When the Ashtanga system is applied correctly – that is, when we are required to complete each posture or movement before learning the next one in the series – we are forced to encounter, cultivate and integrate the movement patterns which are less natural and comfortable for us. This is what makes the Ashtanga system unique in its structurally transformative and balancing effects. Progress through the system must be gradual, if it is to be sustainable. Deep structural changes which shift our fundamental biases require time, patience, and often involve a certain degree of discomfort as we integrate them. A skillful teacher will ensure that his students work through this process in a way that is sustainable and not overwhelming.

Finally, we can zoom out to observe the relationship between prana and apana across the broader scale of the structure of entire series. Primary Series is apanic in nature. Only two of the postures (Purvottanasana and Setubandhasana) are pranic. Apana represents the roots from which the tree of prana rises and spreads. This is why we begin our journey through the Ashtanga system by fully developing the rooting apanic pattern in Primary Series. Once the roots of apana are firmly established within us, we can use this stable foundation as a base upon which we nurture the growth pranic energy.

Urdhva Danurasana represents a counter posture to the entire Primary Series, and cultivation of pranic energy though backbending at the end of the series is necessary to elicit an overall balance. Developing some integrated experience of pranic energy through proficiency in backbending (including the ability to stand up from and drop back into Urdhva Danurasana) at this stage is necessary before we learn Intermediate Series.

The first section of Intermediate Series features a powerful sequence of eight backbending postures in a row. The net effect of practicing these postures together, with the connecting vinyasas and breathing, creates an experience of pranic stimulation which most practitioners are unprepared for. It is not uncommon for practitioners who begin a daily practice of this sequence to experience disturbed sleeping patterns, vivid dreams, resurfacing of old and possibly traumatic memories and emotional instability. These phenomena illustrate the extent to which the transformative influence of the Ashtanga system reaches the deepest layers of our embodied selves. It is worth repeating that a stable and integrated practice of the apanic Primary Series, along with the initial pranic experience of standing up and dropping back from Urdhva Danurasana are essential prerequisites to attempting to integrate the more intensive pranic experience of the first section of Intermediate Series.

The next section of Intermediate Series features leg behind the head postures and arm balances. This section provides a stronger apanic stimulation than primary series provides, and also counters the pranic stimulation of the first section of Intermediate Series. It is at this stage that we can remove Primary Series from our daily practice, and focus on Intermediate as a stand-alone practice, since both the pranic and apanic sections have now been cultivated within Intermediate Series.

Third Series reverses the order of energetic patterning that we experience in Intermediate Series. In Third Series, we begin with apanic stimulation and finish with pranic stimulation. Changing the order in which we stimulate the two patterns elicits a very different phenomenal experience of the practice.

The first section of Third Series begins with Visvamitrasana and Vasisthasana. I consider these two postures to be advanced variations of the standing postures Trikonasana and Parshvakonasana, respectively. We could refer to these postures as Trikonasana C and Parshvakonasana C. In terms of the pranic – apanic energy spectrum, these postures are relatively neutral in nature. Beginning the series with these two postures functions as an extension of the Standing Sequence, which is helpful when we are practicing Third Series as a stand-alone practice (without preceding it with Intermediate Series). This subsection is an effective way to ease into the series before the deeper postures which follow.

The remainder of the first section of Third Series features a deeply apanic sequence of five variations of Eka Pada Sirsasana (leg behind the head). It is essential that one has mastered Eka Pada and Dwi Pada Sirsasana in Intermediate Series, before one is moved on to begin Third Series. Unfortunately, this is often not the case. Dwi Pada Sirsasana is one of the most poorly performed postures in the Ashtanga system. I have observed very few students who are taught this important posture properly – that is, cultivating the ability to spread the feet apart with the toes pointed away from each other and to keep the head held upright. I struggled with this posture myself, and it was only when I went to Mysore to practice with Sharath Jois for the first time in 2014, that I was required to learn the correct technique. I detailed my experience with Dwi Pada in my article “You Stop There.”

Those who fail to cultivate the prerequisite depth and comfort in the Intermediate variations of leg behind the head are far more likely to encounter structural issues if they are taught the five variations in Third Series prematurely. Practicing these five variations in a row with the connecting vinyasas induces a tremendous amount of structural shifting  – especially for those who have a natural pranic bias in their body structure. If the ground work has not been sufficient to prepare oneself for this experience, there is a high likelihood of experiencing pain in the hips, pelvis and lower back as the core part of the body restructures to accommodate the daily inputs of these extreme apanic postures. It is also essential to have developed enough strength and opening in the upper body and shoulder girdle to safely hold the leg behind the head without strain on the neck. This sequence should not be approached casually or lightly. For those who are prepared, and who learn these postures in the gradual manner that is taught in Mysore, our understanding and mastery of the apanic energetic pattern is deepened and these postures provide a grounded entry into the power of third series.

Part 3: Advanced A – Arm Balances (Urdhva Kukkutasana – Astavakrasana)

00:00 – Urdhva Kukkutasana A

00:44 – Urdhva Kukkutasana B

01:22 – Urdhva Kukkutasana C

02:08 – Galavasana

03:11 – Eka Pada Bakasana A

04:17 – Eka Pada Bakasana B

05:23 – Koundinyasana A

06:28 – Koundinyasana B

07:38 – Astavakrasana A

08:45 – Astavakrasana B

The second section of apanic postures is considered to be the most demanding part of Third Series by many practitioners. This section features ten consecutive arm balancing postures. If we count both sides the bilateral postures, the total is seventeen consecutive arm balances. Those who have a natural apanic bias in their physical structure will tend to have an easier time with this section than those who have a pranic bias. For pranic types, this section will undoubtedly pose the greatest challenge in Third Series. The potential for profound structural transformation is accordingly high for a pranic practitioner who dedicates the time and musters the necessary perseverance to master this section.

A sufficient level of strength cultivation is the most obvious prerequisite to completing this section of the practice. Mastery of Intermediate postures such as Bakasana, Karandavasana, Mayurasana and Nakrasana (along with their connecting vinyasas) and deep stability and comfort in Chaturanga Dandasana will be necessary before tackling the arm balance section of Third Series. There is simply no possibility of compromising for a lack of strength by working around, avoiding or modifying these ten postures, which represent a significant chunk of Third Series. At this stage, one must fully embrace the strengthening aspect of the Ashtanga practice.

Strength is not the only necessary factor for mastery of these postures. A sense of ease in accessing the apanic rounding pattern of the back and pelvis is also extremely important. The rounding pattern is essential to experience the full expression of the first six of these arm balances – which are done with straight arms and the back rounded in the characteristic apanic shape. The apanic rounding is less relevant to the final four arm balances, which are done with the arms bent and the spine in a twisting pattern. The rounded shape of the back is cultivated through mastery of Intermediate postures such as Bakasana, Dwi Pada Sirsasana and Karandavasana and Primary postures such as Baddha Konasana B

Eka Pada Bakasana A is the most difficult of these ten arm balances. The apanic rounding of the back is absolutely necessary, in order to attain the full expression of the posture with both of the arms relatively straight, the kneecap of the bent leg placed on the arm and the foot of the bent leg pulled up. Most practitioners end up doing the “easier” version of this posture, where the shin of the bent leg rests on the arm (rather than the kneecap) and the foot of the the bent leg hangs down, which ultimately makes it impossible to straighten the arm that the bent leg is resting upon. This was one of the Third Series postures which posed the greatest difficulty for me to learn (the other being Gandha Berundasana, which comes in the next section). For over a decade, I did the “easy” version of this posture. It was only when I was given Eka Pada Bakasana A in my practice with Sharath Jois on my fourth trip to Mysore in 2018, that I was required to learn the full version in order to satisfy his standards. I am happy to have been pushed to this level of integrity in my practice, as the full version always felt out of reach for me prior to that trip. Two and a half years later, my ability to execute this posture has improved significantly, though it is certainly still a work in progress (as are all of the postures in the practice).

The third aspect of self-cultivation which is indispensable for success in the arm balance section of Third Series is that of stamina and concentration. The qualities of stamina and concentration go hand in hand. They support one another and work together synergistically. It is impossible to fully cultivate one of these qualities without the other. Mastery of these qualities within the Ashtanga practice is represented by the ability to flow through all of the vinyasas and postures of a particular section or series without the need to stop and break the flow of body and breath in order to rest, or to distract oneself with anything outside of the structured flow of the vinyasa count. In other words, stamina and concentration are responsible for the ability to follow the flow of the vinyasa count precisely, without breaking or deviating from the count for the duration of one’s practice.

The ability to “follow the count” is one of the most important, but least recognized components of mastery of the Ashtanga system of practice. Teachers who focus on this feature of the practice in the training of their students tend to produce the strongest and most stable practitioners. This is one of the defining features of the teaching style of Sharath Jois (and those of his authorized teachers who follow his teaching faithfully.) I’ve noticed that the ability to follow the vinyasa count tends to be lacking in students who prefer to learn from “workshop teachers” – many of whom seem to discard the importance of the vinyasa counting system from their teaching styles. At my shala in Bali, I’ve encountered students who have been trained by “workshop teachers” to the level of Intermediate or even Third Series. Some of these students haven’t even learned what the appropriate vinyasa counts are, let alone cultivated an ability to flow through them without interruption. These same students tend to have distracted, unfocussed practices, lack stamina, and often complain of chronic pains and injuries.

In the previous section, I discussed the structure of the vinyasa count with respect to the way that it alternately stimulates prana and apana, via oscillation between apanic vinyasas, executed with an exhalation, and pranic vinyasas, executed with an inhalation. When a practitioner cultivates the ability to focus continuously on this oscillating internal pattern of breath and bodily movement in a meditation on internal form, the phenomena of bandha builds up within him. Bandha is not something that can be turned on or off from moment to moment with a simple muscular contraction. I am sometimes asked by students if they should be “holding bandha.” Bandha is not something that can be “held.” Rather, it is something that is built up through sustained flow and internal concentration on the continuous movement of body and breath. For steam to build up in a pressure cooker, heat must be applied continuously, and the lid must be kept tightly sealed on the pot. If the application of heat is stopped – even for a few moments – the internal buildup of pressure in the pot will cease and the pressure will begin to decrease. If we take the lid off the pot, the internal pressure escapes completely. Similarly, if we stop the continuous oscillation between pranic and apanic stimulation via the flow of breath and movement through the vinyasas, then we remove the heat which drives the buildup of internal pressure which generates bandha. If our concentration wanders away from our embodied, phenomenal experience, then we have taken the lid off the pot and we lose everything. Nothing inside gets “cooked” and we don’t experience the internal transformation that we could potentially have experienced.

Sharathji once made a comment during conference that stuck with me and is relevant to the present discussion. He said that the biggest cause of injury in practice is a lack of concentration. I had never thought about this fact in these particular terms before, but the statement resonated with my understanding of the practice and injury completely. As I previously mentioned, it is often those students who have not been trained to follow the vinyasa count precisely, and who have distracted and unfocussed practices, who seem to be nursing chronic pains and injuries. These students tend to address these injuries by deviating from the structure of the practice even further – obsessively squirming around, adding in extra stretches in between postures and vinyasas and skipping certain postures and vinyasas altogether. They generate a vicious circle where the very thing that contributed to their injuries (improper application of the Ashtanga system) becomes the tool they attempt to use to address their injury, which only drives them deeper into discomfort. When I encounter such a student in my shala, I usually address the issue by bringing them back to the foundational sequences – Standing Sequence and Primary Series – and I train them to move slowly and carefully through these sequences with emphasis on focus and attention towards the count of the vinyasa. In most cases – for those who are willing to follow my instructions for a sustained period of time – the injuries and pains work themselves out, and the student then progresses further into the system feeling stronger and more stable. When one is deeply focused on the vinyasa count and engrossed within one’s internal experience of movement of body and breath, a profoundly embodied state of being arises which is characterized by the primacy of intuitive, animal intelligence. This is a state where injury or mistakes that will lead to excessive pain are much less likely to occur.

When we remain internally focused on the sensations involved with the flow of body and breath, and we commit to staying with the continuous flow of vinyasa from one posture to the next, we encounter challenging experiences within ourselves. The state of bandha is not a natural experience which would occur in ordinary circumstances outside of the practice. When we build bandha through continuous flow of body and breath, we experience unique sensations in deep somatic layers, which are unlike sensations that we would naturally encounter our mundane lives. These sensations can be connected to subconscious samskara patterns (habitual patterns of reaction which we generate throughout our lives, and which we tend to default to.) These deeper sensations can sometimes feel overwhelming and unpleasant (though they can also sometimes feel blissful and intoxicating), and the default tendency will be to react to these sensations by attempting to avoid them. This is particularly common when we approach or arrive at the most difficult postures or vinyasas in our practice. Aversion and the tendency towards avoidance lead us to either stop and take a rest, or perhaps to distract ourselves by adding in extra stretches, squirming around, looking at other people practicing near us, picking our toenails, or any of the myriad of escape techniques that practitioners employ.

When the process of building bandha through continuous flow of body and breath is sustained for longer stretches of time, our internal experience and the samskaras that we encounter can become even more challenging. This is why it it is necessary to build the intensity our practice up gradually, taking the time to adapt to each section of practice by training ourselves to be non-reactive towards the internal sensations that arise through the unique experience of flowing through the vinyasa count. If we hold ourselves accountable to the vinyasa count for each section of practice, and train ourselves to master the ability to flow through the count without interruption, then we can adapt to our inner experience and work through these layers of samskara patterns in a sustainable way. If we don’t habituate gradually, and we launch into the more intensive postures and vinyasa sequences of Intermediate and Third Series prematurely, the samskara patterns which arise can be overwhelming and destabilizing, causing serious emotional and energetic imbalance. This can lead to a full blown breakdown which often results in abandonment of the Ashtanga practice altogether. If one does take the time and effort to work though these layers of samskara in a gradual and sustainable way, one becomes stronger and more resilient emotionally and energetically. Emotional and energetic resilience and equanimity are key signs of correct long term application of practice.

When I consider whether to move a student forward and add more postures to their practice, the ability for that student to flow through the vinyasa count of their current practice without interruption and without exhibiting signs of being energetically or emotionally overwhelmed is an extremely important factor. It is of equal importance as the mastery of the postures themselves. A student may be able to bind or complete all of the postures in his practice perfectly, but if he cannot flow smoothly through the vinyasas without becoming distracted or excessively fatigued, then I won’t move him forward and teach him new asanas until his focus and stamina improves. This is also a factor that I closely monitor when judging the state of my own practice.

The arm balance section of Third Series is a make or break point in terms of stamina and concentration. Most students will need to stop and take breaks during this section, especially when they are in the process of learning it. In my opinion, this section of Third Series is not mastered until one can flow through it without interruption, following the vinyasa counts.

Following the vinyasa counts does not mean that one cannot take extra breaths here or there, when necessary. Taking extra breaths within the flow of the vinyasa is quite different from dropping out of the flow altogether to rest, or to distract oneself. Taking extra breaths within the flow of the vinyasa count lessens the intensity of internal experience, but allows one to maintain the process of building bandha. If you watch the video closely, you might notice that I do take some extra breaths in my execution of the arm balance section of Third Series. For example, when I jump into headstand, and then position my leg on my arm, in a few of the postures I then take an extra inhale and exhale, before I then inhale into the final state of the posture itself. Ideally, even these extra breaths should eventually be eliminated completely. In Primary Series, it is possible to flow through the entire series without these sorts of extra breaths. In Intermediate, and especially Advanced Series, most mortals will need a few extra breaths here and there.

Part 4: Advanced A – Transitions and Peak Backbending (Purna Matsyendrasana – Supta Trivikramasana)

00:00 – Purna Matsyendrasana

02:10 – Viranchyasana A

04:47 – Viranchyasana B

08:32 – Viparita Dandasana A

09:55 – Viparita Dandasana B

11:40 – Viparita Salabhasana

12:46 – Gandha Berundasana

14:06 – Hanumanasana

16:08 – Supta Trivikramasana

The third section of Third Series features the transition from the apanic energetic cultivation of the first half of the series into the pranic cultivation of the second half of the series. This section also features what I consider to be the energetic culmination of the series in the difficult backbending postures Viparita Salabhasana and Gandha Berundasana.

The transition from apanic to pranic movement patterns occurs over three seated postures: Purna Matsyendrasana, Viranchyasana A and Viranchyasana B. These postures maintain a slight apanic bias in their nature, but help to prepare one for the subsequent backbending postures by also featuring strong pranic elements. Purna Matsyendrasana and Viranchyasana B are both twisting postures, which require apanic movements in the lower body, combined with pranic expansion of the upper body. Viranchyasana A is a variation on the leg behind the head theme, which is deeply apanic, but also features pranic cultivation with the addition of binding the arms in Gomukhasana style.

I find these three transitional postures to be the calmest part of Third Series. They are a welcome respite after the intensity of the arm balances which precede this section, and before the peak backbending which follows these postures. These three postures are complex, as they combine elements from several different categories of posture. Provided one has completed the necessary groundwork to established the various types of required mobility, the energetic demands are less here than in other parts of Third Series, giving this section a feeling of calm between the apanic and pranic storms which precede and follow it, respectively.

Transitioning back and forth between pranic and apanic movement patterns is an important feature of the Ashtanga practice. As I have previously discussed, bandha manifests through a fluid and dynamic balance between the pranic and apanic energetic poles. If we are successful in cultivating the phenomena of bandha, one hallmark should be ease and resilience in our ability to move back and forth between opposing patterns of movement and energy. In other words, a sign of maturity and competence in the Ashtanga practice is the ability to move effortlessly and fluidly between pranic and apanic trends.

A state of bandha is analogous to walking upon a high and narrow mountain ridge between two valleys. From the vantage point of the ridge, we can clearly see the terrain of both valleys and if we should choose to move into either valley, we can easily do so from the central point of the top of the ridge. Conversely, if we are stuck in either one of the valleys, it is impossible to see the terrain in the other valley. If we want to move into the other valley, it requires great effort as we must first climb up the ridge, and then down into the opposite valley.

I once had a unique experience while walking along a steep and high ridge while trekking in the Indian Himalaya. I was trekking alone, without a guide or companions. It was mid-morning, and I had set off from my starting point about 90 minutes prior to reaching the ridge. I hadn’t seen anyone, or any signs of human settlement since setting off, and I wasn’t fully confident that I was on the correct route to my destination. The ridge and the surrounding mountainscape were stunning and I felt intoxicated by the power of the mountain wilderness. At the same time, I felt a gnawing apprehension due to the extremity of the environment and the potential of getting lost.

There were broken sections of thin rock wall upon the ridge, and the walking path meandered back and forth from one side of the rock wall to the other. When the walking path passed along the side of the wall which exposed me to the Northwest and blocked my exposure to the Southeast, I was struck by a ferocious and icy cold wind blowing from the main Himalaya range. There was no sun on this side and the path was full of patches of snow and ice, as was the steep and foreboding valley that lay on this side of the ridge and the jagged mountain peaks that stretched out beyond the valley. The icy wind stung my face and threatened to throw me off balance as I carefully navigated the icy patches of ground. I felt my fear and apprehension of getting lost increase dramatically when I was on this side of the rock wall. Then suddenly the rock wall would end and a new section of rock wall would emerge, with the foot path running on the opposite side of the wall, exposing me to the Southeast and blocking my exposure to the Northwest. As soon as I passed onto this side of the rock wall, the entire universe shifted. The howling wind was abruptly cut off by the wall and replaced with a calm stillness, punctuated only by the heartening chirp of birdsong. The sun shone warmly on this side. There was no snow or ice and the valley running down this side of the ridge towards the gentle foothills was green and sparkled majestically in the morning sunlight. I loosened my clothing and felt my mood shift just as abruptly as the wind had ceased. Here, I felt confident that I was on the right path and I basked in the gentle warmth of the morning sun and birdsong playing on my senses. Then, the rock wall would end again and the next section would take me back to the opposite side with its wind, cold and fear. My memory of walking this particular ridge exemplifies the experience of bandha. When we are moving from the perspective and vantage point of bandha, we can taste the essence of both extremes which lie on either side of the middle line, and we can effortlessly move back and forth between them. It is this vantage point and perspective which we should strive to cultivate in our Ashtanga practice, always keeping one foot on the ridge of bandha, while we move between the opposing valleys of prana and apana.

As we progress through the sections and series of the Ashtanga system, the macro level transitions between pranic and apanic tendencies becomes more intense and more challenging to navigate. The more deeply we venture into either extreme of prana or apana, the more difficult it becomes to move back into the opposite pattern. Using the example of the mountain ridge, we can say that the further we descend into one valley, the more difficult it becomes to climb back up to the ridge and then down into the other valley. One of the first places we may encounter this challenge in the Ashtanga system is after Supta Kurmasana in Primary Series. Supta Kurmasana is one of the deepest expressions of apanic energy in Primary Series. Many people will find that after exiting from Supta Kurmasana, the subsequent upward facing dog (a pranic position) will feel a little bit stiffer than usual.

The next place we may encounter this challenge is in practicing the backbending sequence (Urdhva Danurasana and dropping back and standing up) at the end of Primary Series. After spending the entirety of the Primary Series cultivating an apanic pattern in the body and nerves, it can feel difficult to suddenly attempt to move deeply into the opposing pranic pattern with Urdhva Danurasana. Dropping back and standing up – and perhaps even catching the legs with the hands – brings us even deeper into pranic expression. Some newcomers to the system complain about the abruptness of this transition and about the requisite of cultivating the ability to drop back and stand up from Urdhva Danurasana before starting Intermediate Series. It’s common for people to suggest that practicing the milder backbends at the beginning of Intermediate Series is a more appropriate way to ease the transition into the deeper backbending of Urdhva Danurasana and dropping back and standing up. I address this issue by pointing out that Ashtanga system is designed to aid us in cultivating the skill to move between the extremes of prana and apana with ease and fluidity. As we cultivate the elemental skills of the practice, we should require fewer transitional steps to move between extremes. The transitions between deeply apanic and deeply pranic sections of postures increase in intensity as we move into Intermediate and Advanced Series, so it is essential that we cultivate some skill in transitioning between extremes while we are still in Primary Series.

After completing backbending, we flip back into apanic energy with Paschimottanasana. Just as upward facing dog can feel a bit stiff after Supta Kurmasana, most practitioners have probably had the experience of needing a few breaths to get fully into Paschimottanasana after drop backs or catching the legs in backbending. The ease and fluidity with which we can move between these extremes is indicative of our state of internal balance and bandha. If we can easily move into a full Paschimottanasana without resistance after deep backbending, this indicates that our body and nervous system are relatively stable energetically balanced. If, however, we feel stiff and it requires a few breaths to fully move into Paschimottanasana after backbending – and especially if this phenomena happens for several days in a row – this indicates that our body and nerves are not in an ideal state of balance. This could be due to some deeper structural shifting that is taking place. In this case, it is appropriate to exercise increased caution and awareness in our practice until things feel more balanced and a sense of ease returns to our pranic – apanic transitions.

In Intermediate series, we encounter the macro level transition from the peak pranic posture Kapotasana to the peak apanic postures Eka and Dwi Pada Sirsasana. This can be a tricky section of the series to navigate and it is essential that the learning and integration process not be rushed. Students should cultivate ease and full integration of each posture before learning the next one in the series. An experienced teacher will usually keep a student on Kapotasana for some time, even after the student has cultivated the ability to catch the heels with the hands. Keeping a student on Kapotasana for a few weeks (at least) after attaining the ability to complete the posture will ensure that the peak pranic experience is deeply imprinted in the body and nerves. This integration of the extreme pranic pattern will make the subsequent transition to peak apanic movements less destabilizing. If a student is moved past Kapotasana prematurely, the result is often that the ability to catch the heels in Kapotasana is lost when the apanic cultivation of putting the legs behind the head begins to be developed. If one is simultaneously struggling with both Kapotasana and Eka Pada Sirsasana, the potential for the body and nerves to become completely overwhelmed – and for a painful breakdown to occur – is much higher.

Cultivation of new structural and energetic patterns in the self-organizing network of the human organism is a process that cannot be rushed. The power and depth of the re-organizing process which is induced by the Ashtanga system must be respected. Rushing through the system prematurely and without proper integration of each step is a sign of immaturity and lack of respect (often on the part of a teacher who encourages their students to move through a series too quickly), and inevitably leads to negative results such as excessive pain and emotional and energetic imbalance. The vast majority of injuries and negative experiences in the Ashtanga system are caused by moving through the series too quickly and without respect for the depth of the process. I believe this is the main reason Sharathji chose to slow down the pace at which students are taught new postures over the years after he took over from his grandfather.

In the third section of Third Series, the buildup to the peak of pranic backbending in Gandha Berundasana occurs quickly, over four backbending postures. Gandha Berundasana was the most difficult asana in Third Series for me to learn, and is still the most psychologically intimidating part of the series for me. On the majority of my Third Series practice days, I catch myself thinking “I can’t do that today” at the beginning of my practice. Experience has taught me that this doubt is always unfounded. Rather than obsessing about sections of the practice which are yet to arrive, I let go of those thoughts as soon as they occur, and drop into embodied presence within each movement and each breath. I patiently complete each posture and vinyasa of the practice with this embodied awareness. Then, when I do arrive at Gandha Berundasana, I find there is no longer any doubt and I am always able move into it with minimal struggle. I wrote at length about my process of learning this posture, and my experience of practicing it with Sharath Jois in the main shala on my last trip to Mysore.

A final reflection on the cultivation of the ability to transition between pranic and apanic states in our practice is to understand how this trains us to be able to shift energetic states in our daily lives off of the mat. We all have physiological biases in our bodies towards pranic or apanic patterning. Similarly, we all have habitual states of our nervous system which we default to in our interactions with the world. All states of the nervous system have advantages and disadvantages. Some states are appropriate in certain situations and inappropriate in others. If we remain limited to a small repertoire of states in our nervous system, and we always default to these select few states, we limit our ability to engage with life in the fullest and most effective way possible. If we cultivate the ability to move between all of the different possible states of our nervous system with ease and fluidity, then are able to engage with life more effectively. Cultivating the ability to transition easily between pranic and apanic postures and movements in the Ashtanga practice – and to feel equally comfortable in all off the different varieties of postures – will aid us directly in cultivating more resilience and fluidity in the way our nervous system responds to different situations in life. We use our practice to reconfigure our nervous system to function more effectively and efficiently.

Part 5: Advanced A – Standing Balances & Final Backbending (Digasana – Eka Pada Rajakapotasana)

00:00 – Digasana

01:14 – Trivikramasana

02:08 – Natarajasana

03:29 – Rajakapotasana

04:05 – Eka Pada Rajakapotasana

The final section of Third Series consists of five postures, all of which are pranic in nature, and three of which are deep backbends. This section begins with a return to Samasthiti, followed by three postures which involve balancing on one leg. After the deep backbending (Gandha Berundasana, etc.) of the previous section, the standing balances function to restore some stability and grounding to the body and nerves. Although the three standing balances are pranic in nature, they also require deep focus on the standing leg and the connection of the foot to the ground. These features aid in cultivating the apanic qualities of strength and stability, which are essential to counterbalance the strong pranic stimulation of the second half of Third Series.

After completing the standing balances, we return to the ground for the final two postures, Rajakapotasana and Eka Pada Rajakapotasana, both of which are deep and stimulating backbends.

Although none of the five postures in this section could reasonably be classified as “easy”, they are less difficult than the peak backbending of Viparita Salabhasana and Gandha Berundasana in the previous section. The aforementioned postures are the peak “hump” in Third Series, and after completing them there is a tangible feeling of winding down as one approaches the end of the series. Although the five final postures of Third Series do require meticulous presence and depth, once one has attained the ability to complete Gandha Berundasana, there are no major challenges remaining.

All of the series in the Ashtanga system share the feature of having the most challenging postures in the middle section of the series. The final section of each series is a winding down of sorts, with relatively easier and somewhat restorative or grounding postures.

In Primary Series the peak challenges of the series occur in the section from Marichasana D to Garbha Pindasana. Once Garbha Pindasana has been completed, the final section of postures are much easier, and several of them are performed in the Supta (reclined) position, lying on the back. These Supta Variations are restorative in nature and function to replenish one’s energy reserves after the peak effort required in the middle of the series.

In Intermediate Series, there are three postures which comprise the peak challenges, all of which occur in the middle part of the series. Those postures are Kapotasana, Dwi Pada Sirsasana and Karandavasana. Once Karandavasana has been completed, the final section of Intermediate Series won’t pose any significant challenges. The final few postures involve twisting and lateral movements, which are restorative and help to release any tensions in the back which may have arisen from the deeper peak postures. The seven Sirsasana variations which close the series are restorative in nature.

The phenomena of winding down with easier postures towards the end of a series helps to stabilize the internal energetic dynamics, so that one can approach the final backbending and finishing postures in a state of relative calm and repose.

There are a total of seven deep backbending postures in Third Series, all of which occur in the second half of the series. In my discussions of Third Series thus far, I have focused extensively on the dynamic balance between the opposing patterns of prana and apana, and how the two patterns collaborate to create bandha via their antagonistic energetic movements. I’d like to conclude my discussion of Third Series by acknowledging that there are also antagonistic patterns within both pranic and apanic categories of postures.

It is natural to assume that if a person is competent at performing certain backbending postures, this competency will extend to all backbends. This is untrue, and it was the seven backbending postures in Third Series which gave me an experiential understanding of this fact. Although all seven of the Third Series backbends are pranic in nature, and all seven postures involve deep extension of the spine, there are also antagonistic movement patterns within this subset of postures. For example, when I first began to practice Third Series, well over a decade ago, I noticed that on days where Viparita Salabhasana felt quite deep, Rajakapotasana would feel more difficult than usual, and vice versa. This is extremely counterintuitive. If we examine the two aforementioned postures, we can see that the shape of the body itself is nearly identical in both postures, with the only major difference being the orientation of the body with respect to the ground.  My experience of the antagonism between these two postures makes little sense, if one approaches the analysis from a reductive, mechanical perspective.

I no longer experience the antagonistic dynamic between the aforementioned two postures, however I do experience antagonism within the seven backbends in Third Series in other ways. When I filmed the practice that I have presented in the videos here – in September 2020 – I was able to press my heels onto the ground in Gandha Berundasana. This had been the case for several months prior to the filming of the video. However, at this time I had difficulty in keeping my heels together and touching the entire foot on my head in Viparita Salabhasana, as well as in Vrichikasana (both the variation in the final backbending sequence and the variation in Fourth Series). I could touch my toes on my head, but I struggled to keep my heels together, and could not fully press my heels to my head. Gandha Berundasana is structurally very similar to Viparita Salabhasana / Vrichikasana, however I found the former to be easier than the later. Then, a short time after filming this video, the bias between this antagonistic set of postures switched. Over a period of several weeks, it felt like my ability to keep my heels together and press my feet more fully into my head was improving dramatically, but at the same time, my ability to press my heels on the ground in Gandha Berundasana became more difficult. By November, I found it very easy to keep my heels together and was able to fully press my heels on my head for a sustained period of time in both Viparita Salabhasana and the two Vrichikasana variations. This represented a depth of movement I had never previously experienced. At the same time, I completely lost the ability to touch the heels to the ground in Gandha Berundasana. I could still catch my feet with my hands, and I could press my toes on the ground, but I could no longer bring the heels all the way down. At the time of writing – in February 2021 (and still, at the time of posting this article on my website, in May 2022) – this antagonism and bias between these two very similar types of pranic posture remains in the state I have just described.

Maturity in the Ashtanga practice should lead one to the experiential understanding that antagonism and trade-offs between moving parts are a fundamental property of self-organized living systems. An even more important realization is the fact that we have very little control over how these trade-offs and antagonisms manifest themselves. I have observed that relatively few practitioners and teachers posses this important insight. More commonly, I see reductive biomechanics being erroneously applied to the Ashtanga practice, and to the human organism in general.

The pioneering systems biologists Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela beautifully described an important property of complex living systems with the following statement:

“You can never direct a living system. You can only disturb it.”

A complicated system, such as a machine, is fundamentally different from a complex system, such as a cell, a human being, or an ecosystem. All living systems are complex systems. They self-organize, behave non-linearly, and are fundamentally less predictable than complicated systems. We can direct the behaviour of a complicated machine such as an airplane or a factory. One who devotes the necessary time to study and fully understand the mechanics of how these complicated systems function is able to manipulate certain parts of the system, in order to attain a predictable and desired result. It is for this reason that airplanes generally succeed in transporting millions of people through the sky without disaster each day of the year. Complicated systems are predictable and they can be directed by one who has the skill and knowledge to do so.

The fundamental fallacy of modern biomechanics and medical science is the assumption that complex, living systems will also behave predictably if we attempt to direct them. In the postural yoga and Ashtanga world, we often see this philosophy applied. If one experiences tightness, or discomfort in the shoulders, for example, a teacher who applies biomechanics philosophy may recommend adding in some “shoulder openers” before key postures or outside of the usual practice routine. These well intentioned recommendations rarely give the desired result, because they fail to take into account the non-linearity and lack of predictability inherent in complex living systems.

If one develops tightness or pain in the shoulders during the course of their Ashtanga process, this may very well be a natural result of the deep and complex structural reorganization involving the network of relationships between all of the parts and systems of the human organism. The shoulders may develop tightness or discomfort due to other parts of the body opening up or strengthening in order to accommodate particular postures or movement patterns which have been added or deepened in the practice. Adding in extra shoulder stretches may temporarily relieve pain or stiffness in the shoulders, but the deeper and unpredictable costs of doing this may be to completely sabotage the intelligence of the underlying structural reorganization which is under process. The result will be that the pain or stiffness in the shoulders will simply re-emerge in a different form elsewhere in the system a few days later. One may end up feeling a pain in the back, or the hips, or the knees, and other postures or movements will then suffer. The ignorant practitioner or teacher will again apply symptomatic linear treatments to the afflicted part, in a never ending cycle of futile attempts to exert control over the direction of the evolution of a complex living system. I consider this an immature and erroneous way to approach the Ashtanga system and it’s influence on the human organism.

An approach that represents matured wisdom and understanding of the dynamics of the evolution of complex systems, is to recognize that our practice – and especially adding new postures / elements to our practice – is simply a method of “disturbing” the complex balance of our internal structural dynamics. After consciously choosing to disturb our own internal balance through our practice, it is appropriate to step back, release our desire to control and direct, and allow the results to unfold as they will. The evolution of our bodies and nerves may not proceed in the way that we expect or desire them to, but if we respect the innate intelligence of our body to integrate the “disturbance” that we give it via the sequence of asanas, and we allow our bodily intelligence to integrate that disturbance into a new structural framework at its own pace, we will eventually emerge on the other side of the transformative process in a state that is stable and balanced.

The tendency to always move towards balance, stability, or homeostasis is another important feature of complex living systems. When the system is disturbed – i.e. new information, elements or features are added to it – the system will temporarily be pushed out of balance as it attempts to integrate the new input into its organization framework. The phenomena of being temporarily pushed out of balance accounts for the various stiffnesses, aches and pains, etc. that we experience when we add new asanas, or move deeper into existing asanas in our practice. The new asanas, or the experience of attaining new depth in an asana, “disturbs” our internal state of balance. The important thing to understand is that the choice of adding new features to our practice is where our ability to consciously influence the result ends. We are in control of whether we add new asanas or not, or whether we push ourselves to attain new depths in an asana. Beyond that initial choice, we have no control or ability to direct how this disturbance will influence or change our internal organizational patterns. The mature and wise practitioner will step back and simply allow the results to play out within themselves. It may takes days, weeks, or months for a new state of balance or internal homeostasis to manifest. Once this new balance or homeostasis is attained, it then becomes time to disturb the system again by adding more new postures, and then to again step back and allow the innate intelligence within us to sort things out. This is the cyclical process of self-evolution via the Ashtanga practice in a nutshell.

A mature teacher understands this process and watches for the stages of integration and rebalancing in his students. When we add new asanas to a student’s practice, or we take a student deeper into asanas, it is normal to witness a period of destabilization in the student’s body and practice. A patient teacher understands that this destabilization must be given time and space to play out, and that it is not necessarily appropriate to attempt to “fix” any discomfort that the student may experience during this process. When a student reports discomfort or stiffness, my response is nearly always to acknowledge that this phenomena is “okay” to experience and to encourage the student to respect the process of integration that he is going through, rather than reactively attempting to apply quick fixes to make the discomfort or stiffness go away. There certainly are cases where we do need to make mechanical changes to the structure or form of the student’s practice, but usually this simply involves a scaling back of intensity in order to create space for the body to incorporate and accommodate the process of structural evolution.

For one who has undertaken the commitment to a long term, daily Ashtanga practice, I feel that an understanding of the nature of complex systems is essential.

When one experientially understands the process of disturbance – discomfort – rebalancing within oneself, a deep respect for the intelligence inherent in nature should develop. The innate self-organizing intelligence of the human organism is a manifestation of the intelligence of nature. Self-healing (rebalancing) is an inherent feature of natural intelligence, and once we experience this phenomena inside ourselves, we can more readily see it happening everywhere in nature. Have you ever watched how quickly a dog with an injured leg adapts to it’s condition? Or how a deeply disturbed ecosystem eventually finds a new balance, within which it can support life and flourish? Nearly every human attempt to engineer an ecosystem produces unintended and often negative consequences. Yet, if left alone, an ecosystem will always move towards health and homeostasis. The self-organizing intelligence inherent in nature is vastly superior to the rational, analytic intelligence of human beings. Undoubtedly, the rational human mind has invented and discovered wonderful things over our species evolutionary history. But none of these human inventions come close to the complexity and functionality of what nature itself has designed. Our experiments in tinkering with nature over the past few centuries have elucidated this inferiority. Unfortunately, our modern techo-industrial culture has not understood this important aspect of reality, and we continue to make devastating mistakes in our attempts to direct and control natural complex systems. Imagining that we can control the population growth cycle of a seasonal respiratory virus through totalitarianism is a recent example of this sort of mistake. This mistake is born from the same philosophical position that imagines it can hack the internal rebalancing process which arises through the Ashtanga practice.

My approach, which I believe is in resonance with the laws and properties inherent in nature and natural intelligence, is one of surrender. I actively and consciously choose how and when to disturb things and then I surrender to allow the effects of that disturbance to play out. The wisdom lies in knowing when to step forward and exert our will to disturb something, and when to step back and surrender to allow nature to take its own course. This is the ultimate balance I strive for in my practice and in my life. The Ashtanga practice is a wonderful teacher which guides my experiential understanding of the laws of nature.

Part 6: Final Backbending Sequence

00:00 – Urdhva Danurasana x 3

01:21 – Drop back and stand up x 3

02:20 – Tick Tocks x 3

03:00 – Vrichikasana

03:50 – Catching

04:55 – Paschimottanasana

In the Ashtanga system of asana, we practice the backbending sequence following the completion of whichever core series (Primary, Intermediate or Advanced) we have practiced on that day. Just as Surya Namaskar A & B and the Standing Sequence are always practiced before the core series, the backbending sequence is always practiced afterwards. Backbending serves as an intense and somewhat dramatic conclusion to the deep work of the core series, before we move into the final finishing postures.

The structure of the backbending sequence remains the same, regardless of whether one is practicing Primary, Intermediate, or Advanced Series. The backbending sequence is gradually built up, and elements are added to it after certain milestones are reached in our progression through the various core series.

Urdhva Danurasana is usually added to the end of one’s core series practice at some point during the first half of Primary Series. Exactly which point in Primary Series the backbending is brought in at will vary depending on the unique strengths and weaknesses of each practitioner. By the time one has reached the Marichyasana sequence, it is usually appropriate to also be practicing Urdhva Danurasana. 

The next element to be added to the backbending sequence is dropping back into and standing up from Urdhva Danurasana. This is usually initiated when a student is at or near the end of Primary Series, though it can be added earlier for students who are naturally proficient in backbending. It is important NOT to begin forcing drop backs with a student who is not ready to do so. There is significant risk and effort involved in working on dropping back and standing up prematurely – for both the student and teacher – with little benefit to be gained. Attempting to drop back and stand up before the necessary prerequisites are developed will often lead to excessive pain and inflammation, and potentially more serious injury for the practitioner. It is also very taxing for the teacher, who would have to bear the entire weight of the student, if the student is not able to at least partially support himself during the movement up and down.

It is more appropriate and productive to begin cultivating the necessary skills to support dropping back and standing up while practicing Urdhva Danurasana on the ground. One should easily be able to straighten the arms in Urdhva Danurasana, and also to comfortably walk the hands in towards the feet. If one can straighten the arms and then walk the hands in at least half of the initial distance between the hands and the feet, then one likely has the requisite level of flexibility to attempt dropping back and standing up.

Strength and stability are also important factors to cultivate. Some practitioners are flexible, and can easily walk the hands in towards the feet, but are wobbly and cannot sustain a backbend without squirming around or coming down prematurely. I like to test a student’s stability in Urdhva Danurasana by placing my hands on the two iliac crests of the pelvis, and pressing down on them while asking the student to push up against my hands. If a student can easily meet my pressing downwards with an equal amount of counter pressure upwards, and can sustain this resistance for a significant length of time, then I usually become confident that the student has sufficient strength in both the arms and the legs to support the dropping back and standing up movement. Another good test of a student’s stability is whether he can follow a leisurely paced vinyasa count in the three backbends at the end of a led Primary Series class. If a student cannot hold Urdhva Danurasana for a somewhat slow count to five, three times in a row (without lowering to the ground) at the end of led Primary Series class, then that student is not ready to benefit from dropping back and standing up. I’ve witnessed students who are working on Intermediate Series, and yet cannot sustain the vinyasas count for Urdhva Danurasana at the end of a led Primary Series class. This is a recipe for disaster.

Standing up from and dropping back into Urdhva Danurasana without assistance is considered to be a prerequisite for beginning to learn Intermediate Series. Learning to drop back and stand up at the end of Primary Series ensures that a certain degree of flexibility, strength and control are developed for the backbending movement, and that the nerves become habituated to the pranic stimulation of the nervous system during the backbending sequence. If this prerequisite is firmly established while a student is still practicing Primary Series, the subsequent process of learning Intermediate Series will be smoother and less shocking to the body and nervous system.

Catching the legs with the hands can be added at any point in Primary or Intermediate Series as the final element of the backbending sequence. Needless to say, one must be able to drop back and stand up with ease, in order to begin catching. One should also be able to easily walk the hands all the way to the heels while in Urdhva Danurasana on the ground. The legs must be strong, stable and grounded in order to support the catching position safely. To test this, I first ask a student to walk his hands all the way to his heels while in Urdhva Danurasana on the ground, and then to keep the hands and feet firmly engaged with the ground while I push down on their iliac bones with my hands. If I can feel the student’s legs confidently engage to push back against my hands in this position, then I will usually feel comfortable to start working on catching with this student.

It should be emphasized that adding catching as the final element should not be rushed, and some students may never be ready to do so. Catching is an extreme posture and should only be attempted by those who have put in the necessary effort and dedication in practice over a period of months or years to cultivate the necessary skills to attempt it safely. Usually, by the time one has fully integrated Kapotasana in Intermediate Series, it will be possible to begin working on catching.

Within the catching posture itself, there are also varying degrees of depth one can work at, and it is customary to gradually work a student’s hands higher up on the legs as their proficiency in the posture develops. One can hold the legs anywhere from the lower ankles to the lower thighs. In my last trip to Mysore, I experienced Sharathji putting my hands on my lower thighs, completely above my knee caps, for the first time. I discussed this experience in my article about my last trip in Mysore. In this video of my home practice, my hands are on my upper calves, just below the knee caps.

The final two elements of the backbending sequence – tick tocks and Vrischkasana, are not added until one has completed Intermediate Series, and sometimes not until one has practiced at least a few postures into Advanced A Series. These movements are practiced after dropping back and standing up, and before catching. They both add deeper elements of strength, co-ordination and flexibility. Vrischkasana was the most difficult element of the backbending sequence for me to develop, and it was only in January 2021 that I was able to fully place the entirety of my feet on my head, with my heels pressed together. When this video was filmed – in September 2020 – I could touch my head with my toes, but not with the bottom part of my feet.

I practice the full backbending sequence as described above – and as shown in the video – on the three or four days (Mondays – Thursdays) that I practice Advanced Series. On Sundays, when I practice Intermediate Series, my backbending consists of Urdhva Danurasana, drop backs, and then low catching at the ankles (no tick tocks, Vrischkasana or higher catching). On Fridays, when I practice Primary Series, my backbending consists of three Urdhva Danurasana on the ground, followed by Chakrasana and Paschimottanasana, as in a traditional led Primary Series class. I don’t practice the other elements of backbending on Fridays. 

It is important for practitioners to understand that there is a vinyasa count for the entire backbending sequence. The sequence should be practiced fluidly and seamlessly, in co-ordination with the breath, according to the vinyasa count. It is natural to need a few extra breaths to prepare for Urdhva Danurasana, and perhaps in between each of the different elements of the backbending sequence. In the video, you can see that I do take some extra breaths in between each element of the sequence.

As a teacher, I often see students abandon the vinyasa method completely when they practice the backbending sequence. It is common to see students lying on their mat for long periods of time before, or in between repetitions of Urdhva Danurasana, or adding in extra stretches to help prepare, etc. I have seen students literally take 20 minutes to complete three Urdhva Danurasana on the ground, and just as long to complete three drop backs. The backbending sequence should be practiced with the same focused flow of body and breath as one practices the core series. It should take no longer than a few minutes to practice the full backbending sequence. In my video, it is done in six minutes from start to finish, including nearly 1/3 of that time spent in Paschimottanasana. 

A daily practice of the Ashtanga system of asana is difficult to maintain, especially when one does not have the support of a teacher and shala. Digging deeply into oneself and finding the willpower and motivation to persist in completing one’s practice to the best of one’s ability – each and every day – is the field where significant growth, evolution and progress arises from. It is only through cultivating the ability to maintain a strong and consistent personal practice in the face of adversity, that one can expect to realize one’s full potential. 

As a teacher based in Bali, I work predominantly with visiting students who practice with me for a temporary duration of time. There are a number of students who I see once or twice per year, for periods of time ranging from a few weeks to a few months. Of these returning students, there are three basic types. One type of student practices deeply, working at their edge consistently, year round, whether they are practicing in my shala, or whether they are elsewhere working on their own or with another teacher. When this type of student visits me, I can clearly see the progress that has been made in their practice during the time period that they have been away from Bali. A second type of student practices deeply when they are in my shala, but when they are elsewhere, they maintain only a basic or rudimentary level of practice. When this type of student visits me, it is usually as if they are picking up where they left of on their previous visit with me. There has not been any progress during the time they were elsewhere, but there has also not been regress. The third type of student practices deeply when they are in my shala, but when they are elsewhere, they stop practicing altogether, or they practice only sporadically. This type of student usually regresses between trips to practice with me, and when they return it takes a few weeks or a few months of practice, just to attain to the same level they were at when they left at the end of their previous trip.

All students are welcome at my shala, whether they are consistent practitioners or not. I make the above distinctions to outline the fact that continuous application of effort to encounter one’s edge is necessary to make deep and long lasting progress in the Ashtanga system. Furthermore, cultivating the ability to find one’s edge when one is alone, with fewer external motivating factors then one would have in a shala, brings a certain level of depth and self-understanding that cannot be found when practicing in a shala with a teacher.  This is not easy to do, and the reality is that many Ashtanga teachers do not practice deeply themselves. We all experience situations where, for one reason or another, it becomes necessary to back off from the intensity of our practice for a period of time. There is however, a big difference between taking a temporary respite from stronger practice, and simply lacking the motivation or willpower to engage in deep practice at all. 

My practice is not effortless, and I struggle nearly every day. Awakening for practice at a time of the night when some people are just going to bed is difficult. Stepping onto my mat in those dark hours of the morning, regardless of how I feel, requires strength of will. More often than not, I begin my practice while being assailed by thoughts such as “there is no way I can do this today.” I always give myself an out, by telling myself that if things end up going very badly in my practice, I will revert to “only Primary” or cut my practice short regardless of which series I am practicing on that day. More than 99 percent of the time, I do end up completing my intended practice for that day, and I almost always feel great at the end of my practice. The consistency of this outcome helps to generate the motivation to begin practice each morning. The process of dropping into my embodied experience in each moment, each vinyasa and each breath – and attempting to confine my awareness to each of these moments – is key. When one learns how to be fully present and absorbed within each posture and within each breath, it becomes natural to work deeply at one’s edge in each vinyasa and in each posture, for the duration of one’s entire practice, on each and every morning. This is an exercise in sustained embodied focus and concentration.

Success in the endeavor of maintaining a strong daily practice over a long period of time is empowering. One gains familiarity with the process of overcoming the unique and idiosyncratic obstacles that one encounters within oneself. Self empowerment is one of the main benefits of long term practice of the Ashtanga system. A system which necessitates reliance on external forces or authorities to derive benefit leads to disempowerment and enslavement. A system which necessitates the cultivation of self-motivation and self-reliance leads to self empowerment and freedom. The main difference between a true teacher and a predatory leader is that the former attempts to transmit independence and self-reliance through their teachings, while the latter manipulates their students into co-dependence and enslavement. 

At present, in human societies all over the planet, there are significant forces at work which are acting to disempower people. There are large scale attempts to coerce people into surrendering their autonomy and freedom and to outsource the responsibility for their own health and well-being to external authorities. I’ll refrain from a digression into global politics, but I will conclude by emphatically stating that I find the self-empowering nature of my personal practice to be more important than ever under the present conditions which persist in human society.

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Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

Ashtanga Immersion courses with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/the-energetic-dynamics-of-ashtanga-advanced-a-iain-grysak/feed/ 0 The Role of Thinking in Ashtanga Yoga Practice – A Conversation between Andy Davis and Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/the-role-of-thinking-in-ashtanga-yoga-practice/ https://spaciousyoga.com/the-role-of-thinking-in-ashtanga-yoga-practice/#comments Fri, 24 Jan 2020 13:41:06 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=2068 A few months ago, I engaged in an email discussion with Andy Davis, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee and an Ashtanga practitioner. We explored the subject of thinking during asana practice. Many practitioners hold the erroneous assumption that the goal of yoga and meditation practice is to stop thinking. [...]

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A few months ago, I engaged in an email discussion with Andy Davis, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee and an Ashtanga practitioner. We explored the subject of thinking during asana practice. Many practitioners hold the erroneous assumption that the goal of yoga and meditation practice is to stop thinking. Andy and I discussed this assumption and some of my alternative viewpoints based on reactivity:

Andy: I’m wondering about the stray thoughts I have during practice. By ‘stray thoughts,’ I mean thoughts not directly related to the asana at hand. Yoga teachers often define or describe asana practice in relation to “citta vrtti nirodha” [cessation of the fluctuations of consciousness], which is the stated goal of Patanjali Yoga. On one understanding of citta vrtti nirodha, all my stray thoughts are signs of deficient absorption in what I am doing. But in my experience, sometimes stray thoughts seem to get in the way of practice and sometimes they don’t. I’d like to ask you some questions about this.

How would you describe the general relationship between thinking and asana practice? Is practice a form of thinking? Is it opposed to thinking?

Iain: I suppose the answer to this would depend on a precise definition of “thinking”. For example, can we consider actions and responses in movements of the physical body as a form of “thought”?

The abstract, disembodied process of mental conceptualizing, which we commonly refer to as “thought”, must have gradually developed over time in our homo sapiens ancestors and our other ancestral species. What were the experiential precursors to the abstracted and disembodied thought processes which characterize much of our lived experience today? Can we still feel these sorts of ancestral precursors to thought at an organic, embodied level, where the boundaries between physiology and psychology become blurred? Can we refer to these phenomena as “thinking”? Can we/should we think in this way during our asana practice?

If you prefer to stick to a definition of thinking as something that is inherently disembodied and abstracted from our phenomenal level of experience, then I suggest that asana practice is a method through which we use a formulaic set of conditions to objectively observe whatever habitual patterns (samskaras) tend to manifest within those conditions. If abstract thinking is one of those patterns which arises, then we accept and observe that. So, I wouldn’t say asana practice is biased either towards or against this form of thinking.

Andy: One type of abstract thought is what is sometimes called the ‘inner monologue’ or ego-based narration of past and future events. Will Johnson suggests that when we are fully present in our lived, ongoing sensations, the “inner monologue” shuts off completely (Aligned Relaxed Resilient pp. 19-20). Should we work to diminish this form of thinking?

Iain: In general, I would say that physical practices which promote embodied concentration within a limited field of awareness will – over a long period of continuous practice – tend to reduce the degree of unnecessary or superfluous thinking. Having the inner monologue “shut off completely” is a relatively rare phenomena, which represents a very deep form of concentration that leads into the first stages of samadhi. This is unlikely to be experienced by most practitioners – even those who have engaged deeply with their practice for many years. To suggest that this should be the case would be discouraging to the vast majority of people, who are likely experiencing the opposite of this form of “cessation”.

Superfluous or unnecessary thought tends to be based on reactivity. The phenomena of having certain thought loops and themes which we revisit again and again – and that we can’t let go of – tends to be caused by a deeper reactive pattern (samskara) which is playing out on the surface of our conscious awareness. A long term practitioner should train himself to concentrate on – and ideally become absorbed within – the experience of sensation and feeling in body and breath for the duration of his daily practice. If this absorption within embodied experience is coupled with the intention of objective (non-reactive) awareness, the reactive samskara patterns will become weaker, as will the persistence of superfluous or excessive thought.

Is the goal to eliminate thought completely? No. Thought is useful, and essential to function in the human world today. I feel that practice can help us to avoid falling into the trap of reacting to our thoughts, and building those reactions up into grooves and loops which we become trapped in. But I don’t feel that practice should be viewed as an attempt to eliminate thought.

Andy: I find your emphasis on reactivity helpful. Instead of performing a classification of thoughts, sorting them into categories of good and bad, helpful or harmful, we might attend to the manner in which we take up the thoughts. An otherwise ‘good’ thought can become obsessive. Even something that begins as embodied awareness can become a reactive loop. Sometimes the concern for alignment in a pose can become a loop that sucks attention away from the lived conditions of the body into an abstract, ideal body. I’ve certainly aggravated my body by pushing a pose to the place it was yesterday, rather than the place it wants to go to today, using an abstract marker like whether my chin touches here or there on my leg. By contrast, a thought about something very unyogic can arise and dissipate without any problematic reactivity. Does the awareness or observation of a reactive loop as such naturally diminish or dissolve it over time or have you found additional steps necessary?

Iain: The cultivation of equanimity is central to the teaching of the Buddha, and also plays a role in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. “Upekkha/Upeksha” is the term in Pali/Sanskrit which refers to this quality of non-reactiveness. It does requires some degree of effort and awareness to cultivate. In fact, cultivating increased sensitivity without a corresponding emphasis on cultivating equanimity can be detrimental, as reactiveness will naturally tend to increase with sensitivity. Some Ashtanga practitioners become highly sensitized as a result of their embodied concentration in the energetically stimulating practice. This sensitization can lead to emotional and energetic imbalance if they have not cultivated an ability to experience their increased sensitivity in a relatively non-reactive way.

Attempting to not to react to a thought is slippery. In the Vipassana meditation technique, it is understood that the locus of sensation/feeling on the body is where reaction actually takes place. We may feel like we are reacting to a thought, or an emotion, or an external object, but what we often fail to realize is that with every experience that we have, there is a corresponding sensation and feeling in the body. Samskara is formed through reaction to this sensation/feeling on the body. So, a central part of the Vipassana technique is the conscious attempt to decrease reactivity towards sensation on the body. I apply this technique to all of my practices, including asana and pranayama, and I feel it is extremely important to develop.

For powerful and deeply rooted samaskaras, it can take months or years of cultivating non-reactivity before we start to feel their power and influence over our lives begin to diminish. With long term and regular cultivation of increased embodied sensitivity and non-reactivity towards that sensitivity, we should experience that the influence of our samskaras gradually diminishes over time.

Andy: Are there kinds of thoughts (or ways of having them) that you have found to be beneficial to asana practice?

Iain: Any thought pattern which arises during asana practice creates the potential for a reactive tendency or samskara pattern to manifest. The point of asana practice is to encounter these reactive patterns and become more consciously aware of them, so that we can learn to work with them more effectively. One could argue that any thought pattern which arises is beneficial, because it gives us the opportunity to encounter and potentially transform a habit, which is certainly more beneficial than ignoring or repressing it.

The question becomes: What do we do once that thought pattern arises in our practice? Do we allow it to distract us from the experience of being absorbed in embodied sensation? Or, can we allow the thought to play itself out in the background with minimal disturbance to our process of embodied absorption in the process of asana? The second option is the field where authentic transformation can take place.

Andy: Are there thoughts (or ways of having them) that you have found to be obstacles to asana practice?

Iain: Being extensively trained in Buddhist practices, I see all practice as a method of observing “reality as it is”. Any thoughts which naturally arise during our practice are helpful, as they represent some tendency that we have. In other words, by observing those thoughts which naturally arise, we are observing a natural part of who and what we are – whether we like that part of who and what we are, or not.

What can be contradictory – and even dangerous – to mix with the above described process are thoughts which are intentionally conjured up, because we feel it may be good for us to try to think in a certain way. If we are “trying to think” certain things, or even “trying not to think at all”, then we are not observing ourselves naturally, and we often end up repressing or avoiding what is actually there. We hide the reality as it is with a “suggestion”. I consider this to be inauthentic practice. Unfortunately, this process is widely taught and promoted in the name of “spirituality”.

Andy: A thought which is natural to me might be forced for you and vice versa. This suggests that teaching yoga is very difficult because the likely result of a specific teaching is that the student will “try” to have a different practice than he naturally has, i.e. he will try to have a practice that looks like the teaching. The problem with ‘spirituality’ you identify also seems to be a problem with teaching more generally. By attending to the teacher’s insight rather than our own, we get to avoid ourselves and believe that we have found our true selves at the same time!

Iain: Absolutely. Accepting any form of dogma without having experienced the truth of it ourselves – at the embodied, sensation/feeling based level – is fallacious. I feel the main role of a teacher should be to train people how to experience and feel things for themselves.

Andy: Do you take specific precautions to reduce certain kinds of stimulus or certain kinds of thoughts during asana practice?

Iain: I think it is helpful to practice in a space that is as neutral as possible. A neutral environment will promote concentration and the lack of strong stimulus will promote natural arising of samskara patterns which are normally hidden in the deeper layers of our subconscious.

Andy: Can you say a bit more about what you mean by “neutral” here?

Iain: By neutral, I mean attempting to remove stimulus which promote reactivity. For most people, that would mean things such as one’s phone, or any external object which will tend to draw one’s attention away from being present with embodied breath and sensation. In places like Southeast Asia, it is common to find yoga shalas in stunning beachfront locations. I find this distracting. A shala should be simple, and mostly enclosed by walls. It should be a protective “container” which keeps one’s awareness and energy within the room, and ideally within one’s own body and breath. Even excessive instruction from or interaction with a teacher can take one’s attention away from being present with embodied sensation and breath. A good teacher should also strive to be “neutral” in their presence.

Andy: Have you found that there are separable ‘stages’ of awareness (e.g. like the 4 jnanas of Buddhism or Patanjali’s Dharana-Dhyana-Samadhi) that one climbs like a ladder as the asana practice deepens?

Iain: Not really. I don’t feel that there is a particular end goal to yoga practice and therefore, I don’t feel there is any form of linear path to reach a goal. All eight of Patanjali’s limbs can and should be experienced together. I don’t really consider them to be separate things. They all support and loop back into one another and should not be thought of as sequential or linear. The ability to observe oneself and one’s own samskara patterns with less reactivity will gradually develop over time, but this manifests within all forms of consciousness and awareness, from the mundane to the sublime.

Andy: Do you have advice for students who find themselves easily distracted by stray thoughts of such a powerful nature that they derail practice or cause them to lose their place in the rhythm of the practice?

Iain: This is the power and beauty of the vinyasa count. If we hold ourselves accountable to “staying with the count”, we will be much less likely to be pulled completely out of our embodied experience of practice by distracting thoughts. When one forces oneself to stay with the count, one must necessarily pay more attention to the breath. This will lead to a deeper phenomenal experience of the sound and sensation of breath and body. As a teacher, this is the main thing I look for when assessing the maturity of a practitioner. Is a student able to remain absorbed in the vinyasa count – and therefore absorbed within themselves for the duration of their practice? Or, are they constantly slipping out of that flow (flow of body and breath and flow of concentration) and losing their focus? I see beginners doing half primary or less who are very focused and absorbed in the vinyasa count and within themselves. I see long term practitioners doing intermediate or advanced series who seem to give no importance at all to the vinyasa count and are constantly distracting themselves with superfluous movements, props, and unnecessary fidgeting. They seem to be doing everything that they can to avoid their phenomenal experience of the practice. It is clear to me which practitioners are experiencing the deeper benefits of working with the unique tool of embodied absorption within the flow of the vinyasa count. This has little to do with which postures or series they are practicing.

A group Mysore class is usually conducive to this process. A good Mysore style teacher will promote an atmosphere which is conducive to concentration and accountability towards the vinyasas count. The main benefit of a once or twice a week led class is also to teach students how to be accountable to the vinyasa count.

If one is unable to practice in a Mysore class, then creating a neutral space at home – where external distractions which might tempt one to drift away from the essence of practice are kept out of sight and out of reach – is helpful.

Andy: This makes me wonder about led classes. They would certainly encourage accountability to the vinyasa count, but they can also pull the practitioner away from the timing of his or her own breath. I have experienced them as mixed blessings, helping me focus in some regards while disrupting my focus in others. What role do you think led classes play in the process of developing a non-reactive, embodied awareness?

Iain: Led classes can be tricky in the way you described. We are often forced to move in a way that is not in harmony with our natural rate of breathing or counting. But, this can also be a good thing. We can become attached to the habits we develop in Mysore style practice, and unwilling to move in a different way. The led class shakes up these attachments (reactions) by forcing us to let go of our own particular pace and habitual way of moving through the sequence. If we allow ourselves to be open to the insights that this brings, it can then have a profound effect on how we practice Mysore style. Practicing led primary series and led intermediate series with Sharath Jois profoundly influences the way that I move through the vinyasa count in my own independent practice. When I am practicing on my own, I don’t necessarily move at the same pace that Sharathji uses in the led classes, but I find that I do hold myself much more accountable to the integrity of the vinyasa count due to the influence of his led classes. As a teacher, I have observed that students who do not regularly experience led classes often have something missing from their practice, which is connected to the integrity of the vinyasa count.

Andy: For counterpoint: do you think some students are, in fact, not thinking enough during practice?

Iain: There are practitioners who are able to stay within the framework of the vinyasa count effectively, but who are not absorbed in concentration on their internal experience, because they are coasting on autopilot. A teacher can sense this when nothing about the student’s practice ever changes – even after a long period of time. There is no inquiry, no receptivity to information that is coming from the embodied experience of practice. Practice should promote evolution of the self, and this can only happen when we are paying attention to the information we receive in the form of embodied sensation. Subtle and gross changes within the structure of one’s practice should occur over time if one is paying attention to feedback and “thinking” about it. This form of thinking is similar to what I described in my answer your first question. It is as much a property of the responses of the body to its environment, as it is an abstract, disembodied process.

Andy: Do you think there is tension between embodiment and some forms of thinking or is all thinking part of the body and therefore part of being embodied?

Iain: Over tens of thousands of years, we have manufactured a human world of conceptual abstraction, which has nothing at all to do with the physical reality of rocks, wind, water, trees, animal bodies, etc. Most modern humans spend most of their hours of conscious awareness immersed within this abstract, conceptual human made world. We treat it as if it has an objective reality of its own, independent of humans. As human society becomes more complex, our absorption within the abstract, conceptual human world seems to increase, to the point where it feels more real than the physical world of rocks, trees, wind, water, and animal bodies. This is largely why our planet earth is in such a critically unhealthy condition today.

The interesting thing is that if all the humans died tomorrow, the abstract, conceptual human world would vanish along with us. It has no objective existence of its own, and it means nothing to the rocks, wind, trees, water, and animal bodies. The reality of the abstract, conceptual human world of thinking and thought is entirely dependent on the world of animal bodies. But, the reality of animal bodies, rocks, wind, water, etc, is not dependent at all on the abstract conceptual world of human thought. It is unfortunate that the legacy of Descartes’ fallacy of dualism is so strong and enduring. Mind and matter are inseparable and any distinction between them is illusory. I feel that the “union” of yoga is to remove the illusion of separation between body and mind. We can experience all thought in an embodied state, and we are much less likely to become lost or deluded by our thoughts when they are grounded in conscious, phenomenal, embodied experience. Paying more attention to the rocks, water, wind, trees and animal bodies can help with this.

Andy: If we reject dualism, what does it mean to say that a certain sort of thinking is ‘disembodied’ or ‘abstract’ activity? You seem to identify some human activities as natural and others as unnatural or as out of sync. Can you say more about this and how you aren’t suggesting some form of nature/culture dualism that follows from a body/mind dualism?

Iain: I don’t think nature and culture are separable, just as I don’t think body and mind are separable. Culture is an inherent part of human nature. We are social creatures and culture simply represents our way of social interaction, just as it does for other social animals such as primates, wolves, ants, etc. I think the “out of sync” problem refers to an overemphasis on social interaction within our own species, and specifically through our abstract ideas. We have narrowed the sphere of our social interactions to such an extent that we have almost completely fallen out of awareness of our relationship with all that is more-than-human. We forget that our environment has shaped who and what we are over millions of years of biological evolution. Our environment is part and parcel of being human (this is also why I think the idea of colonizing other planets is a form of madness). The agricultural, industrial and technological revolutions have progressively diminished our awareness of this fact, to the extent that we are now destroying our environment and our heritage. We are thus losing touch with and destroying an integral aspect of who and what we are as a species. A person who cuts off his own legs would be considered insane, yet this is essentially identical in nature to what we are doing by destroying all of the other species and aspects of the more-than-human world which we are structurally coupled to. This is the fundamental reason for the “void” and lack of meaning that pervades so much of modern human culture and society, and the necessity of inventing religion as a means to anesthetize the discomfort of that void. We have abandoned something that has accompanied us for millions of years. I don’t think it is a matter of nature/culture dualism, I think it is more of a lack of inclusiveness of the sphere of our ancestral social interactions with the more-than-human world within our “culture”.

Andy: Would you describe bandha as necessarily bringing with it a certain kind of focus, attention or equilibrium of thought or is it possible to have ‘aligned fluidity’ in the body without having it throughout the fields of attention and thought?

Iain: Embodiment and intuitive phenomenal awareness are necessary conditions for a true experience of bandha. It can be difficult to teach this concept to students who are fixated on intellectual, biomechanical analysis of what constitutes bandha. Bandha is a deeply felt continuity between self and environment, where the borders between where one ends and the other begins becomes blurred. This certainly requires a degree of concentration and focus. The illusion of discontinuity between body and mind must be yoked for the illusion of discontinuity between self and environment to be yoked. So, I would say that a true experience of bandha takes the union of body and mind one step further by creating a fluid union between body, mind, and environment (see my article “The Tree of Bandha” for an in depth discussion of this).

Andy: I’d like to thank you for taking the time to explore these questions. As I have continued my practice, I have found your responses helped guide me away from self-criticism that perpetuated reactive thought patterns. It has been a valuable discussion for me.

Iain: Thank you. Your questions are a valuable opportunity for me to examine and clarify my own beliefs and biases. I look forward to the next discussion.

— — —

Ashtanga Immersion courses with Iain in Ubud, Bali

Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

The post The Role of Thinking in Ashtanga Yoga Practice – A Conversation between Andy Davis and Iain Grysak appeared first on Spacious Yoga.

]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/the-role-of-thinking-in-ashtanga-yoga-practice/feed/ 1 Reflections on the new shala and my fifth trip of practice in Mysore with Sharath Jois – by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/reflections-on-my-fifth-trip-in-mysore/ https://spaciousyoga.com/reflections-on-my-fifth-trip-in-mysore/#comments Sat, 28 Dec 2019 07:24:26 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=2057 I recently completed my fifth trip of practice with Sharath Jois in Mysore, India. It’s been a few trips since I wrote an anecdotal account of my experiences in Mysore. After my preceding two trips, I didn’t have much that was new to say about Mysore or practice with Sharathji, but this trip felt different. [...]

The post Reflections on the new shala and my fifth trip of practice in Mysore with Sharath Jois – by Iain Grysak appeared first on Spacious Yoga.

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I recently completed my fifth trip of practice with Sharath Jois in Mysore, India. It’s been a few trips since I wrote an anecdotal account of my experiences in Mysore. After my preceding two trips, I didn’t have much that was new to say about Mysore or practice with Sharathji, but this trip felt different. I had the opportunity to be in the first batch of students who practiced the full schedule in the new shala that Sharathji has recently opened. Something about this trip felt special for me, not just in terms of being part of the inauguration of the new shala, but also in the context of personal development. It was my best trip so far and I feel it is appropriate to share some of that positivity, especially in light of all the negative sentiment that has been propagated by a disgruntled minority of the Ashtanga community on social media over the past year or two.

The new shala is located approximately 10 km outside of Gokulam. Sharathji began conducting led classes there in the previous practice session—which I did not attend—but this was the first session where the full schedule of classes was held at the new shala. When it was announced that all of the classes would be held there, I was not looking forward to the daily commute for practice. On previous trips, I enjoyed the fact that all of the facilities we need as students, including accommodation, decent restaurants and shops have all been developed in Gokulam. One could stay close to the shala in Gokulam, without the need to travel further than walking distance for most of one’s daily needs. It was always pleasant to stroll to the shala on foot in the early hours of the morning and I wasn’t very keen about a 10 km scooter drive for practice.

The drive took 10–15 minutes in the early morning hours, which are mostly traffic free. I drive faster than most people, as I am accustomed to a similar scooter commute from my home to the shala where I have taught in Ubud, Bali for the past five years. The roads on the main route from Gokulam to the new shala are all in decent condition and it only took a few days for me to get used to the drive. It wouldn’t be possible to have a shala of the size of the new one in the Gokulam area, and it quickly became apparent that the drive-in was an acceptable trade-off for the benefits we experienced at the new shala.

The most notable thing about the new shala is its size. It is very large and can easily accommodate all 300 students for a led class. It seems to have previously been some sort of warehouse. A nice floor has been installed, which is similar to the floor that was installed at the old shala in Gokulam a few years ago. The property surrounding the shala is also sizable and the folks from Depth N Green restaurant have set up a refreshment and snack stall in an adjacent side building. The coconut guy has also set up there during practice hours.

The interior of the shala is well organized. There is a central stage on the East side, where Sharathji sits, and there are 76 mats spaces, individually marked out by construction tape, in front of the stage. The mat spaces are of ample size and in total, the 76 mat spaces take up approximately one third of the total floor space of the shala. Tall students, like myself, are requested to practice in the back two rows. I ended up claiming the back right corner spot, which I enjoyed quite a bit. It gave me even more room with no one on my right side or behind me.

There is a large space between the main entrance on the North side and the marked mat spaces. On the South side of the mat spaces, there are a few removable dividers, which section off a good-sized space for finishing postures. The changing rooms lie on the Southern most end of the shala.

Everything was impressively organized, especially considering this was the first run of a very sizable move of everything into a new space. The system for Mysore classes ran smoothly. Each new shift would wait outside the main doors, and eventually be brought in all at once to sit in the back right corner, where they would wait to be called to the vacant spaces one by one, as each practicing student finished and moved to the finishing area. As usual, I was on the first shift, which officially began at 5:30 a.m. – one hour later than it did in the old shala. Arrival was very casual. The doors would open at 4:45 a.m. and I usually arrived on my bike right about that time. We would all walk in and set up without any rush or fuss and begin practicing. Sharathji would come out of his office at 5:30 for the opening mantra.

Led classes were also smooth and it was enjoyable to practice with everyone together. All 300 students easily fit in the shala space, without any feeling of being crowded. Hence, there were no long line-ups or jostling for spaces like there was in the old shala. Led primary series began at 6:30 a.m.. I don’t know what time the door was opened for led class, but I would usually arrive between 5:45 and 6 a.m., and about one third of the students would already be in the room and setting up. Conference would be held after led primary class, with a 30 minute break in between. On Mondays, led intermediate was at 8:15 a.m., after led primary series finished.

One of the main benefits that I enjoyed in the new shala was the feeling of more air and specifically more oxygen in the room. While I enjoyed the intimate intensity of the old shala, I always found the air to be depleted of oxygen, and I would tire easily at the end of my long practice. I always felt that the oxygen levels in the old shala were somewhat akin to practicing at 3000+ meters in elevation (which I have plenty of experience with), except one didn’t ever get a chance to acclimatize to the lower oxygen content because the rest of the day outside of the shala was spent at normal oxygen levels. At the new shala, this was not an issue at all. The space is so large and the ceilings so high, that even when all 300 students were practicing at once in the led classes, the space felt airy and the oxygen levels felt normal. I immediately noticed the difference in my stamina, and I did not experience oxygen-related fatigue, even though my practice grew to the longest and most intense level it has ever been in Mysore.

Finishing was also very relaxed. There was always space for everyone to finish, and no sense of having to rush through finishing postures to make way for the next batch of people that needed to finish. We were welcome to take a long relaxation at the end, which I am accustomed to doing.

During October and November, the temperature in the shala was near perfect on the first shift of Mysore-style classes and for led primary series class. Some people complained that it was too cold, and it certainly was colder than it was in the old shala in Gokulam. This wasn’t an issue for me, as I am used to practicing in the chilly early morning hours at home in Bali. I don’t rely on external heat to open my body up, and I usually feel better practicing in a slightly chilly environment than I do in excessive heat. Even in these slightly cooler conditions on the first shift, I was always sweating heavily by the end of my practice. I can imagine how it might get uncomfortably cold in the colder months of December and January, however. For led intermediate at 8:15 a.m. and also for a conference at approximately the same time on Saturdays, it felt uncomfortably hot in the warmer month of October. Once the morning sun hit the roof of the shala, things heated up very quickly. Apparently, a better ventilation system is one of the next projects to be implemented, so we should see this improve by next season. The climate in Mysore cools down in November, so the heat was never an issue towards the end of my trip, even during led intermediate and conference.

During the first week or two of practice, I felt there was an intimacy and certain energy that was missing in the new shala. The place felt too big and “cold” energetically, but this perception shifted by the time we had all been practicing together in the space for two weeks. It takes time for energy to accumulate in any new space, and this was no exception. By the second half of the first month, I felt perfectly at home and comfortable in the new shala, and this feeling was reflected in my practice experience. No doubt the energy will continue to build in the room as different batches of students develop their practices there.

Sharathji himself was very sharp and seemed to be in a positive and vibrant mood for the duration of the two months. In the old shala, I believe we had 50–60 students practicing at a time for Mysore classes, so the numbers were only slightly increased here at 76 students. In the old shala we had 2–3 assistants at any given time for Mysore classes, and here we had 5–6 assistants. There was never any waiting for postures like Supta Vajrasana or for catching, as someone was always close by and ready to help. Sharathji was attentive and the increase in student numbers did not seem to affect his ability to monitor everyone’s practice. I certainly received ample attention from him. Other students that I spoke to felt the same in this respect.

For Sharathji himself, I feel this move made the teaching process more sustainable. I always marveled at the amount of work he did at the old shala, teaching from 4 a.m. to 11 a.m. for Mysore practice and teaching three led classes in succession on the led class days. Though he did it extremely competently, and I cannot think of any other living human being who could have done so, it also seemed like it would not be sustainable for him in the long run. He still has to work extremely hard in the new shala, but his work hours are slightly reduced, with a later start time in the mornings, and only one led class on Saturdays and two on Mondays. I hope he feels like it is something that he can continue to do, so that we can continue to benefit from his teaching for years to come. He certainly seemed to feel good about the move, and we all benefited from that positivity.

Overall, the energy and mood in the shala were high. I am a hermit by nature, and don’t socialize very much in Mysore, so I can’t claim to have access to a very wide sampling of perspectives from other students, but all of the people that I did talk to shared similar opinions. We all enjoyed practice in the new shala and felt like we had an extremely positive experience there. The move seems to have been beneficial for both Sharathji and for the students.

The past one to two years have seen a certain amount of negativity directed towards Sharathji on social media. I have no interest in publicly commenting on the specific issues that have been brought up, except to say that I fully understand and support the changes that Sharathji has made. His actions all make complete sense to me. As a trained psychologist and Buddhist, I have found it extremely interesting to witness the vehement negativity in the accusations that some people have publicly leveled against Sharathji. A teacher of any authentic system of self-transformation has a difficult job, in that he becomes an easy object for the projection of the internal samskara (habitual patterns or grooves that we generate in the ways that we unconsciously react or respond to the world around us) patterns which naturally arise for the students in the practice.

Any authentic practice will bring our samskaras onto the surface of our conscious experience. When this occurs, a practitioner has three choices: 1) Run away from or avoid experiencing the samskara; 2) Add fuel to the fire of the samskara by reacting more strongly to it and increasing the depth of its groove in our subconscious patterning; 3) Attempt to consciously observe the manifestation of the samskara without reaction and with as much objectivity/equanimity as possible. 

Some members of our community have engaged in dramatic public displays of self-immolation, burning in the flames of their own unresolved samskaras for everyone to witness. Certain opportunists from outside the Ashtanga system have capitalized on this mess and encouraged the performers to deepen the drama of their performances.  I have felt both entertained and embarrassed for these social media circus acts over the last year or two. Other people have left the organization in quieter and more respectful ways. The most unpalatable aspect of the entire spectacle for me has been the number of people who’ve jumped onto the bandwagon of blatant social media virtue signalling, as a means to promote their own self-interest.

The positivity of our experience in the new shala with Sharathji over the past two months has solidified my perception that what has occurred has been a very healthy process of weeding out those who are no longer benefiting from, nor wish to continue to engage in the practice of Ashtanga Yoga in the way that Sharathji teaches it. I wish all of the people who have weeded themselves out the very best, and I hope that they can find a healthy and fruitful way to engage with themselves and with their lives which makes it irrelevant for them to criticize those of us who still very much enjoy and benefit from our practice and especially from our relationship with our teacher, Sharath Jois.

The above is all I wish to publicly say about recent controversies. I request those who hold a different opinion from my own to refrain from attempting to engage with me on this subject in the comments section. This is not because I wish to exist in an echo chamber. I am well aware of all of the issues and accusations, and my own opinions are well developed and considered in light of all of the information that has been shared. I am comfortable and happy in my own relationship with the Ashtanga practice, and my relationship with my teacher, Sharath Jois, and with my students. I simply don’t wish to devote any of my time and energy to debating with those who hold a different opinion from my own, and who are unable to move forward from the quagmire of their own samskaras. There are issues and problems facing the human race and the entirety of life on the planet earth which are of far greater magnitude and importance than the internal politics of the Ashtanga system of yoga practice.

To sum up this section of my reflections on the past two months: The evolution of practice with Sharath Jois in Mysore feels very positive to me, and seemingly to most of the students who were there in October and November. We all enjoyed and benefited from practice in the new shala very much and it was a privilege to practice with a group of 300 people who were all grateful for the opportunity to be present at the inauguration of the new shala and to benefit from Sharathji’s teaching.

Part of the positivity I experienced on this trip came from the development in my personal practice. I’ve written about some of the struggles that I experienced in my personal practice on my first two trips of practice with Sharathji, as well as the insights and benefits that I gleaned from working through those struggles. The subsequent three trips have been much smoother on a practice level, and the sense of ease in my asana practice at the shala culminated in this fifth trip. I feel that Sharathji and I have learned a lot about each other, in spite of the fact that we rarely exchange words, and we understand how to work with each other effectively and with mutual respect. The evolution of this relationship is a major factor in my increased sense of ease and progression in my asana practice under Sharathji’s guidance.

I began this trip on Koundinyasana, which is about halfway through the arm balance section of the third series. My only major stumbling point in my previous trip was Eka Pada Bakasana A, which is the most difficult arm balance and one of the weakest links in my third series practice. Sharathji demanded that I develop the ability to lift the foot of the bent leg up higher and that I straighten the arms in the posture. These expectations required me to study and rework the entire posture from the ground up, which I did in part by watching YouTube videos of the few advanced practitioners who are able to execute this posture adeptly (thanks to those who have shared their practice of this posture in this way). I was stuck on Eka Pada Bakasana A for a few weeks on the previous trip. Once I had worked out how to do the posture in line with Sharathji’s standards, he moved me forward with a few more postures at the end of the trip.

I continued to develop my Eka Pada Bakasana A in my home practice over the past year and was happy to experience continued progress in it. On the first day of third series practice on this most recent trip, I think I heard Sharathji make an approving comment from somewhere nearby while I was executing the posture.

A large part of my asana development with Sharathji over five trips can be summed up by the following general description: I consider the full manifestation of Difficult Asana X to be beyond my physical capabilities due to structural limitations in my body. When I reach Difficult Asana X in my practice with Sharathji, he points out that he wants me to be able to do it anyways. He then leaves me to work it out myself. I grumble and moan about it for a few days, and then put my head down and attempt to figure it out. With persistence and effort, I eventually manage to improve my ability to manifest the full version of the posture, and then feel happy about having attained something which I had previously considered impossible. Due to the conscious engaging with, and eventual transformation of, my most challenging structural limitations, the positive effects of having attained Difficult Posture X reverberate to deeper layers of my being for a significant period of time afterwards. My overall understanding of the dynamics of how the practice works on the human organism deepens as a result. There aren’t any other teachers out there who would force me to encounter these blind spots within myself through the necessity of encountering Difficult Posture X, and I wouldn’t have the willpower or motivation to do it on my own without it being made a requirement by a teacher. This is one of the main reasons that I return to practice with Sharathji each year.

My focus for this trip was the intimidating third series posture Gandha Berundasana. After returning home at the end of the previous trip, I realized that if Sharathji continued to give me new postures at the standard pace he has developed with me, I would probably reach Gandha Berundasana at the end of this trip. Gandha is a physically challenging posture, but it is the psychological intimidation which makes it the most difficult posture in the series for me.

I first learned Gandha Berundasana more than a decade ago with my former teacher, Rolf. At that time, I did not have the ability to attain the final stage of the posture on my own, so my teacher would put me into the posture every day, by holding my legs for me while I brought my arms around to catch them. I practiced Gandha Berundasana with Rolf in this way for several trips over a period of a few years, but I never cultivated the ability to practice it on my own, at home. Without assistance, I would find it too intimidating, and eventually left it out of my practice altogether. At the end of my previous trip with Sharathji, in August 2018, I hadn’t attempted to practice Gandha Berundasana since my last trip with Rolf, which was in 2013. I realized that I would have to reencounter the posture soon enough in my practice with Sharathji and I wondered what his expectations would be for it. Few people develop the ability to do the full version of it, and some do get moved past the posture without having attained the ability to catch the feet without assistance.

Sharathji has always set very high standards for me, and I realized that Gandha Berundasana would be no exception. Gandha Berundasana thus became my Difficult Posture X for 2018/2019. I began to work on it at home in earnest, not really expecting to attain the final version of the posture on my own, but hoping to at least gain some experiential familiarity with it before I had to attempt it in Mysore. I surprised myself by cultivating the ability to bring my left arm forward and to catch my left foot with my hand within a few weeks of commencing my daily attempts. Bringing the second arm forward was a completely different story. Once the second arm comes forward, the psychological vulnerability comes into play, as the entire body is then in an extremely compromised position, with all of the weight of the body being born on the upper chest and chin. If the posture is done incorrectly, the breath can be completely cut off and blacking out is a possibility. This happened to me once when I was practicing it with Rolf, and I have heard of other practitioners who had a similar experience. Not wanting to repeat this sort of experience added to the intimidation factor for me.

It took me at least another month to gain the courage and skill to bring the second arm forward. The breakthrough came when I watched a few YouTube videos of advanced practitioners who can do the posture well (thanks again to those who shared…) Sharathji’s own technique of bringing the second arm forward very quickly appealed to me the most when I watched his third series practice video, so I decided to apply this method in my practice the following morning. When the moment came to try, I whipped my second arm around, and was happy to find that it worked—for a moment. In the next moment, I lost my balance and fell sideways out of the posture, which is quite dangerous considering the compromised position and weight distribution of the body and neck. Fortunately, I didn’t injure my neck in the fall, but I did land heavily and uncontrolled on one foot and bruised a toe, which resulted in the necessity of modifying my practice for a few days afterwards.

Once a particular physical movement is completed for the first time, it sticks in the cellular memory of the body, and one is much more likely to be able to complete the movement again on subsequent attempts. From the next morning onward, I was able to bring the second arm forward every day, with greater control and no sense of risk of falling.

The final step, of catching the right foot with my right hand took the longest for me to attain. After bringing the right arm forward, the right foot still hovered what seemed like a vast distance from my hand. Due to the intensity of the stimulation of the nerves in the compromised position, I didn’t feel I could stay there very long and there wasn’t much progress in either lifting the hand up or bringing the foot down. I remained stuck at this stage for at least a month or two. Eventually, my comfort in that particular stage of the process increased and I made some progress by playing around with how I shifted my weight on my chest. I learned that I was allowing my weight to fall back too far. This helped with the sense of comfort and balance, but to bring my right foot down, I had to allow my weight to tilt more forward. I also learned that by pulling my left foot closer to the ground with my hand and then more forward and away from my head, the weight of my entire body could shift more forward, and subsequently, more arch would become possible in the right hip and leg. I also began to cultivate the ability to move my right arm and shoulder more freely by focusing on deepening the mobility of the shoulders in twists like Bharadvajasana, Supta Urdhva Pada Vajrasana and Viranchyasana B. Increasing the mobility of the shoulder and chest in these postures felt very similar to what was required to move the shoulder and arm more freely in Gandha Berundasana.

Finally, about 3 or 4 months after I began to work on Gandha Berundasana, my right hand caught the right foot, and I had completed the posture. For the next week, I was able to complete the posture each time I attempted it. I then had a scheduled trip to Canada, which is a long and exhausting journey from Bali, to visit my family for a month. I was surprised to find that my ability to complete the full posture hadn’t been lost in the 30 hours of air travel and arrival in sub-zero early spring weather. I retained the ability to complete the posture fully for the following three weeks in Canada, but then I suddenly lost the ability in my final week in my home country. The series of return flights to Bali was tougher physiologically than the flights to Canada were, and I arrived feeling stiff and exhausted. When my physical condition did not open back up very much after a few days of settling in, it became clear that I was entering into a “pull back and integration phase”, which often follows a period of deeper opening. After more than 15 years of daily Ashtanga practice, one becomes accustomed to the dynamics of the cycles of structural shifting and integration.

When one enters into a phase of tightening up, as the structural intelligence of the body integrates the deeper changes that have begun to manifest, it is good to respect the process by letting go of any attachment one may have felt to the achievements and feelings of the open state, and to work intelligently with the new reality of the body as it manifests each day. In this case, I continued to practice only intermediate series for much longer than I usually would after a period of travel. Intermediate felt like enough of a struggle and third series felt completely unpalatable. A few weeks later, I began to work back into what had been my regular practice of the preceding six months, which was all of intermediate and third series up to Gandha Berundasana. Once I started working on Gandha again, I was back to ground zero, and I had to repeat the entire process of learning the posture step by step as I had done six months earlier. It took another three months of patient daily application to arrive back at the stage where I was catching both of my feet and completing the posture. By this point, it was June or July, and I had two or three months of being able to execute the posture fully again before my trip to Mysore in October.

The three months of practice at home before my Mysore trip were quite strong. A deeper phase of structural change and integration was taking place and I had been maintaining a long daily practice of nearly two full series on three of my practice days per week for over one year. The opening and strengthening felt good, but there were also the inevitable transient aches that come with deeper integration, such pains in the ribs (especially on the right side) and shoulders. The right side of my body had changed significantly from the process of teaching myself how to catch the feet in Gandha. I was a little bit concerned that I might experience another “pull back” or burnout once I reached Mysore, but fortunately this did not happen at all. In fact, my practice in Mysore became much easier than it had been at home, and all the little aches disappeared completely within my first two weeks of practice in Mysore. Starting practice at 4:45 a.m. in Mysore means I get to sleep in a few hours longer than I do at home, and being able to go home after practice and relax, instead of going to teach for several hours probably contributed to the increased ease that I felt my practice in Mysore. I felt strong, open and vibrant right from day one in the new shala.

After the customary first few days of primary and then intermediate series practice, I started my full practice in the second week. Sharathji began giving me new postures right away, and also helped me with catching at the end of backbending a little more frequently than he had in previous trips. For most of the trip, he did catching with me at least 3  days per week, leaving the assistants to do it only occasionally. Deepening my catching became the focus of the trip and my interactions with him. The postures of third series that he added to my practice each week seemed to be superfluous, and he rarely even watched me perform them before giving me the next ones, but catching my legs seemed to be something he was adamant about deepening with me.

Catching has never been easy for me. My previous teacher did not do it very often with me because his wife was strongly opposed to the procedure altogether. So, when I began practice with Sharathji in 2014, I had only rudimentary experience with catching. Catching is a big focus in Mysore, as those who have practiced with Sharathji know. Over the five trips, I developed in catching significantly. I went from catching my ankles and lower calves on the first trip, to regularly being able to catch just below my knees, and being able to stand and straighten my legs on my own by the time I was at the end of my third trip. A few times on my third and fourth trip, Sharathji adjusted my fingers right up onto my kneecaps, which was terrifying. The first time I was successful in holding my kneecaps was towards the end of my third trip when we did catching at the end of led intermediate. Sharathji was accustomed to me bailing out of the posture pretty quickly when he moved my hands higher up, so this time when he put my hands on my kneecaps he loudly commanded, “Now STAY! Everyone is watching.” It worked, and I managed to balance holding my kneecaps for a good 5–10 breaths on that day. Each new stage of development in catching has always felt very healthy for me structurally, and no one is better at adjusting this posture than Sharathji.

Holding the kneecaps was a rarity in my third and fourth trips, and usually he left me at the standard holding place of just below the knees. This trip was different. By the middle of the second week, he was already bringing my hands onto my kneecaps. The first time he did it, I didn’t feel ready, and I bailed out. We smiled at each other when I came up and he asked, “Why? It came so nicely today.” As he pressed me in Paschimottanasa, he jovially inquired, “Why you fear so much?” The next day he tried again and this time I disregarded my habitual fear reaction and I managed to stay and hold my kneecaps. Sharathji is correct about the fear. Once I let go of the fear reaction and try my best to work with the adjustment, I experience the reality that there is nothing physiological which prevents me from being capable of it. It is the aversion to the intense feeling in the nervous system that drives me to avoid it. This is the wisdom of a teacher like Sharathji, who can see exactly what one is capable of, and expects one to encounter whatever samskaras are preventing one from achieving one’s full potential.

From the second week onward, catching the knees became the standard each time that Sharathji did it with me. As with each of the previous stages of catching, the more often I did it, the easier it was to become comfortable and to stay there. Sharathji is also adamant about squeezing my elbows inwards while holding my legs. It always feels great on my spine and shoulders and being adjusted skillfully into catching is truly the best way to end the practice. For most of this trip, I was finishing after a long sequence of apanic postures, and the deep catching was a wonderful counter posture to end with.

It soon became clear that the focus on catching was preparing me for the deep backbending in Viparita Salabhasana and Gandha Berundasana, which were soon to come. This is another aspect of Sharathji’s teaching that I admire. He isn’t interested in simply adjusting postures. He teaches according to a long-term plan that he makes for each student, given the amount of time the student is spending with him on any particular trip. He is also aware of whether he will see a student again on a subsequent trip or not. He knew that he was going to take me up to Gandha on this trip, and his focus for the weeks before that happened was not so much on the other third series postures that he was giving me, but on cultivating the necessary depth in my backbending for me to be able to perform Gandha well.

There were very few backbends in my practice for most of the trip. After the backbending sequence at the beginning of intermediate series, the subsequent two thirds of intermediate series, and then the first two thirds of third series are all apanic postures, featuring mainly leg behind the head variations and arm balances. In order to help myself in the process of going deeper into catching at the end of this long apanic sequence of postures, I focused strongly on pulling my sacrum and tailbone deep into my body with each and every upward facing dog posture that I did in my practice. It was a nice meditative thread to sustain, and the degree of mobility I could cultivate in the sacrum and tailbone would be a good yardstick to measure how I would feel in backbending at the end of my practice. As long as I could feel a natural ease in the mobility of my sacrum and tailbone in my upward facing dogs, I knew it would be no problem to straighten my legs and move deeper into catching at the end of the practice.

Sharathji added the two Viparita Dandasana variations, which are the first backbends of third series, near the beginning of my second month of practice. It was a relief to have this extra preparation for catching after stopping on the Viranchyasana postures for the preceding week or two. As soon as Viparita Dandasana was added to my practice, Sharathji upped the ante for catching. After bringing my hands to the customary position at the bottom of the knees, and then waiting for me to straighten my legs, instead of bringing my hands onto my kneecaps—as I had grown accustomed to in the preceding weeks—he brought my hands entirely above my knees, so that all of my fingers were on my thighs. After the first hand was moved into position, my mind reacted with a familiar “You’ve got to be kidding! No way!” sort of revolt, but having grown accustomed to pushing my limits over the preceding weeks of practice with Sharathji, I was able to remain fairly calm and was shocked to find that it was physically possible. After the second hand was brought into position, I was able to remain there for a few breaths, though my balance was shaky, and Sharathji had to keep his hands on my hips to steady me. When I came out of the posture, I had a unique and interesting experience. I felt like something “snapped” energetically somewhere deep inside me. There was no physical pain or discomfort, but my entire body felt like it was made of rubber. The structural tension that I was accustomed to feeling in my relationship with gravity had been completely shifted and I felt loose and untethered. Although it wasn’t a painful feeling, it was mildly disturbing to have the foundation and base of my relationship with gravity suddenly vanish, as if a rug had been pulled out from under my feet. I walked over to the finishing area with wobbly rubber limbs. By the time I was done with finishing postures I felt relatively normal, and the wobbly feeling was replaced with the familiar pleasant feeling of deeper structural opening.

I felt relatively “normal” in the next morning’s practice, but I was not surprised to find that I couldn’t lift out of Karandavasana. In my previous trip, I had also found that deepening my catching had inhibited my ability to lift out of Karandavasana. This is natural, because catching and Karandavasana are polar opposites in their physiological and energetic patterning. On this trip, it was only that particular morning where I could not do it. By the following morning, the changes had been sufficiently integrated and I could once again lift up out of Karandavasana. From then onward, catching with my hands completely above the kneecaps became the standard when Sharathji did catching with me. I no longer experienced the wobbly rubber man effect after the first time.

Interestingly, he kept me on Viparita Dandasana for two weeks, which was the longest stretch of this trip that I did not receive new postures. In the second last week of the trip, he added Viparita Salabhasana and Gandha Berundasana. On the day he gave me those postures, I had already finished Viparita Dandasana and all of the finishing backbending. I had done three backbends on the ground, three drop backs, three tic toks and I was in the middle of executing Vrischkasana, when I heard him say, “Tsk tsk….what did you do?” I knew he was talking to me, even though I couldn’t move my head to see him from the compromised position that I was in. I came down and looked at him and he asked me again what I did. “Viparita Dandasana”, I replied.

“Show me B”, he said. Having already done all of intermediate series, three quarters of third series, and the entire backbending sequence, I was shaky and exhausted. But, it was easy enough to pop back into Viparita Dandasana B. Afterwards, I looked up and Sharathji was nowhere to be seen. I knelt on my mat for a few seconds, unsure of what to do, and then I saw him walking back towards me. “Show me”, he repeated. So, I did Viparita Dandasana B for the third time of the morning. When I finished, he said “Viparita Salabhasana”.

Though my focus for the past year had been Gandha Berundasana, and I consider it much more psychologically intimidating than the posture that precedes it, Viparita Salabhasana is more difficult for me in terms of flexibility. Though I had managed to teach myself how to catch the legs in Gandha Berundasana, I hadn’t developed the mobility to touch my feet onto my head in Viparita Salabhasana. Viparita Salabhasana requires a different kind of movement than Gandha, and this movement has always been very difficult for me. The posture is less psychologically intimidating due to having the support of the arms behind the body, but I feel like it does require more flexibility in the spine and hips. Gandha is a more complex combination of flexibility, balance, coordination and courage.

All of the extra backbending that I had done that morning was exhausting, but it was a blessing because, along with the sustained preparation of all the deep catching over the preceding six weeks, it created the conditions where I couldn’t have possibly been more prepared to attempt one of my most difficult postures than I was in that moment. Whether Sharathji had made me do the extra repetitions of Viparita Dandasana and the whole backbending sequence first on purpose, or whether it was just a fluke is unknown, but he certainly did have a plan to prepare me for this by relentlessly pushing my limits in catching over the preceding six weeks.

Not surprisingly, it was the easiest and deepest Viparita Salabhasana that I have ever done. As I began to work my way into the posture for the first time in two months, I found entirely new qualities and degrees of movement. I was shocked to find my feet plant themselves on my head, with my toes in my eyes. Sharathji had been watching me intently, and demanded, “heels together!” I lifted my feet a bit, pressed my heels together and drew my knees in, and was then able to reposition my feet on my head again. After I jumped back to Chaturanga, I looked at him, and he silently made the motion of moving his arms around as a signal for me to attempt Gandha Berundasana. I made my way into the posture and caught the first foot fairly easily. “Catch the other foot quickly!” he demanded. I was accustomed to taking a few breaths while I gathered my courage before bringing the second arm around. He repeated his demand: “Catch it quickly!” I brought the second arm around and managed to grab my foot immediately. As soon as I had caught my second foot, I saw him turn around and silently walk away. I then did the closing backbending sequence for a second time, to complete what was probably the strongest morning of practice that I had ever had with Sharathji.

A key feature of Sharathji’s style of teaching the Ashtanga system, is to ensure that the foundations are properly and deeply developed, so that the subsequent postures are much more likely to be easily attained. When I had first learned Gandha with my former teacher, I did not have enough foundational development to be able to accomplish the posture, and even when he helped me do it, the intensity of the experience was overwhelming. This is why I had dropped it altogether in the interim years before practicing it with Sharathji. The depth of Sharathji’s understanding of how the system will work on each individual person, is that he is able to prepare you for what is to come, and he feels no hurry, allowing the preparations to take root over time. The five years that he focused intently on catching and backbending in general with me, the preceding one year that I had personally placed so much emphasis on cultivating Gandha in my own home practice, the six weeks of  this trip where he was having me catch my legs much deeper than I ever had before, and finally, all the extra backbending preparation (whether it was accidental or not) on the day I did it, led to the moments of finally practicing Viparita Salabhasana and Gandha Berundasana in the shala to be an almost effortless anticlimax. There were times where I had imagined what practicing these postures in the shala with Sharathji would be like, and I never anticipated it would be anything less than extremely intense. In the end, because of the cumulative prep work that had been done, there was no struggle or special emphasis, aside from the fact that Sharathji watched me do them intently that first time.

The only downside to my first day of practicing Viparita Salabhasana and Gandha Berundasana in the shala was that I injured my toe jumping back from Viparita Salabhasana. A confluence of factors contributed to the injury: The fact that I was fatigued from all the extra backbending on that day; the fact that I had not practiced the posture for two months; the fact that I was much deeper into the posture than I had ever been before and due to the unfamiliarity of the increased bend in my body, I had less of the strength and control I was accustomed to experiencing in the jumping back to Chaturanga. The transition from Viparita Salabhasana to Chaturanga Dandasana is always a bit tricky and usually involves a harder landing than in most transitions. On this occasion, I landed extra hard in Chaturanga. It didn’t seem like an injury at first, I simply had a feeling of: “Oh! That was a bit hard on my toes”, but no pain seemed to linger as I carried on with Gandha Berundasana, backbending and finishing. When I got up from relaxation, however, my toe had begun to swell and feel painful and I figured it would be sore for a day or two. Throughout the day the swelling increased dramatically, spread to half of the foot, and the toe itself cycled through most of the colours of the rainbow. I went to a homeopathic doctor around noon and got some arnica cream and pills, and figured I’d have to modify my practice for a few days, as I had when I had fallen out of Gandha and hurt my toe in my learning process at home. It turned out to be more serious than I anticipated, and for the remainder of that week, I was not able to place any weight on my left foot at all while jumping forward or back and had to modify the postures which required me to bear all of my weight on one foot. I still managed to maintain the intensity of my full practice jumping with one leg and it didn’t dampen my mood at all. I even managed to continue my daily 5 km walks around Kukkarahali Lake, albeit at a greatly reduced pace and with a pronounced limp for the subsequent week. After a few days, the swelling began to subside somewhat, the colour began to normalize and I began to be able to bear more weight on the foot and needed to modify less. It’s been slow healing, though. At the time of writing, it has been more than one month since the injury and the base of the toe is still quite swollen, though my movements are 95 percent back to normal. I still avoid landing on it in the most difficult transitions.

I didn’t expect to be moved past Gandha Berundasana on this trip. From what I understood, Sharathji usually likes to keep people on that posture, with a marathon practice of all of intermediate and three quarters of third series for at least one whole cycle between trips. I was surprised when he told me to half-split intermediate the following day. From then onward I would only do either the first or second half of intermediate, on alternating days, before doing all of third series. Even with the added strain of my toe injury, the shortened practice felt rejuvenating and invigorating. I was even more surprised the day after that when he told me to add Hanumanasana the following week, which was the final week of the two month trip. He added a couple more postures in that final week, and I ended the trip on Digasana, which is only four postures away from the end of third series.

The trip ended quite fittingly with the deepest and most stable catching I had done so far. As had become the standard in those final weeks, he placed my hands on my thighs, above my kneecaps, and I was able to stand quite steadily, draw my elbows inwards, and remain stable for a good 10 breaths. “Last Day”, he smiled, as I came up. “Thank you!” I replied.

The trip felt like a maturation of all of the work I have done with Sharathji over the preceding trips. It was my favorite trip, and the smoothest one I have had. One final reflection to share about this experience is that at age 44, I feel that I am still making deep progress in my practice on all levels, including strength, flexibility and stability. I hear a number of longer-term practitioners talk about how they are “feeling their age” and that something is lost when they reach their late thirties and forties. I have not experienced this at all. I also “feel my age”, but this is not a negative or detrimental feeling when it comes to my asana practice. I do feel that a certain… vigour… has declined over the past decade or so, but other important factors, like concentration, stability, and overall maturity have increased over the same time period, and the net effect of the increase in these positive qualities far outweighs the decline in vigour. Overall, my practice feels orders of magnitude stronger and more open than it ever has. Vigour carries immaturity and recklessness with it, and this leads to many pitfalls. I don’t miss that, most of the time. The “sthira bhaga” (steady strength) that has come with aging is something I value more than immature vigour, and this is why I continue to make deep progress in my asana practice.

I feel that lifestyle factors have a major influence on the sense of well-being or lack thereof in the fourth and fifth decades of life and beyond. I can understand how teachers in their forties and fifties who live a lifestyle of constant travel, consume a less than ideal diet and add excessive strain to their bodies through engaging in frequent asana displays (outside of their usual practice routine) for Instagram and YouTube would feel the negative effects of aging on their asana practice much more readily than I do. Anyone who leads a busy, high stress lifestyle is more susceptible to a sense of decline as age increases.

Stability in my life, which includes travelling as infrequently as possible, has become increasingly important for me over the past decade. The subtleties of structural transformation and integration require a stable background in order to manifest in a way that is healthy and assimilable. I love the feeling of landing back at home in Bali after travelling and realizing that I won’t have to move for the next six to nine months. This is when I feel like I can really settle into myself and sink deeply into the intricacies of my practice. It is one of the main reasons that I almost always decline invitations to teach workshops in other places. There are other reasons that I don’t enjoy short-term teaching gigs in new places, but the disruption to my own lifestyle and my own practice is first and foremost.

It boils down to a question of emphasis. I prioritize my personal practice and I still enjoy engaging in a longer and intensive daily practice. I work my teaching habits around that emphasis. I still practice one and a half to two full series on three or four of my six practice days per week. I completed fourth series with Rolf Naujokat in 2013, but since I started practicing with Sharathji in 2014, I’ve chosen to mainly focus on what I am practicing with him in my personal practice at home. Usually, in between trips to Mysore, I practice what I think Sharathji will give me in the shala on my subsequent trip. That means that over the past year, at home, I maintained a daily practice of all of intermediate, and third series up to Gandha Berundasana on at least 3 days of the week. For the other 3 practice days, I practiced one series—one day each for primary, intermediate and third. There is no possibility that I could have sustained this kind of practice if I was travelling around and teaching in different places, or if I was engaging in additional display sessions for Instagram and YouTube. Maintaining a high level of depth and intensity in personal practice before teaching for several hours each morning requires being grounded in one place, and cultivating a disciplined, regular lifestyle and diet. I enjoy this form of asceticism.

From where Sharathji left me at the end of this trip, I will probably start to work back into fourth series in my home practice over the next year. I look forward to this, it should be interesting to revisit fourth series, after all of the changes that have manifested from my practice with Sharathji in the years since I last practiced fourth regularly.

I feel that diet is also extremely important in maintaining a high physical and energetic level into my forties. Diet is a vast subject, which is far beyond the scope of this already lengthy article. I began writing an article about my dietary explorations some time ago, and hopefully I will return and finish that article in the future.

In brief, I eat a vegan diet, based on nutrient dense whole foods with approximately 50/50 ratio of raw and cooked food. I avoid all processed foods, most common allergens, most forms of sugar (including “natural” sugar) and most kinds of fermented food. I rarely consume heavy pulses or nuts. I consume moderate, but not excessive, amounts of starchy grains and vegetables. I consume a moderate, but not excessive, amount of fruits. The most important and prominent components of my diet are fresh fibrous vegetables, lighter legumes, “pseudograins” and seeds. My diet tends to be alkaline overall. Brendan Brazier’s “Thrive Diet” is the published dietary system which is closest to my own. Brendan has written several books about his Thrive Diet, and I feel it is conducive to deep yoga practice.

I feel that it is also important for Ashtanga practitioners, and especially teachers, to monitor the effects of the quantity of food that they eat. Most people are aware that overeating is detrimental to progress in the practice, but undereating, or following an overly restrictive diet, will also lead to weakness and inhibit muscle recovery. Undereating over a long period of time will certainly contribute to a sense of decline as one ages.

Appropriate quantity and timing of food are highly individual and dependent on one’s personal constitution. I have a very rapid metabolic rate and need to eat a high quantity of the right kinds of food in order to sustain my high level of physical and mental activity. I never skip dinner, and I would rather eat dinner too late, than not at all. My last meal of the day is typically around 6–6:30 p.m., and I begin my practice around 2 a.m. I finish my practice at 4 a.m., and take a long relaxation until 4:30 a.m. I then have two hours before I start teaching at 6:30 a.m. Those two hours are dedicated to preparing a calorie-dense and nourishing breakfast—typically buckwheat porridge (or raw dehydrated buckwheat granola when I can get it), with lots of nutrient dense toppings and a fruit and herb smoothie, followed by a nuclear-strength coffee. I then shower and drive to class.

Many Ashtanga teachers don’t leave any time gap between the end of their personal practice and the beginning of teaching. Their first meal of the day doesn’t occur until after teaching, when they have already engaged in 4 to 6 hours of heavy physical and mental work. I believe that this lifestyle will weaken and deplete a person if sustained over a long period of time. I have witnessed older Ashtanga teachers become weaker and unhealthy due to this lack of self-care. Many give up regular Mysore style teaching because of it. Paying more attention to diet—especially in the important junction between practice and teaching—is a way to prevent this.

I use a lot of herbal and whole food supplements, and this experimentation becomes increasingly important as my age increases. I focus on three categories of herbal supplements—anti-inflammatory, adaptogen and tonic strengtheners. My favorite anti-inflammatory foods include cissus triangularis, varieties of the ginger family and turmeric. In the adaptogen category, ginseng, maca and shilajit are my favorites. For tonic strengtheners, muira puama, thai black ginger (not easy to find—if you are heading my way from Thailand and want to bring me some, I would be grateful!) and tribulus terrestris are the most effective for me. When I am consuming any of these strengthening herbs on a regular basis, there is a tangible increase in strength and stamina that runs through my entire practice. Many powerful herbs and foods overlap between the three above-mentioned categories. I also include a high quality vegan protein powder on a daily basis, blended into a smoothie with homemade coconut cream, bananas, coconut water, and a few of the above-mentioned herbs. Vega Sport Performance Protein (formulated by Brendan Brazier) is the best one available on the market, and I am grateful to the many people who bring tubs of this to Bali for me. One needs to be careful with protein supplements, as many contain inferior sources of protein and contain filler ingredients which can upset the digestive system and increase inflammation in the body. Whey protein in particular should be completely avoided. On this most recent trip to Mysore I also began to experiment with adding pure L-glutamine powder in several doses throughout the day. This seemed to have a positive effect overall. I am currently experimenting with L-arginine, and 2:1:1 BCAA powders as well. These amino acids are also found in any good quality protein powder supplement, as well as in a healthy regular vegan diet. I have found that adding additional supplementation is quite useful for supporting a 2-to-3-hour advanced daily Ashtanga practice. There is much, much more I could say about diet and supplementation, but I will save all of that for its own dedicated discussion in another article.

It should also be noted that the aging process is undoubtedly different for men and for women. I think much of what I have written above applies generally to both sexes, but the intricacies of the different hormonal changes would certainly lead to different experiences and probably to different foods and herbs that would be most helpful. As always, one’s own phenomenal experience is the best teacher. 

A final factor that I attribute to helping maintain my strong asana practice is my daily pranayama practice. I’ve been practicing pranayama for nearly as long as I have been practicing asana. My current pranayama routine was taught to me over a 5 year period by Rolf Naujokat approximately 10 years ago, and according to him, it is the pranayama sequence that K. Pattabhi Jois taught to his advanced students in the 1990s. The entire sequence takes about 45 minutes to complete, and I usually do it in the late morning or early afternoon. It has a powerful rejuvenative influence and it brings immense depth and subtelty to the cultivation of breath and internal form in the asana practice itself. It is said that pranayama practice becomes stronger with age, and I can attest to that. For me, it works hand in hand with the asana practice, and the two are part and parcel of a single process of self-cultivation.

In summary, my fifth trip of practice with Sharath Jois was my best trip so far. I enjoyed practice in the new shala immensely, and my own asana practice has never felt better. I am deeply grateful for the influence and guidance of Sharathji on the evolution of my practice, and my respect for him as a teacher and as a person grows with each trip. I look forward to the months ahead of continued self-exploration in my practice, in the dark, damp early morning hours at home in Bali, and I look forward to my next trip with Sharathji in Mysore.

Acknowledgements

  • Thank you to Clayton Loizou and Greg Steward for helpful editing and suggestions about the article.
Ashtanga Immersion course with Iain in Ubud, Bali
Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/reflections-on-my-fifth-trip-in-mysore/feed/ 25 “Movement Homeopathy” in Ashtanga Yoga practice – by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/movement-homeopathy-in-ashtanga-yoga-practice/ https://spaciousyoga.com/movement-homeopathy-in-ashtanga-yoga-practice/#comments Thu, 07 Nov 2019 10:57:10 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=2035 I recently listened to a podcast interview with movement therapist Greg Lehman. Greg's perspectives on movement, pain and pathology resonate strongly with my own, and I have shared his ideas on my Spacious Yoga Facebook page numerous times. I found some interesting concepts in the interview which are applicable to my approach to Ashtanga [...]

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I recently listened to a podcast interview with movement therapist Greg Lehman. Greg’s perspectives on movement, pain and pathology resonate strongly with my own, and I have shared his ideas on my Spacious Yoga Facebook page numerous times. I found some interesting concepts in the interview which are applicable to my approach to Ashtanga Yoga practice.

The concept of “movement homeopathy” was my favorite takeaway. The concept is that we can train/retrain ourselves to perform movements that are painful and/or have been injurious to us by giving ourselves small or mild doses of the movement in question. “Movement Homeopathy” effectively describes my approach to recovery from injury or excessive pain in the Ashtanga practice. It also applies to how I approach the learning of new and difficult or intimidating new postures.

Standard professional medical advice after an injury or excessive pain/inflammation is either complete rest, or complete avoidance of the particular movement pattern that is associated with pain or injury. The application of ice to the injured or inflamed area is often included as part of the recovery protocol. Those who have experienced pain or injury while practicing with me know that I recommend against these standard procedures. Both the avoidance of movement and the application of ice to a painful or injured part of the body will encourage the trauma pattern (including the emotional and perceptual aspects of the trauma) to become locked into the body/mind/nervous system. Long-term healing or resolution is inhibited.

When we follow standard advice to avoid a movement pattern (or to avoid movement altogether in the case of complete rest), we generate a belief that continuing to engage with movement will cause us to deepen the damage or pain that we are already experiencing. This belief creates an emotionally reactive pattern (samskara) of fear, anxiety and aversion, which further compounds and complicates the discomfort that we are already facing. Moving (or not moving) in a perpetual state of fear and anxiety about our condition is highly unlikely to lead to healing or positive resolution of discomfort. The negative and apprehensive emotions we feel will tend to increase the overall tension levels in our body/mind/nervous system, and a negative feedback cycle, which perpetuates discomfort and inhibits healing, is created. I have seen numerous cases of yoga practitioners who report consistent chronic pain that does not improve, even though they are practicing carefully and mindfully and often avoiding or eliminating the movements which were originally associated with pain. In every one of these cases, I have observed high levels of fear, anxiety, and self-distrust around particular movements or aspects of the practice.

Another common approach to pain or injury is to look for issues in the alignment of the body, and to expect that shifting to a “healthier” alignment pattern will resolve the discomfort. I have also observed many cases of practitioners with chronic pain who fixate on following certain alignment dogmas (which they have been told are healthier) in their practice, and yet continue to experience chronic pain and discomfort. Again, there is an emotional rigidity and fear which develops around the possibility that they may slip into “bad alignment” which will cause their pain and discomfort to worsen. The emotional and physical rigidity which develops around this obsession with certain alignment principles also serves to lock the pain and trauma into the body/mind/nervous system, and in some cases the pain and discomfort actually worsen.

In the above examples, something which began primarily as a “physical” discomfort, is propagated and maintained by psychological fixations and emotional reactive patterns (samskaras), long after the initial physical trauma (if there was any to begin with) has dissipated. Techniques which are intended to protect us from our pain end up creating a complex system of negative feedback loops which often intensifies and unnecessarily prolongs the experience of pain.

Freezing a part of the body with ice will temporarily reduce inflammation, which can be useful for emergency pain relief in the case of a severe injury. Reducing inflammation, however, does not generally contribute to long-term resolution, especially in the case of chronic symptoms. Inflammation is a natural healing response of the human organism, and we could say that inflammation is creative in nature. Inflammation is a functional response of the intuitive organic intelligence of the body, and is part of how the autopoietic, self organizing human organism repairs and rebuilds itself. Freezing a part of the body cuts off the circulation of creative life force and awareness to the injured part. Blocking this creative flow of life force into a part of the body through freezing with ice is quite similar in principle to blocking the creative flow of life force by avoiding movements which stimulate that part of the body.

Avoiding or restricting movement or certain movement patterns; fixating on “correct” alignment; and aggressively reducing inflammation through the application of ice or allopathic anti-inflammatory agents can have limited and temporary usefulness in certain contexts, but in general I de-emphasize their importance and in many cases I recommend against them completely. The short-term benefits of decreased pain from these therapeutic techniques are transient in nature and do not contribute to long-term resolution or aid in the creative process of self-transformation that Ashtanga practice brings about. In essence, all of these therapeutic techniques block pain to some extent, but this necessarily means that they also block the creative flow of awareness, intuitive intelligence and life force. This ultimately leads to stagnation and inhibits long-term resolution and complete healing.

The blocking techniques all work on the principle of avoidance of the phenomenally embodied experience of the movement (and pain) in question, and through this inhibition of awareness and embodied intelligence, they generate a complex of fear and aversion which runs deeply through all the layers of the body/mind/nervous system. The lack of trust in bodily movement patterns ultimately represents and deepens a lack of trust in the self, a lack of trust in the practice, and a lack of trust in the relationship of the self with the practice. The intuitive, embodied intelligence of the animal self — which is where embodied understanding and natural healing intelligence arise — is forced into slumber and the ideas of the abstract and rational mind are imposed on the movement experience of the body. The result is a highly disembodied practice and disembodied experience of the self with strongly etched grooves of physical and emotional tension.

The other point that Lehman made in the interview which is highly relevant to the present discussion, is the fallacy of the goal or expectation of being pain free. Many branches of medicine and physical therapy ask patients to rate their pain on a scale of one to ten, with ten representing the highest amount of pain, and one representing the lowest. Lehman mentioned that expecting everyone to reach “a level of two or three” is completely unrealistic. The fallacious expectation of being pain free also percolates through the postural yoga community. It is common to hear certain well-respected yoga authorities say things like, “If it hurts, you are doing it wrong.” I disagree with this trend. Lehman’s perspective resonates much more strongly with me.

When we allow ourselves to actively engage with movement and with our discomfort or pain, rather than applying the previously discussed blocking techniques, we allow the creative response of the human organism’s innate intelligence to work most effectively. As blood, life force, and both intuitive and conscious awareness flow into the wounded or painful area, so do aspects of the intuitive intelligence which are related to the reconstructive process of healing and transformation. Inflammation and pain are an unavoidable aspect of this process.

We may wish to keep the ideal part of the process (creative healing energy and intelligence) and avoid the unpleasant part (inflammation and pain), but, we can’t have one without the other. The human organism is a highly refined, self-organizing system which has attuned itself to function as it does over two billion years of evolution. These phenomenally pleasant and unpleasant components of the healing process work together, and we cannot separate them with a few simple bio hacks. Pain is one dimension of the innate intelligence of the human organism, and attempting to block or avoid pain necessarily causes us to block and subdue other important aspects of our innate animal intelligence.

Striving for a pain-free practice or a pain-free life is undesirable if we are aiming for self-transformation and self-evolution. The saying “no-pain, no-gain” is more appropriate than “if it hurts you are doing it wrong.” Without pain, an important stimulant for increased awareness and for the mobilization of creative intuitive intelligence is removed. A pain-free life and a pain-free practice would be a life and practice that easily slips into complacency and stagnation. For me, pain is the creative juice that keeps self-evolution flowing. Without discomfort, there is no challenge to overcome, and hence no stimulation to change. Evolutionary biology recognizes this principle on a broader scale. One of the main driving forces of biological evolution is adaptation, and this force becomes more relevant and important when the environment is shifting and changing in a way that makes life more challenging. Adaptation occurs as a creative response to a problem (which is likely a painful problem) and this dynamic perpetuates the evolutionary process. Without pain – problems and challenges which require adaptive response – the entire creative process of the evolution of life would stagnate. If we wish to continue to grow and change, we must consciously experience the discomfort involved in problems that we face, in order for the creative flow of adaptive response within us to occur and lead us forward.

The creative flow of adaptive response to problems effectively describes the process of restructuring the human organism through the sequential learning of the asanas and vinyasas of the Ashtanga system. In my article “A systems thinking perspective on the resolution of pain in Ashtanga practice”, I describe the restructuring process in more detail. The long-term process of changing how the different parts and systems of the human body relate to one another and to our environment is a highly creative and nuanced process. The self-regulating system of the human organism must continuously reorganize and rearrange itself in novel and creative ways, in response to the controlled pressure we place upon it through the repetitive application of asana and vinyasa sequences. There is no doubt that this creative process involves inflammation and the experience of pain. To expect to experience creative transformation of the structure of the self without some degree of pain and inflammation to flow along with the mobilization of creative energy and intelligence, is to completely misunderstand the nature of the human organism and how it participates in the endless process of change. I am highly skeptical of the depth of understanding of teachers who state, “If it hurts, you are doing it wrong.”

The art and skill that comes with experience in working with a system like Ashtanga Yoga is to understand how to adjust the parameters so that we can experience creative transformation – and corresponding pain and inflammation – to a degree that is sustainable and does not overly inhibit our ability to function normally in our day-to-day lives. The main factor is how much of the series or which series we practice and how quickly or slowly we should add to that series. In my opinion, the main role of a Mysore-style teacher is to determine this for each student. How much of the series, or which series, is appropriate for each particular student to experience a sustainable level of creative transformation. Or, to provide a healing response to an injury or excessive pain.

The Mysore-style teacher is overseeing the long-term transformational dynamic which occurs between each student and the particular set of postures or series they are practicing. Many students believe that the main benefit of going to a Mysore-style class is to receive a few good adjustments in the postures. An experienced and effective Mysore-style teacher will give much subtler, deeper guidance using their own experience with the dynamics of how the system of Ashtanga reorganizes and restructures the human organism, to monitor this aspect of the student’s practice. I sometimes receive emails from prospective students that say things like “I only have time to practice with you for one or two days, but I’d like to learn as much as possible in that time.” I usually don’t say anything, but I chuckle to myself and think: “Nothing. I can’t teach you anything about this practice in one or two days, all I can do is give you a safe space and good energy to practice in. If you really want to learn about how this practice works, one month is a bare minimum for the transformational dynamics within your practice to start to really respond to my guidance.” The process of relationship between the self and the asana sequences requires deep time to evolve and manifest in life-changing ways. So also does the influence of a teacher on this process and relationship.

Let us return to the specifics of “movement homeopathy” in Ashtanga practice. My advice to practitioners who are experiencing pain related to injury or to an excessive amount of structural transformation is usually to continue practice, but in many cases to back off to a more basic, shorter practice. The homeopathy is that we are “treating” the pain or injury with the same thing that has caused or aggravated it. We are reducing the intensity or quantity of the movement, to a degree that the human organism’s intuitive intelligence is better able to process and integrate it. This ensures that the creative intelligence is flowing into the process of structural reorganization or healing, but at a moderate level and rate, so there is a reduced amount of pressure on the organism to shift and evolve in the restructuring process. This slowing down and de-intensifying of the process allows the intuitive intelligence to adapt to the movement patterns in question more effectively and with less pain. Because we are still moving, and even performing movements that are painful, we are still presenting the adaptive intelligence of our animal selves with a problem to address. And so, the creative adaptive response of the organism will still be engaged. This stimulates evolution and change which will eventually generate an enduring resolution to the pain or discomfort which is present.

As the pain and discomfort dissipate, and correspondingly the level of confidence in the self and in the movements of the practice increases, the intensity of posture and movement can be gradually increased again. In other words, as the adaptive intelligence of the animal becomes stronger and more capable, we can again increase the pressure we place upon ourselves to change with more asanas, or more intensive depth in the asanas.

There is no set formula for how much or how long this “homeopathic” process needs to be continued for. In severe cases, one may need to switch from a practice of a full series or even multiple series to a very short practice of just a few surya namaskar and standing postures. In other cases, one may need to simply back off on the intensity of the last posture of their practice for a little while. In some cases the reduction to a homeopathic dose of practice may only be necessary for a few days or a week. In other cases, it may need to be applied for months or even years. It all depends on factors unique to each individual case, and a good teacher should be able to help a person determine the exact prescription. Ultimately, it is one’s own embodied experience of, and familiarity and willingness to engage with the phenomenal experience of pain, inflammation and structural change, which allows one to adjust the homeopathic dosage accordingly.

The same principle can also be applied to learning new postures and movements, even when no pain or inflammation is present. Very difficult and intimidating movements, which may seem impossible from the outset, can be experienced to be much more palatable, when tasted in small, homeopathic doses. When I give a difficult new posture to a student, and that student cannot perform the posture to its full expression, I rarely give strong adjustments in the beginning. I let the student play around with the preliminary versions of the posture, and watch how the intuitive intelligence of the student adapts to those movements. Only if I see a real capability to move into the final version of the posture without excessive strain or shock, will I use some physical manipulation to put the student there. Otherwise, it is much better, and more sustainable to allow the intelligence of the student’s own organism to work it out naturally and gradually. I have learned over many years of teaching that less adjusting and more observing is a more effective method for students to learn the postures in a way that is enduring and sustainable. I feel that a student has fully learned a posture, or portion of the practice, when I am confident that they can go away and do it on their own, just as effectively as they could do it in my shala or with my help.

One example of this process from my own practice is in the difficult third series posture “gandha berundasana.” I began to practice this posture with my former teacher Rolf more than a decade ago. There was no possibility of coming even close to completing this posture under my own means, but Rolf would be sure to put me into the final version of the posture every day. It was always an extraordinarily terrifying experience to prepare for this posture, but over time I began to trust my ability to experience the full version of the posture – with Rolf’s assistance. There was no homeopathy involved. I don’t think he ever let me try to work my way into the posture alone – not even once. It was an all or nothing experience. When I was practicing with him, it would be “all” and when I would be back at home, practicing on my own after my visits to my teacher, it would be “nothing.” On my own, I would simply find it too intimidating to even attempt without help, and for more than a decade I resigned myself to the fact that this was one posture which wasn’t for me to experience on my own in this lifetime.

My attitude changed last year, when I realized that I might have to practice gandha berundasana with Sharath on my subsequent trip to Mysore. I dreaded revisiting the posture, and wondered what Sharath’s approach with me would be regarding it. I gave myself an easy out, by telling myself that Sharath wouldn’t expect me to be able to do it. Many students do get moved past this posture in third series without having to complete it.

While I was beginning to contemplate this, a friend of mine visited my shala, and it so happened that he had recently been given that same posture by Sharath. We talked about it and my friend felt that “Sharath will expect both you and I do be able to do it.” I knew he was right. A short time later, another friend of mine who can do gandha berundasana very nicely visited my shala. Both these events inspired me, so I decided to begin working on it in my home practice.

I began in earnest, and without any real expectation of success. I started with very small homeopathic doses of the posture, and would only work as far into it as felt safe; and to a point where I felt like my body’s intelligence would be able to understand, process and integrate the structural changes which were taking place and would be necessary to continue to move deeper into the posture. In the beginning, I was certainly nowhere near even the first stages of completing the posture. Not surprisingly, with daily homeopathic application the organic intelligence did begin to take over, and a surprising amount of progress took place. After about six months of daily application, I succeeded in being able to catch both of my feet with my hands and to be in the most rudimentary version of the final posture. This continued for about a month, and then suddenly it was completely gone. I was back to square one, perhaps even further back than when I had first begun to tackle the posture six months earlier. What to do? Nothing, but to start the homeopathic process over again, which I did. This time it took five more months of homeopathy to attain the final stage of posture again. Only this time, I did not lose it, and I was able to continue to perform the final version of the posture every day for several months. Interestingly, I have now had to stop it again because I am currently in Mysore practicing with Sharath, and I am still a few postures away from reaching gandha berundasana in my practice with him. It will be interesting to see, if he gives me ganha berundasana on this trip (or if not, when I go back to doing it at home after the trip), whether I will be able to return to doing it straight away, or whether another homeopathic process will be necessary. I no longer have any fear or apprehension about the posture, as I can feel the deeper embodied understanding and integration from my practice of it over the past year, so I do expect that it will come back fairly quickly the next time I tackle it.

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As I was finishing up this article, I came across another sports therapy based article which resonates with what I have just written. It provides an interesting footnote and complement to Lehman’s statements from the interview, and my own interpretation of those statements: Putting Ice on Injuries could be doing more damage than good

Disclaimer 1

I don’t claim to represent the work or teachings of Greg Lehman. I have never met or directly learned from him. He may very well disagree with how I have interpreted his own perspectives on pain and movement. Or, he may agree with me. The views expressed in this article are my own, and are based on my own experience with the practice of Ashtanga Yoga.

Disclaimer 2

This article is conceptual in nature, and does not represent specific advice for any individual reader. Each situation is unique, and involves many factors, and I can only give specific advice in the context of a personal relationship with a student who is present in my shala.

Acknowledgements

  • Thank you to Clayton Loizou for helpful editing and suggestions about the article.

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Ashtanga Immersion courses with Iain in Ubud, Bali

Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/movement-homeopathy-in-ashtanga-yoga-practice/feed/ 2 Reflections on Todd Hargrove’s “A Guide To Better Movement” in the context of Ashtanga Yoga practice – by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/a-guide-to-better-movement/ https://spaciousyoga.com/a-guide-to-better-movement/#comments Fri, 30 Aug 2019 07:07:46 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=2007 I recently read Todd Hargrove's book, "A Guide to Better Movement". I don't recall who initially recommended Hargrove's book to me, but it was after I had mentioned that I was reading and Katy Bowman's "Movement Matters" a few years ago. I bought "A Guide to Better Movement" around that time, and it has [...]

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I recently read Todd Hargrove’s book, “A Guide to Better Movement”. I don’t recall who initially recommended Hargrove’s book to me, but it was after I had mentioned that I was reading and Katy Bowman’s “Movement Matters” a few years ago. I bought “A Guide to Better Movement” around that time, and it has sat in my book box (regrettably, I can’t keep my books displayed on a bookshelf in Bali as they quickly become degraded by dust and mildew) waiting to be read until I picked it up a month or so ago.

I enjoyed Hargrove’s book even more than I expected to. The focus is not on the specifics of biomechanics or kinesiology (which I usually find to be boring, dogmatic and fallacious), but more about the “top-down” influence of the nervous system on our experience and performance of physical movement. I appreciated that he avoids reductionist and dogmatic principles of what constitutes “safe” movement and alignment, and instead focuses on a more general consideration of the multitude of factors beyond anatomy and physiology which constitute the whole of our experience of body movement and comfort/discomfort.

One drawback to his approach is that he does perpetuate a clear distinction between body and brain, whereas I prefer a more integrated and “enactive” approach to human experience which discourages the artificial and imagined separation of the component parts of the human organism. Nonetheless, the book was enjoyable and I look forward to reading his recently released second book, “Playing With Movement.” I appreciate the optimism and absence of fear mongering in the perspectives of movement therapists like Hargrove and Greg Lehamn (whose recovery strategies pdf book is also well worth reading).

Hargrove’s book is not at all about yoga, but while reading it, I found myself interpreting many of his ideas and principles in the context of Ashtanga Yoga practice. I began to share my interpretations and reflections of certain passages in the book on my Spacious Yoga Facebook page. I have collected those Facebook posts here for archival purposes and for those who do not use Facebook or follow my Spacious Yoga Facebook page. Each photograph below is a passage from Hargrove’s book, with my commentary directly below each photograph.

1

Can a paralyzed person practice Ashtanga? Can a zombie practice Ashtanga? Absolutely. I see people practicing intermediate, third series and beyond as paralyzed zombies. They are the practitioners who are most resistant to feedback – from the practice, from their teachers and from their own somatic experience.

Practice can be a way to dissolve paralysis, or it can be a way to deepen paralysis. It all depends how we use the tool of practice.

2

This is bandha. Note that it has nothing to do with gripping, squeezing or holding certain muscle groups, as many Ashtanga practitioners are erroneously taught to do. Aligned fluidity creates energetic efficiency.

3

As a teacher, I would say that the most capable students are not the strongest or most flexible ones, but those who are most receptive to, and able to assimilate new information. This may include information from their external environment (including their teacher) and their internal environment. Students who are strongest and most flexible are often the least capable in this respect.

Those who have cultivated bandha are able to intuitively adapt to changing internal and external conditions with fluidity and effortlessness. Bandha represents a seamless relationship with one’s environment.

4

Physical techniques and information are of very minor importance in the process of deepening one’s practice. Teachings which focus on physical techniques and an overload of information often end up being a distraction from actual practice.

Cultivating meditative phenomenological awareness of embodied breath and sensation is the key factor in deepening one’s practice and one’s relationship with oneself.

5

This is why a good Mysore style teacher will demand mastery of the foundations contained in the first part of primary series before moving students on to more advanced postures and vinyasa.

Advanced postures are simply novel and more complex combinations of fundamental movement patterns. For those who have truly mastered all of the fundamental movement patterns, the advanced postures will come easily and with little need for instruction or support from a teacher. Those who have failed to learn fundamental movement patterns will struggle endlessly and need a teacher to put them into more difficult postures.

Rather than continue to adjust students into a number of difficult postures that they cannot perform without assistance, a good Mysore style teacher will ask the student to go back to a more basic practice until the prerequisite movement patterns are mastered. This may feel frustrating and less immediately gratifying for the student in the short term, but will produce a much healthier, independent and empowering practice in the long run.

6

For hundreds of thousands of years, our Homo sapiens ancestors skillfully moved through the forests and savannah in ways that would probably make today’s Olympic athletes envious. The intuitive animal intelligence of the human organism does not need rational, intellectual instruction in order to learn how to move in efficient and functional relationship with its surroundings.

It mystifies me that so many modern yoga practitioners and analysts assume there is a necessity for the modern science of anatomy and physiology to inform our postural yoga practice. To me, “99 percent practice and 1 percent theory” refers to the relative contributions of phenomenological, intuitive, animal intelligence (99 percent) vs. rational, scientific anatomical knowledge (1 percent) to our practice experience.

The suggestion that all yoga practitioners and teachers should be trained in anatomy and physiology is as absurd as suggesting that babies need to study anatomy and physiology in order to safely progress in their learning of movement skills as they develop and mature in their first years of life. Our prescientific era ancestors did just as well at mastering movement skills as babies do. What has caused us to forget this obvious fact?

Postural yoga is a beautiful opportunity to rekindle the flame of the embodied, intuitive, animal aspect of movement intelligence which we all are born into this world with, but so many modern humans tend to neglect and discard with their maturation into the adult world of civilised domestication. Reducing postural yoga to anatomical formulas and prescriptions strips it of its very heart and soul… as we have already done with so many other aspects of our lives.

7

It is relatively rare that pain experienced during a particular postural movement (in yoga practice or otherwise) is directly caused by poor alignment or soft tissue damage. There are multitudes of interconnected and interrelated factors from all layers of our being, which contribute to our conscious experience of any given phenomena, including that of pain.

I find pain and discomfort to be a fascinating opportunity to observe and transform various layers of my own reactive habit patterns (samskaras/ sankaras) during practice. Slight and subtle shifts in the structure of my conscious awareness in the embodied state can completely transform my experience of asana practice, including the perception of pain (or more often generalized unpleasantness). This provides fuel for a fascinating journey deeper into myself on the mat every morning.

I can’t recall the last time I addressed my experience of pain with a shift in alignment or superficial technique (though this can certainly sometimes be appropriate). The relationship of how the various body parts are organized with respect to one another and with respect to the earth is only one minor ingredient in the complex soup of our conscious phenomenological experience at any given moment.

It baffles me when I see many yoga teachers and practitioners focussing solely on one superficial aspect (alignment/tissue damage) of our multidimensional experience of yoga asanas and vinyasas. I’ve witnessed several teachers who claim to understand the source of a student’s pain before even watching that student practice, let alone inquiring into other dimensions of the student’s being. This is usually followed by application of whatever dogmatic alignment principles the teacher happens to subscribe to. Needless to say, this approach is usually ineffective.

8

In this chapter, Todd Hargrove discusses the protective mechanisms of the CNS, which prevent us from ever reaching our full potential in strength, flexibility, endurance, etc.

I deeply appreciate and enjoy Hargrove’s perspective on human movement, which recognizes the multiplicity of factors aside from simple biomechanics which contribute to the whole of our experience of physical movement. One shortcoming to his approach is usage of language which suggests that the brain/CNS and body are distinct entities. In my own explorations, I have come to the conclusion that the tendency to separate components of humanness – such as body; brain; mind; spirit, etc. – represents a fundamental flaw in human reasoning, which has been exacerbated by the scientific reductionism which has proliferated since the time of Descartes. Entities are wholes whose parts are separable in theory, but not in actual functionality. Unfortunately, modern science does not yet have language which can effectively support exploration within this framework.

Sharath Jois is fond of stating that the body is okay, and the mind is stiff. This is similar to what Hargrove is getting at here, and is certainly an underappreciated aspect of performance – in asana or anything else in life.

As I have matured over 16 years of daily Ashtanga practice, I have come to understand that physical biomechanics is of very minor importance in comparison to the perception of the conscious and subconscious mind in terms of what is and isn’t possible in physical movement. The fuzzy boundary between the perceptions of the conscious and subconscious are particularly fascinating and this is where the real “openings” are taking place which allow the physical expression of difficult asanas to manifest over time.

Cultivating equanimity towards all of our embodied experience – especially towards the experience of our perception of what is and isn’t possible – is a golden key to unlocking potential. When I step on the front of my mat at 2:30 a.m., feeling fatigued or achey, and think, “I can’t….” My very next step is to stop reacting to that thought and to enter a non-reactive state of “let’s see…” And then, 99 percent of the time, I find that I can…..

Ashtanga Immersion course with Iain in Ubud, Bali
Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/a-guide-to-better-movement/feed/ 5 The Tree of Bandha: Moving in Embodied Relationship with the Earth – by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/the-tree-of-bandha/ https://spaciousyoga.com/the-tree-of-bandha/#comments Sat, 08 Jun 2019 07:37:16 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=1970 When I introduce the subjects of breath and bandha in my immersion and pranayama courses, I begin with a description of three different layers of internal feeling and experience to which we can attend and move from during practice. These three layers of our experience of posture and movement are body, breath and bandha. [...]

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When I introduce the subjects of breath and bandha in my immersion and pranayama courses, I begin with a description of three different layers of internal feeling and experience to which we can attend and move from during practice. These three layers of our experience of posture and movement are body, breath and bandha. These layers are functionally intertwined and inseparable in their roles within the experience of the whole organism, so rather than thinking of them as separate “things”, I prefer to frame them as different perspectives or lenses from which we can view the whole of our experience of posture and movement.

We can consider different asanas and movement patterns as dynamic “forms” which we attempt to mould ourselves into. Backward bending, forward bending, twisting, inverted postures, etc. all have different types of shape or form. When a beginner to movement practice first attempts to perform asanas, he instinctively attempts to copy the forms that he sees with the form of his own body. For someone with little experience in consciously embodied movement, this layer of external form is the main layer of awareness from which he instinctively attempts to perform asanas. The external shape or form of the asana could be considered as the most superficial layer from which we can practice.

If we compare an asana to a building, this superficial layer is analogous to the shape and form of the building – whether it is low and flat like a strip mall, high and narrow like a tower, or elongated and curved like an arched bridge, etc. We can also note details such as whether the surface of the building is made of wood, concrete, metal, etc.

The asanas of a beginner can tend to look sloppy and unrefined when compared to those of an experienced practitioner. The beginners’ posture may resemble the general form of a particular asana; however he may also appear (and feel) strained and lacking in the fundamental qualities of stability and ease — or sukha and sthira — which an experienced practitioner of the same asana often exhibits. The beginner will also lack alignment, stamina and resilience. He may fatigue quickly and be unable to incorporate even minor adjustments in form without losing his balance and toppling over.

In contrast, the asanas of an experienced practitioner will hold the same general form as the asanas of the beginner, but he will exhibit (and feel) the added qualities of alignment, stability and ease. An adept practitioner will be able to sustain a longer practice or hold particular asanas for longer periods of time without excessively tiring. He will also have the resilience to change certain features and details of the posture if he is asked to, without losing the fundamental essence of the posture. The postures of the adept practitioner will look and feel “aligned, relaxed and resilient”, as rolfer Will Johnson describes in his book of the same title.

How does the progression from the unstable and strained forms of the beginner to the aligned, relaxed and resilient forms of the experienced and adept practitioner occur?

When a beginner applies the techniques of Ashtanga practice on a regular basis – especially the vinyasa system of moving body and breath in a co-ordinated and concentrated flow – he will eventually begin to experience the asanas from a deeper layer within himself than the external shape and form of the postures and movements. Over time, he may begin to feel as if there is something that is supporting these external forms and movements of his body from a deeper place inside himself. He may begin to reduce emphasis on applying instructions and directions which originate from the outside intellect to the form of his body, and he may start to give precedence to an intuitive and embodied intelligence which guides and moves his body from the inside.

Some experienced practitioners say that this internal force or intelligence is the breath, and that at a certain stage of maturity in Ashtanga practice, the breath becomes the primary force in shaping and moving the body through the postures and vinyasas of the practice. There is certainly some validity in this statement, and the breath is the second layer from which we can perform and experience the asanas and vinyasas. The layer of breath is deeper and subtler than the superficial layer of external shape and form. For an experienced practitioner, the sound and sensation of the continuous flow of elongated, smooth and deep breath can pull him deeper inside himself and it becomes the most prominent feature of his embodied experience of the Ashtanga practice. At this stage in practice maturity, the superficial structural layers of the form of flesh and bone become more of an adjunct to the experience of the form of the breath.

An important discovery that some practitioners make at this layer of experience is that the breath does indeed have a shape and form to it, just as the external body has a shape and form to it. One important feature of the internal form of the breath is that when correctly applied, it remains relatively constant regardless of the variety of different external forms (such as backward bends, forward bends, twists, inverted postures, standing postures, supine postures) that the body can take in the practice. That is to say, regardless of the variation in external form of the body in the practice, the internal form of the breath should remain within one basic pattern. I call this form “the tree of breath,” and will return to it later.

Returning to our analogy of a building or structure, we can think of the layer of breath as the infrastructural elements, such as the main posts and beams, which support the external structure and form of a building. The infrastructure is usually not obviously visible in a finished building, but beneath the external layers, it is what supports and holds the entire building up.

We can continue to probe deeper into the forces which support and move us in the practice. Just as the internal form and movement of the breath support the external form and movement of the body, some practitioners eventually discover that there is an even deeper layer which supports the form and movement of the breath. I call this the layer of bandha, and it is the deepest and subtlest layer from which we can experience and perform the forms and movement patterns of asanas and vinyasas.

In this particular context, I define bandha as the energetic dimension of our relationship with our environment. This vague and abstract definition will become clearer if we return to our analogy of a building: The effectiveness of the infrastructure of a building in supporting the form of the structure is highly dependent on how the infrastructure is arranged in relationship to the field of gravity and to the terrain of the earth that it is built upon. The way the structure of the building will relate to the earth below it and the space around it is the most important consideration to take into account when planning the construction of the building. I don’t know very much about architectural design, but as far as I understand, the features of the environment which the building is to be built within and how the building will relate to these features are the foundations of everything that comes afterwards in the planning process. A building which works with gravity in a constructive way will be strong and stable and more likely to withstand any kind of disturbance that it might encounter during its lifespan with minimal damage. An arched bridge that is built with effective distribution of natural forces from its center will be a bridge that is safe and stable to travel upon for many years.

Urdhva Danurasana by Allen Enrique

Bandha is the energetic patterning which manifests in the way we move in relation to the earth below us and the space around us. This energetic movement occurs in both static asanas as well as dynamic movements of the body. When we practice in a state of embodiment and tangibly work with our relationship to the environment around us, bandha can be intuitively understood, and becomes the root and foundation of our entire practice experience. As embodied beings who are functionally and physiologically intertwined within – and inseparable from – the planet earth, this energetic relationship between self and environment is occurring every moment that we are alive. Formal practice is a place and space within which we can refine and cultivate the intricacies of that relationship to its maximum potential for harmonious exchange, but the actual relationship of energetic exchange between self and earth does not stop when formal practice stops. This fact can shed some light on K. Pattabhi Jois’ famous statement that mula bandha should be applied 24 hours a day.

The energetic form of bandha in our postures and movements can also be understood by examining how it manifests in trees. We tend to think of trees as static entities, but a significant amount of movement takes place as a tree communicates with and relates to its environment. We share more than half of our genes with trees and the common ancestor that we share with trees is relatively close on the phylogenetic map of life, as shown in the diagram below. Though trees and humans have evolved some very different ways of relating to gravity on the planet earth, we also share some fundamental qualities, including the movement of bandha.

In order to see all of the movement patterns that a tree engages in, we would need to view it in time lapse, and also be able to see what is happening underneath the earth. We would also need to be able to see the chemical signals that trees exchange with one another and with animals and other forms of life. Trees form vast interconnected networks with their roots through underground fungal filament networks, which some modern ecologists have likened to the dendritic connections that are made between neurons in a mammalian brain. Trees also communicate with their peers, and with other life forms, by absorbing and releasing chemical signals through their leaves. This has led some ecologists to suggest that trees behave less like individual entities, and more like nodes in a vastly interconnected forest and planetary network. Trees are more like cells which contribute to the health and functionality of a whole forest organism, and their behaviour can be more appropriately understood when viewed from this perspective. Humans, as a part of the web of life, also have this degree of connectivity with our environment. Unfortunately, centuries of the Cartesian legacy of the illusion of separateness has led us to repress and ignore this fundamental aspect of human nature. Bandha can only be effectively understood and felt if we allow ourselves to drop into embodied sensitivity and to feel and move as if we are connected to and communicating with our environment as participants within a network of relationships within a greater whole.

The fundamental movement of bandha is a co-engaging of two complementary or opposite qualities or movement patterns. In the present context, we can discuss the complementary forces of dropping downwards into the earth, and of lifting upwards and expanding outwards, away from the earth.

The rooting force of dropping downwards into the ground is the part of the movement of the tree that we cannot see with our eyes. The germination of a seed actually begins with the sprouting and downwards movement of the root. The stalk which grows upwards towards the light and air doesn’t appear until after the root of the seed has already established itself. For a tree to have any degree of stability and reach its potential to expand and grow upwards and outwards, it must have space to grow downwards, penetrating ever more deeply into the earth. A tree which is kept in a pot or in a confined space where its roots have nowhere to grow, will never reach its potential to fully mature in its upwards and outwards expansion. A tree’s roots are powerful. The movement of the roots happens slowly, relative to our perception, but this movement is epic in deep time. The roots of trees can eventually crack and destroy rocks, concrete foundations of buildings, roads, and other structures which are located a surprising distance from the actual trunk of the tree. If all the humans on the planet earth died today, it is the roots of the trees which would immediately begin to spread and proliferate that would reduce all of the concrete structures of our civilizations to rubble within a few decades. These deep and powerful underground movements give trees the strength, stability and longevity that they are known for, and as previously mentioned this is also where the trees become physically connected with one another through their fungal “synapses”.

Humans also have the capacity to move downwards into the earth. Any action that a human wishes to perform will be executed more effectively and efficiently if the part of the body that is touching the ground first reaffirms and deepens its downwards movement into the ground prior to attempting to engage the actual lifting, pushing, pulling, or whatever the intended action is. Imagine you are standing beside a large boulder and wish to push it. You place your hands on the boulder, but before you start to push with the strength of your arms, you instinctively step back a little bit, bend your knees, and then you anchor yourself and press downwards into the earth with your feet. The earth responds to your gesture, and a reactionary force comes back up out of the earth, ripples through your entire body and you harness this force that is given to you from the earth and channel it through your arms and hands as you begin to push against the boulder. Imagine how much less effective your efforts to move the boulder would be if you didn’t make these initial rooting connections to the earth through your legs and feet. This rooting action, and the subsequent channeling and harnessing of the complementary gesture from the earth is the essence of bandha: Bandha cannot be understood in this example without considering it as a function of our relationship to both the earth and the boulder.

Humans can also increase their sensitivity and connection to the rest of the web of life through the earth, just as trees do. Carl Jung is famous for having said: “It is quite possible that India is the real world, and that the white man lives in a madhouse of abstractions… Life in India has not yet withdrawn into the capsule of the head… It is still the whole body that lives. No wonder the European feels dreamlike: the complete life of India is something of which he merely dreams. When you walk with naked feet, how can you ever forget the earth?” I feel it is necessary to insert the caveat that this statement may have been true in Jung’s time, or in his idealized vision of the Indian culture. In my own experience, modern India is as much of an abstracted madhouse as the West. My reason for sharing the quote is that, irrespective of culture or geographic location, engaging with the ground through bare feet, in an embodied state of perceptive awareness, is the only way to actually feel our connection to the earth and to the rest of the web of life. Without this embodied feeling, there can be no connection. Modern scientific discoveries and ecological movements which emphasize the interconnectedness of all of life on the planet earth are important, but unless we cultivate the ability to feel these connections with our living breathing body, as animist cultures have always done, then there is no possibility of authentically feeling our relationship to the rest of life, and no possibility of feeling bandha. I once watched a world-famous and celebrated ecologist speak at a public event. This man understands the nature of the web of life on planet earth as well as any other living human does – at an intellectual level. He has undoubtedly done very important work for the world and for encouraging humanity to understand our appropriate place in the world. Yet, when I watched him speak, as a yoga instructor I watched his body. His body was full of tension and was not connected to the ground beneath him at all. There was no bandha in his lived experience of the earth – at least while he was giving a public lecture.

Most modern humans are unaware of the extent of the loss of communicative skills that has occurred through our trajectory of disconnection from the earth over the last few millennia. The abstract technological universe, within which we communicate solely with other humans, has severed most of our reciprocal perceptual exchange with the more-than-human world. Though we are not able to escape our interdependence with the more-than-human earth, we operate under the illusion that we have done so, resulting in a great void and a profound lack of deeper meaning in life, not to mention the very real possibility of the collapse of all of the earth’s living systems, including our own human civilizations. The few remaining extant societies of indigenous humans have spoken about the ease and regularity with which they communicate with plants, other animals, dead ancestors, etc. Modern humans tend to disregard these tales as myths from a primitive and uniformed worldview, but for those who cultivate embodied sensitivity, the richness of the network of reciprocal perceptual exchange that is possible between the human and the more-than-human becomes apparent. To perceptually inhabit these pathways of exchange is a fundamental element in experiencing the essence of human nature.

Elephants are known to communicate with each other through seismic vibrations that are picked up through their feet. I recall reading about a study which found that elephants emit low frequency vocalizations, which other elephants can receive vibrationally through sensitive receptors in their feet – up to 10 km away! If such a massive and hulking animal can be capable of such sensitivity, there is little doubt that human beings can also be this sensitive, and that our ancestral human forest dwellers also communicated with their environment through their feet.

I attempt to keep my feet open to earth as much as possible. Living in a warm climate, it is natural to keep my feet bare and free of any footwear for most of the day. The only time I put on shoes is when I walk or drive outside. A few years ago, I began to wear Vibram barefoot shoes, which allow one to retain a surprisingly large amount of tactile sensitivity with the ground. Once I became used to wearing this type of shoe, I found it very difficult to return to using regular soled shoes as the degree of tactile communication with the ground that is lost with conventional shoes becomes very apparent. Now, the only time I wear conventional shoes is when it is too cold for barefoot shoes, or if I am hiking with a backpack that weighs more than 10 – 15 kg. I’ve even considered attempting my next trekking expedition with a backpack in barefoot shoes. I’ve climbed all of the highest mountains of Bali in barefoot shoes, as well walked through numerous other challenging terrains. Why? Because I prefer to experience the connection of bandha as often as possible.

My first yoga instructor was an Iyengar teacher. He gave extremely effective training in the rooting foundation of posture, without ever using the term “bandha”. A good portion of the 3 – 4 hour classes were spent doing standing postures on thinly carpeted flooring without the use of sticky mats. Perhaps 50 times per class my teacher would emphatically tell us to “pound your heels into the ground.” And so, we learned how to connect to the ground with our feet. I spent over a year learning intensively with this teacher, and the instinctive ability to initiate all movements and forms of my body by pressing myself into the ground is something I have never lost. I’ve done my full Ashtanga practice without a sticky mat numerous times, as I have little need to use the sticky mat for traction. The main purpose of the mat is to provide some padding for rolling movements or movements where more sensitive parts of the body would become bruised by pressing hard against the ground. I had no idea that I was learning bandha in those early days of my practice. When I asked my teacher about the concept of bandha, he would smile and tell me, “It’s happening, you just don’t know it yet.” Bandha begins with embodied movement into, and communication and exchange with, the earth beneath us.

The complementary force in the tree-shaped energetic patterning of bandha is upward lifting and outward spreading. This movement arises as a response to the downwards rooting force. We can think of it as the feedback that the earth gives to us when we communicate with it by dropping down into it. To understand how this force manifests, we can observe that the trunk of a tree lifts straight up out of the earth in alignment with the force of gravity for some distance, before the first branches appear and begin to spread outwards. Occasionally, we may find a tree with a split trunk, such that there are two main trunks which have split from the root trunk very close to the ground level. This can happen for a number of reasons, but trees which exhibit this feature are much less stable and doomed to a shorter lifespan in comparison to their “normal” peers who have a well-defined main trunk which grows upwards in harmony with gravity. There are two trees of the same species which stand on either side of the front door of my house here in Bali. One tree has been harvested by my landlord several times. He cuts the branches back very closely, and I believe it is for this reason that it has a split trunk. The other tree has never been harvested (to my knowledge), and its trunk is much stronger and more stable than that of its sibling. Sometimes, after a torrential rain, these trees become weighed down and bent beneath the weight of the water that has accumulated on them. The tree with the split trunk becomes much more deviated from its usual growing pattern after the heavy rainfall, and takes longer to return to its usual pattern thereafter, compared to the tree with the stronger trunk. It is clear to me which tree has stronger bandha. Other animals have made the same observations about these two trees. There is a lineage of white rumped munia birds which nest in the stronger tree every year that I have lived here. These birds always choose the tree which has the more developed bandha to build their nest in.

Trees with a stable midline – that is to say, a strong and well-aligned trunk, also have much greater capacity to spread their branches and leaves outwards in all directions. Supported by the stability of the main trunk, the branches can elongate and reach much further outwards without compromising the overall stability of the tree.

I’ve already spoken about the mobility of trees through the growth and connections of their roots beneath the earth. This mobility is also apparent above the ground. Over deep time, trees can grow in whichever direction and orientation will best serve them in their quest to absorb maximal sunlight through their leaves for photosynthesis. When sunlight conditions change, the growth patterns and orientations of trees change in response. Different species of trees living together in a forest also cooperate in various ways to allow each other to capture all niches available for sunlight absorption.

A minimal amount of breeze can be enough to excite all of the leaves on a tree and even cause the thickest branches of a large tree to sway back and forth lazily. In the event of a great storm with gale force winds, the branches and upper trunk of a tree exhibit a huge range of motion and will bend in harmony with the wind, without resisting the extreme forces that assail them. These movements of the branches and trunk of a tree always look very relaxed to me. The tree is so confident in the rooting aspect of its bandha, that it has no fear or need to hold rigidity in its branches and leaves. Rather, the tree understands that allowing relaxed and resilient movement in the peripheral parts of its structure is the path of least resistance and greatest harmony in its relationship with its environment.

Humans can also manifest the lifting and spreading aspect of bandha in a way that is similar to trees. Once we have established a firm and sensitive rooting movement into the earth, we can harness the force of gravity and allow the complementary lifting and spreading action to move through the rest of our body. “Harnessing” and “allowing” are terms that I have selected carefully. Bandha is not an active gripping or clenching of the muscles around the pelvis or lower belly. Many practitioners who have been erroneously taught to do so are not experiencing bandha at all. By attempting to clench abdominal and pelvic muscles without actively soliciting an embodied relationship with the ground and with gravity, these practitioners generate excessive tension which inhibits their ability to harness and allow the energy of the earth to flow freely through their bodies. The result is a state of tension and disconnection, rather than a state of bandha.

Just as a tree seems to relax and allow the wind to move its branches freely, relaxation and release are necessary for humans to allow the force of the earth to manifest to its full potential and move through us uninhibitedly. Once we have effectively “plugged in” to the energy source of gravity by rooting into the earth, we then must cultivate conducive receptive space for this energetic response from the earth to move through us. When we succeed in this, we can manifest movement patterns which are both rooted, stable and powerful, and yet relaxed, resilient and expansive. In this state, we are in the most harmonious and balanced possible relationship that we can have with the earth beneath us and the force of gravity around us. This represents a state of engaged bandha.

Effectively engaged bandha feels effortless, intuitive and meditative. When we cultivate embodiment and give authority to the intuitive animal intelligence within our soma, we experientially understand that the essence of posture and movement is that of reciprocal and active relationship with nature. When practicing from the layer of bandha, the sensations and embodied feelings associated with the “central axis” or “midline” of the body communicate reciprocally with the field of the earth and these sensations become a meditative focal point which can be carried through all of the postures and vinyasas of our practice. If we are able to feel the dropping and rooting force actively co-ordinating with the lifting and spreading force through the central axis of the body, and this “core alignment” is being actively solicited in every posture and vinyasa movement that we place our body and breath into, then we are successfully holding the form of bandha in place throughout our practice.

Allow me to emphasize again that “holding bandha” has very little to do with holding the anus, pelvic floor or lower abdominal muscles in an engaged state. One might ask why these particular muscle groups are so often associated with bandha. It is because when we do harmonize our midline with gravity and activate the tree shaped energetic pattern of balanced rooting/dropping and lifting/spreading movements, some of these “core” muscles will naturally and instinctively respond to this energetic patterning and alignment. The muscular engagement is a product of the energetic alignment of bandha. The muscular engagement is not the cause of bandha. This is an important distinction to understand.

I generally encourage practitioners to focus less on the science of anatomy and physiology in their yoga practice, and more on phenomenological and embodied feeling. Focusing on anatomy and physiology in isolation of engaged relationship tends to lock one into the illusion of a separate self and results in one becoming trapped in the labyrinth of abstracted mirrors which the modern human race is lost within. Moving in phenomenological and embodied relationship with the earth is something that our species has been doing for hundreds of thousands of years, and something that the ancestral lineage to our species has been doing for millions of years. I have little doubt that our hunter-gatherer ancestors moved through the forests and savannahs intuitively, as if the environment was an extension of their own bodies, and were more skilled at movement than most of us are today. I am also sure that healing from injuries was an equally intuitive process which they were also skilled at. Needless to say, intellectual study of anatomy was not a part of this paradigm. Embodied sensitivity and felt relationship with one’s environment provides the vast majority of the confidence, sensitivity and experiential understanding necessary to work with bandha, and to move safely and efficiently. The majority of injuries do not arise from a lack of knowledge in the field of anatomy and physiology. They arise from a lack of embodied sensitivity and focus in one’s bodily attunement with the environment.

The tree shaped movement pattern of the layer of bandha also manifests in the layers of breath and external body.

As I mentioned near the beginning of this article, the three layers of bandha, breath and body are not functionally separate from each other. The form of the tree should be consciously cultivated from all three layers simultaneously. I think of the relationship between bandha, breath and body like the concentric rings in the trunk of a tree. Bandha represents the innermost layer of rings, breath the middle layers of rings and the body the outermost layer of rings. Although it is possible to identify these three layers of rings as distinctly separate things, it is meaningless to think of them as being able to function separately from one other. All three layers of rings are part of the structure, form and movement patterns of the tree.

In the tree-shaped breathing we use during Ashtanga practice, the exhalation represents the downwards movement of the roots of the tree probing into the earth. In this context, the earth is our pelvis and we apply an intentional force to push the exhalation down into the bowl of the pelvis, or into the earth. In a refined breathing practice, this downwards push is not aggressive. It is subtle, yet powerful. It is possible to have power without aggression. It is also elongated. Think again of the roots of a tree, elongating in deep time down into the ground at their glacial pace, and yet with enough strength to gradually crack and move through concrete or rocks. A fully developed exhalation similarly pushes its way through all of the layers of tension and blockage in the belly and pelvis, opening them up, until it eventually connects into the floor of the pelvis itself.

The inhale begins where the exhale finishes, and represents the lifting and spreading pattern of the trunk and branches of the tree. As previously discussed, most tree trunks grow directly upwards, away from the earth for some distance, before the first branches start reaching outwards to the sides. In this context, we can think of the lifting movement of the inhale up and out of the pelvis and through the lumbar spine/abdominal region as representing this straight part of the tree trunk; and we can think of spreading of the breath through the thoracic area, including ribs and shoulder girdle as representing the spreading branches of the tree. In Ashtanga practice, when we begin inhaling upwards from the bowl of the pelvis, we do not breathe outwards into the belly. Instead, we draw the breath straight up through the lower abdominal cavity, until we reach the upper abdominal and diaphragm area. At this stage, we allow the breath to spread outwards through the entire rib cage as it continues its journey upwards. An adept breathing practitioner will eventually be able to lift and spread the inhale through the entirety of the rib cage, including the front, back and sides – all the way up to the sternum and along the width of the collarbones at the front, up to the top of the thoracic spine and between the scapula at the back, and into the armpits at the sides.

When we apply the tree form to our breathing in this way, we sometimes find that the lower part of the abdomen does stay drawn gently inwards, due to a natural negative pressure that is generated in the abdominal cavity. Once more, I will emphasize that this negative abdominal pressure is not due to a conscious and rigid tensing of the abdominal muscles. Just as actively gripping these muscles will inhibit the free flow of energy in the state of bandha from manifesting, it will also inhibit the free flow of breath from manifesting. Sharath Jois says that we should apply “free breathing with sound” to our practice. I have also heard him define bandha as meaning “to lift up.” Sucking in and holding the abdomen muscularly will not contribute to free breathing or to lifting up. When we are able to find relaxed and natural alignment with gravity and we can breathe freely from the roots of the floor of the pelvis to the tips of the branches at the outer reaches of the upper ribs then a natural negative pressure manifests in the abdominal cavity and “lifting up” happens naturally and with relatively minimal effort.

Finally, we can return to the layer of external structure and form of the body. We can examine samasthiti as a basic example of how the form of the tree manifests at this layer of our practice experience. In my immersion and pranayama courses, I like to do a simple but effective exercise to demonstrate this: Standing in samasthiti, a partner comes behind us and uses his hands to press down on the tops of our iliac bones, with a fair amount of force. This usually feels pleasantly “grounding”, and allows us to feel the downwards rooting aspect of our posture. This downwards movement begins from the bones of the pelvis, and moves down through the bones of the legs and feet and into the earth. A second partner then rests his hand lightly on the crown of our head. We can then attempt to actively channel the energetic response of the earth from the downwards pressure being placed on our pelvic bones into an upwards growth and expansion through our central axis, spine and rib cage. When we succeed in this, we are able to lift straight upwards through the crown of our head. Our second partner will actually feel the top of our head growing upwards into his hand. During this exercise, most students find that they can tangibly feel the structure of their body growing taller.

Samasthiti by Allen Enrique

If we learn how to engage with gravity and the earth through the three layers of bandha, breath and body in every asana and vinyasa of our practice, we actually will grow taller over time. I spent 4 years away from my native Canada when I began my yoga practice in India in the late 1990’s and early 2000’s. When I finally returned home, my friends and family who had not seen me during those years all commented that I had grown taller. Though I did not understand it as such at the time, this was due to long-term cultivation of the pattern and form of bandha in the structure of my body.

We can examine the tree-shaped movement pattern of the external body in any other posture or vinyasa movement that we choose to engage with. Utpluthi can serve as another example: When I give instructions for this posture at the end of a led primary series class, the first thing I say is: “Place your hands on the ground and connect deeply with the earth.” Then, I say: “Press down and lift up.” It is the same principle as in samasthiti. Lifting up cannot happen effectively unless pressing down happens first. Utpluthi is a strenuous posture, but it is most effectively and least strenuously performed by working primarily with our energetic relationship with the earth, rather than muscular gripping. When I am holding utpluthi for a longer count and I begin to tire, the first thing I do to recharge the dynamic process is to re-establish the contact of my hands with the ground, and press down more. When I do this, my pelvis and torso immediately lighten and lift up higher with less effort. There is no conscious clenching of my belly or pelvis in this application of bandha. While the core muscles in that area certainly do engage, this engaging is a natural by-product of the cultivated relationship patterns between my body and breath and the earth. Lifting up to jump back to chaturanga dandasana from a seated posture follows identical principles.

Utpluthi by Allen Enrique

To experientially understand the tree shaped movement in bandha, breath and body, it is necessary to work with our reciprocal relationship with our environment from an embodied, phenomenological place of tactile feeling and sensation. Every gesture and movement of body and breath generates a response from the ground and from the space around us, and we need to be receptive and sensitive enough to feel that response from the earth. When we are able to accept, feel and transmit this response through our own body and breath, this informs the next gesture and movement that we make. This reciprocal feedback loop between the self and the environment builds up in intensity and focus over the duration of our practice as body, breath, bandha and earth become intertwined in an inseparable web of reciprocal communication and exchange. The vinyasa system of co-ordinated and concentrated flowing movements of body and breath is one of the unique features of the Ashtanga practice, and is indispensable in order to experience bandha in this way. In a deep experience of bandha, the boundaries between self and environment – body and earth – begin to dissolve, and we begin to experientially understand the fundamental truth that we are not separate from our environment. We begin to identify less with the abstracted, isolated conception and experience of self and more with the felt reality of an embodied organic organism embedded within a rich web of relationships of reciprocal exchange that is the whole of the living, breathing earth.

Acknowledgements

  • Thank you to Allen Enrique for the “made to order” drawings.
  • Thank you to Clayton Loizou for helpful editing and suggestions about the article.
  • Thank you to Richard Powers, whose novel “The Overstory” provided inspiration for me to finally translate some of the concepts and ideas that I have been carrying into words on a screen.

Translations

  • The Chinese translation of this article can be found here. Thank you to Yanyun for the translation.
Ashtanga Immersion course with Iain in Ubud, Bali
Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/the-tree-of-bandha/feed/ 5 Wellbeing on the Edge: Learning from Mysore Style Ashtanga Yoga – by Andy Davis https://spaciousyoga.com/wellbeing-on-the-edge/ https://spaciousyoga.com/wellbeing-on-the-edge/#comments Thu, 14 Mar 2019 07:23:40 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=1951 The following article is a transcript of a paper presented by Andy Davis, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, at the 25th national Asian Studies Development Program conference: "Wellbeing in Asian Traditions of Thought and Practice." The paper is partially based on an interview that Andy conducted with me in [...]

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The following article is a transcript of a paper presented by Andy Davis, Associate Professor of Philosophy at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, at the 25th national Asian Studies Development Program conference: “Wellbeing in Asian Traditions of Thought and Practice.”

The paper is partially based on an interview that Andy conducted with me in November 2018 while he was participating in my Mysore-style classes and pranayama course.

– Iain Grysak

Introducing the Edge

The word ‘wellbeing’ often suggests ease or comfort, a sense of pleasantness and satisfaction. But in my talk today, I would like to examine how a pursuit of wellbeing involves the seeming opposite, discomfort and struggle, due to wellbeing requiring intense work at the limit of one’s current capability. I aim to articulate how wellbeing is linked with learning and learning with growth and growth with a certain amount of discomfort and challenge. To this end, I look at the “Mysore style” of teaching and learning from the Mysore-style Ashtanga yoga tradition to see how it supports this uncomfortable work. I then adapt some lessons from the Mysore room to a discussion of challenge and risk in the university classroom.

The general idea for this paper is inspired by some comments made by my yoga teacher, Iain Grysak.[1] In an interview I conducted with him about teaching Mysore-style Ashtanga yoga, he remarked that, in his view, the teacher’s primary task is to create an “energetic container” where students are “brought to their edge.”[2] In context, this was offered as a contrast to the predominant expectation that a teacher’s job is to provide physical adjustments for students.[3] Grysak takes a wider view of the learning process and the learning environment, suggesting that physical adjustment is only one of many ways that students can be “brought to their edge.”

What does it mean, to be brought to one’s edge? The ‘edge’ is a term used in yoga circles to refer to the limit of a practitioner’s physical ability. When I press up into a backbend and go up just about as far as I can without causing myself too much pain, I am working at my edge.

That seems simple enough. However, the same shape that brings me to my edge might be very easily accomplished by another student. She will need a deeper backbend, such as kapotasana, to encounter her edge. This brings us to the crux of the problem of teaching yoga: every body has a different edge. Even the same body, on different days, will work at different edges. How does a student, a relative beginner, know when he has reached his edge? What does it feel like, and what level of discomfort or pain is acceptable? How much should I push myself in trying to get my body to take the shape of an upward-facing bow?

The yoga student, with good reason, goes to a yoga teacher for help answering this question—that is, to someone with more experience and therefore expertise in working at the limits of the body’s ability. However, the yoga teacher cannot inhabit the student’s body. The yoga teacher has only external access to the limitations of the student’s body. To feel something from the inside, as one’s own, is meaningfully different. Even if the teacher has the skill to recognize the general nature of a limitation and also suspects what might address it, the teacher cannot do the work for the student. Being adjusted into a posture (with external pressure or support) will have important differences from pressing and supporting the body from within. This inconvenient truth underlies Grysak’s concerns about teaching styles that are heavy on adjustments, and explains why physical adjustments are an imperfect tool for finding and working at a student’s edge. Once a student develops some amount of bodily awareness, she will be better at sensing the contours of her personal edge.

If this is so, what use is a teacher at all? Here the rest of Grysak’s suggestion comes into play. The teacher provides an “energetic container” for the student. The teacher offers a space, a room, a place, with conditions that are conducive to seriousness, attention to detail, moral support, focus, patience, calmness, and collective effort. The teacher’s main work is intentional, but it is not a doing, but rather, an allowing and enabling. The student experiences the work of her practice as produced neither by herself alone nor by the teacher alone. Or rather, the work is hers, but has been brought out and made possible by the learning environment and the relationships that constitute it.

An “energetic container” is created by a combination of elements that are numerous and subtle. These could include everything from the colors of the walls and the presence or absence of pictures of gurus or deities to the teacher’s tone of voice, gestures and attire. We will later turn to see how this can be compared with a university classroom. The notion of creating an energetic container is applicable especially with teachers that emphasize their role as listeners rather than talkers, who view their work not as depositing packets of information, but as cultivating the student’s own work at an analogous sort of edge, or rather, the edge broadly conceived.

For the edge, even in a yoga asana practice, is not just the limit of the body’s ability to take a certain shape. It is also the limit of the practitioner’s self-conception, the shape of his ego, the idea he has of who he is and what he can do. I may believe today that I can go further in my back-bending posture, I may be utterly convinced with righteous certainty that I can straighten my legs and arms and walk my hands closer to my feet, but today I find that I cannot. I encounter a limit of discomfort and exhaustion. How do I deal with this? Do I get frustrated and force my body further? Do I immediately back off without any exploration, content to do less than I know is possible? Or will I take interest in this limit as it presents itself and investigate it, looking for space around it? The character of the yoga practice is revealed in the way we negotiate this interaction between body and self-conception. Whether it has the character of a battle, or a friendly dialogue, a yoga practice is a constant encounter between sensation and imagination, between the body and the idea of the body.

Sensation and Imagination

Negotiating the encounter between sensation and imagination is essential not only to achieving bendy postures, but to our most fundamental capacities as animals. When an animal senses something (with eyes, ears, skin, etc.), the sensation is brought into relation with images of sensations that linger in the imagination, i.e., sensations from the near and distant past.[4] Take, for example, when something looks heavy. Here we are combining past tactile sensations of this object or similar objects with present visual sensations. In this way, a quality that is actually absent from sensation (heaviness) is made present to the moment of sensation not through sensation but through the work of the imagination. Imagination completes or fills out the always partial picture of sensation in countless ways. Much of the imagination’s work is unconscious and seamlessly integrated with the work of the senses.

By making present otherwise absent elements of experience, the imagination helps an animal orient itself and move from place to place, seeking out what seems best.[5] By preserving and re-presenting sensory images, the imagination gives the animal an intuitive understanding of the continuity of itself and of the world around it. Locomotion requires holding an action together in the imagination even as the body goes through the motion only one step at a time. The animal must believe, at each step, that even though it has not yet reached its goal, the goal remains ahead of it. Our wellbeing depends on how well we navigate these daily encounters between imagination and sensation, between memory and the present, between the various parts of a single motion, between one desire and another, between who we were, who we are and who we are becoming.

The imagination is sometimes misunderstood as a source of only fictitious notions or illusions that should always be replaced. Some yoga theorists, leaning on classical Indian sources, describe yoga practice as if it could leave the normal conditions of embodied human life behind, as if it released us from all imagined self-conceptions (ahaṃkāra) and all past habits (samskaras).[6] If humans are a special kind of spiritual being with an accidental animal body, then perhaps this makes sense. If, however, we grant that humans are animals through and through, then memory, imagination, desires and habits cannot be discarded or left behind. They must be trained or educated. This indicates to me that meditative absorption is likely not a sudden lightning flash where the material shell is discarded but rather the cumulative result of years of re-patterning the relationship between sensation and imagination to better reflect the way things are.

For the most part, sensation and imagination integrate well. As long as the experience of navigating our world seems to be going smoothly, our retained images have no reason to restructure in relation to incoming sensation. Yet if we are striving for change in our lives, we must change from the root and begin to sense the world differently so that we can desire differently.[7] This seems difficult to accomplish because no amount of thinking about it will change the pleasant taste of unhealthy foods or other misleading sensations and the memories around them. If, however, we bring ourselves to an edge, a limit, even a kind of crisis of perception, we will no longer rely on retained images and we begin to acquire new sensations to become part of the imagination’s repertoire. This is one reason why it is easier to change habits in unfamiliar settings. At the edge, we draft a new relationship between sensations and the images that attend them and fill them out. It is not uncommon for hard-working yoga practitioners to suddenly alter diet, sleep, hygiene or other habits without exerting any effort or ‘willpower’ merely as a consequence of increased attention to their edge.

Therefore, finding and working at the edge of one’s current capabilities is not just for adrenaline junkies, but for all of us. Further, the ability to work at the edge is a revealing definition of wellbeing. To live a healthy life, a person must be ready to respond to the environment, ready to pursue or avoid what it is best to pursue or avoid. If we do not attend to fresh aspects of incoming sensation, if we do not accept what is unexpected or even contrary to expectation, then experience becomes routine, blunted, and unintelligent. If we only work with imagination and memories, then the idea of the body becomes a fantasy, abstract and divorced from lived experience. A person may imagine that he can still run or jump as he did ten years ago, even while struggling to get up from a desk chair. Or he may imagine that he is incapable of getting up from the chair without pain, when, with practice, his body is capable of much more. Because Mysore-style Ashtanga yoga is a strenuous, six days per week practice, the attentive Ashtanga student constantly refreshes her own self-conception and lives as what she is: a growing, changing animal.

Without daily meditative movement at the edge, a person lives with an outdated idea of her own body. And without an analogous kind of attentive, consistent study and inquiry, a person works with an outdated idea of her own self. The Mysore-style of yoga teaching cultivates work at the edge in a powerful yet sustainable way. By reflecting on the features that make this learning environment effective, we can offer parallel suggestions for other learning environments.

Mysore-Style Ashtanga

Mysore-style Ashtanga yoga is the name used to describe the tradition of yoga practice transmitted by K. Patthabi Jois.[8] It is so named because it was developed in the city of Mysore (now Mysuru) in Karnataka, India. Ashtanga yoga has a few distinctive features worth noting up front. First, the Ashtanga practice is a set sequence of postures (asanas) performed in the same order each time. Second, the postures are interconnected by moving transitions or vinyasas. Third, in each posture the practitioner is to pay close attention to the movement of the breath, the placement of internal energy (bandha) and the location of the gaze (drishti). Finally, the Ashtanga practice should be practiced every day except Saturdays, full moons and new moons. Taken together, these guidelines help to ensure that Mysore-style Ashtanga yoga is a demanding yet meditative asana practice.

Mysore-style classes look quite different from other yoga classes. In the Mysore style, each student practices independently at his or her own pace and skill level, watched over by a teacher who has mastered the series of poses. One student may practice the Primary series, another may practice only half of the Primary series, and another may practice the Intermediate series, all in a row next to one another. The different series (Primary, Intermediate, Advanced) are fixed, and poses are given sequentially as the student achieves a certain level of competence in the previous pose. An individual practice usually lasts from one to two hours.

While students practice in the Mysore style, a teacher circles through the room watching them to see if they would benefit from brief verbal reminders about the placement of parts of the body or from hands-on physical adjustments. As noted earlier, Iain Grysak suggests that physical adjustments should be minimal. He writes that a skilled teacher will “give [students] the minimum amount of input necessary for them to understand where they should be going, and then leave it up to them to work it out for themselves.” Grysak concludes that “[t]his approach produces the strongest, most stable and most integrated result in the students, and it gives the students greater strength, confidence and power in the long run.”[9] This pedagogy takes the independent streak inherent in the Mysore style and amplifies it. Following this model, the teacher will tend to adjust only when a certain action is very difficult to engage without help (such as dropping back from standing into a backbend).

What stands out in the Mysore style of teaching is the combination of set structure and independence or freedom. Because the sequence of poses is fixed, the student can show up and practice without being told what to do by the teacher. In non-Mysore yoga classes, the sequence is invented by the instructor and is not known in advance by the student, making the student dependent upon the teacher for sequencing. In this way, the Mysore method defers a portion of authority from the teacher to the sequence itself. A student works not to follow the instructions of a teacher, nor to discover the intended insight that the teacher has in mind, but to deepen the practice of the already available sequence, sometimes with a teacher’s hands-on help, but often without it.

Bringing Out the Edge

The Mysore method offers several distinct advantages for the student who wants to find and work at their own edge.

Practicing the same sequences every day offers significant benefits. From the time of birth, a human body begins to be shaped by the repetitive motions demanded of it. From the way standing and walking bring structure to the developing spine of a toddler, to the way hunching over a cellphone causes the shoulders and head of an adult to slouch forward, to the way smiles or frowns develop wrinkles on our faces, repeated motions give us our shapes. And repetition, having shaped the body, is likely the best way to reshape it. Imagine how many backbends it takes to reverse the effects of twenty years (and counting) spent hunching over philosophy books.

Further, repeated motion provides a constant against which the student can measure deviations and changes. By paying attention to sensations in the practice from day to day, the student learns how to distinguish subtle differences in himself. If the practice were different every time, it would be that much more difficult to identify patterns or changes in the sensations. The repeated sequence effectively facilitates the observed experience of the body. It provides ample opportunity for the practitioner to become skilled at self-observation, a necessary prerequisite for self-teaching.

Another advantage of the Mysore method results from its concreteness, or the lack of abstract conceptualization in its instructions. In the Mysore room, verbal cues are minimal and concern gross actions. Little instruction is offered on how to achieve “perfection” in a posture, and few external standards of symmetry or geometry are applied to the poses. Such external standards impose a normative, imaginary ideal on the shape of the body. If a yoga practitioner follows the instruction of a zealous teacher, they may achieve a specific goal. But they may also lose sensitivity in their practice, overstretch the body’s tissues, and cause damage. It is easy to push toward an imaginary ideal, based on a description from a teacher, ignoring the cues of one’s own body. No other person can feel the sensations of the practitioner’s body, and so no one can effectively specify where the right balance of tension and relaxation will be found. The more we favor someone else’s description, the harder it becomes to follow our own sensations, and the more apt we are to cause ourselves harm.[10]

Ashtanga teaching does, however, instruct the breath. The vinyasa sequence is designed to pair with inhalations and exhalations. On inhalation, the practitioner moves into one posture (usually involving spinal extension) and on exhalation she moves into the next posture (usually involving spinal flexion). In the Mysore room, the practitioner is able to move the body freely with the breath, because they are able to work at their own pace. When they arrives at a held pose, which is usually held for five breaths, they have already forged a link between the motion of the body and the motion of the breath. This means that even a pose that looks motionless on the outside will continue to move, just as the vinyasa moved, but on a deeper, more subtle level.[11] Inhalation might accompany a sensation of lengthening, expanding, or releasing, while exhalation might accompany a sensation of stabilizing, containment, or deepening. The cycle of breathing shapes the posture bit by bit, finding new space within the body. Here, it is the breath that begins to work at the practitioner’s edge, and the breath that seeks out new territory in the practice. Breathing is a deeply original self-motion, so much that it seems to make a bridge between our conscious actions and our unconscious biological processes. We both do and do not control our own breathing, in the same way that we do and do not control our own being alive. In the Ashtanga practice, breath becomes the pioneer, the explorer of the edge, while the gross physical body—and the practitioner—follows.

Breathing is also closely connected to the function of the nervous system. Close work with the breath results in better awareness of the nervous system and the states of excitation and relaxation that emerge from its work. The breath thus forges a link between the imagined body and the actual sensations of the body. The practitioner’s idea of the body is distorted by habitual over- and under-stimulation. An overexcited nervous system is likely to under-react to sensory stimulus and a lethargic nervous system is likely to overreact. If, using the breath, a practitioner can even out the stimulation of the nervous system, they can open up a new attitude toward sensation in the present moment, one that is not pulled toward anxious or depressive responses.

It is a difficult task to learn to breathe smoothly and without forceful exertion while putting the body through strenuous athletic motions. But it is learnable. The body gains cardiovascular endurance, and the practitioner learns not to panic and gulp for air, even if a pose feels uncomfortable or seems impossible. By learning to breathe slowly and smoothly through the course of a challenging sequence, the practitioner learns to maintain a calm and focussed presence of mind. This, in turn, enables a clear evaluation of the body’s sensations, influenced neither by fear nor by ambition. In this way, attention to the breath helps one see through all the distractions, the messy emotions and social cues, so that one might know best when and where to stop.

Another advantage of the Mysore method is in the one-on-one teacher-student interactions. Typical yoga classes involve instructions given to all students, at the same time and in the same way, despite the fact that every student has a different body. In the Mysore room, every teacher-student interaction is one-on-one. This means they may take place as a concrete communication referring to a given body at a present moment, with immediate relevance and applicability. There is virtually no theory in it. The adjustment or instruction from the teacher serves as a reminder rather than a transmission of knowledge. When a teacher touches the body lightly or issues a simple correction, the student is given the opportunity to realize that their attention has lapsed and they have forgotten to hold the body together in the posture. Diffuse attention leads to a scattered way of holding the body. This is often a clear reminder that the idea of the body and the sensation of the body have diverged. This is also a sign that we hold ourselves in a careless way outside of the practice as well. Repeatedly addressing these attention lapses day by day gradually reduces such lapses and increases focus.

When focus is present, sensation and imagination work together at the crest of arising experience. The focused practitioner holds each moment of sensation in relation not to an abstract standard (imagination gone lifeless and dull), but to the relevant whole of a single arc of activity or motion (imagination alive and in the moment). Focus thus tends to arise most clearly at the edge, at the limit of capability, because it is here that each arising sensation bears the most significance. It is here that each decision has meaningful consequences the practitioner may observe immediately within or soon after the practice. At the edge, a practitioner can follow arising sensation toward evolving self-understanding.

Over time, a practitioner might notice attention constantly fleeing from certain areas or actions of the body. Through repeated actions and interventions, the practitioner begins to track their dark zones and blind spots, all the places in himself that they habitually avoid. In the practice, the practitioner may discover a map of habits, and in these habits, a map of choices and values. These are not the values we articulate to ourselves and to others, the stories we tell about ourselves, but the values we enact on a daily basis. I may tell myself that I am not stressed out, that I am kind and compassionate toward myself and others, or that I do not harbor deep and unspoken angers and fears; but my body tells a different story.

Discomfort and Wellbeing

Daily Mysore-style Ashtanga yoga is an intense practice and makes consistent, systemic demands on the body. As the body begins to restructure to better support itself in the practice, the practitioner experiences regular soreness, pain and occasional strains that belong to this process and can be considered good signs rather than warnings or reasons to abandon the practice. These discomforts often indicate that the student is in fact working at the edge of current limitations and cultivating a new relationship of the body to itself.

It often seems taken for granted that the point of practicing yoga is to feel good. Yoga is popularly presented as an exercise that is balancing, centering and calming. It may be more accurate to say that the point of a yoga asana practice is not to feel good, but to feel more deeply—not to feel better, but to feel better. If there is pain, anger, tension, doubt, pride, shame, strength, stability, softness, balance, anxiety, depression or uneasiness in the practitioner, asana practice is a powerful way to become sensitive to these deep stirrings of body and soul. This is necessarily a difficult path. Nobody finds it easy. Often, what the yoga practice reveals will be encountered with frustration, despair, fear, or just plain confusion. The practice is, after all, a daily encounter with one’s limits, a daily attempt to make headway into what seems—what feels—impossible. If it becomes a transformative practice, this means that it involves losing one’s past self. Dying to oneself, even if it prefaces rebirth, is never pleasant, never easy. Nevertheless, it is better to know oneself than to remain blind to psychophysical habits.

It is hard to find as reliable a daily measure of embodied experience as an Ashtanga yoga practice, which is both consistent and consistently diverse in its demands. Without the clarifying light of such a practice, we are likely to feel our body-souls as mediated through shifting moods and ideas or images that have no embodied reality. Human beings act in strange ways. We will claim that everything is okay, until one day we erupt, like a volcano, from a deep swell of anger. Or we will claim that we love a partner, until one day we realize that we haven’t shared our true selves with them in decades. We will do things because they are socially acceptable, without acknowledging how they trouble us to the core. We will choose what is familiar over what could lead to our own happiness. Without some kind of practice that teaches the practitioner to navigate the boundaries of potential, and to do so as a self-directed, self-sensing activity, we become helpless in the face of our unknown selves. We remain unprepared for our feelings and unequipped to respond well to them.

With such a daily practice, however, one conducts a daily survey of what it is like to be living in one’s body on that particular day. One has confronted negative feelings about oneself and areas of stiffness and tension. One has taken the time and effort to practice observing oneself, being sensitive to one’s limits, and persevering in the face of discomfort. This increased awareness can be carried from the practice into the rest of the day. It is difficult to assess the value of yoga practice for personal change and wellbeing because so much depends on what the student does with what he discovers in himself during practice. But the more self-directed and self-applied the practice is, the more likely it is to instill the habit of self-reflection.

It is never a solipsistic practice, however. In the Mysore room, one’s practice is both self-directed, and also observed by a teacher, making it not only an incubator for insights, but also a reminder to apply those insights diligently. When teachers simply talk, students miss out on discovering insights for themselves. They become disengaged, bored, or dutiful in an instrumental way. When students work without teachers at all, they often lack the motivation or capacity for discipline and consistency. The stakes may not feel high enough, the situation does not seem pressing, one feels sore and stiff, and one’s trust in the practice wavers. One is apt to postpone one’s work to the next day, or the next.

This brings us to the problem of pain. Pains, from minor discomforts, to aching limbs, to chronic strains, to tissue tears, present an obstacle and a puzzle to the most perceptive of students. Animals naturally withdraw from pain. This is a healthy response that generally leads to wellbeing, as it assists in survival. However, just as the avoidance of pain can be detrimental in the pursuit of self-knowledge, it can be detrimental in the pursuit of wellbeing. Someone with experience is sometimes needed to remind us that staying with a pain can be good. Pain is not always a signal of harm, even if we are apt to interpret it as such. While, on the one hand, I must let my body be my teacher, on the other hand, bodies have their own prejudices. A good teacher, who has endured the pains and discomforts himself, helps to mediate the body’s work when bodily distress prevents us from recognizing things as they are.

Learning at the Edge

From this look at Mysore-style teaching and practice, a few general conclusions arise. A learning environment should help students find their own personal edge and not an abstract target designated in advance by the teacher. To support this, the learning environment should cultivate consistency, challenge, introspection and independence.

I would argue that these qualities can be applied to liberal arts courses in modern universities to help bring students to the edge of their current capabilities. A class discussion or seminar can potentially offer a flexible learning environment where students can engage fruitfully with varying levels of competence. Unlike an interactive lecture, which rewards only those students who approach the content in a way similar to the professor, a seminar discussion can make space for divergent approaches. In a good discussion, each participant can test the differing limits of their own competence as a reader, thinker and speaker at the same time.

As in the Mysore room, a consistent learning environment should allow students to prepare properly. Continual change at the whim of the teacher invites students to stop preparing for class because it is unclear what preparation is worthwhile. Inconsistency or unpredictability causes students to feel at the mercy of the teacher, and as though they have no personal grasp on the trajectory of their learning. At the same time, the teacher should be prepared to provide diverse challenges to students. If the teacher seems easy to impress or content with a rehearsal of what is obvious—or worse, a rehearsal of what the teacher wants to hear—students are not invited to try for more. To promote introspection, a seminar group should acclimate itself to silence. If the teacher seems anxious or creates the expectation that silences should be filled, there is no space to think in the classroom. The class becomes a place to rehearse ideas rather than a place to discover or test them. Finally, independence can arise in a classroom when it is clear that the teacher does not have an agenda that must be followed. When students begin to see that their decisions and contributions have consequences on the quality of the conversation each day, personal responsibility and independence are cultivated.

While this is all somewhat formulaic, it may help us work past some prevalent assumptions. Yoga pedagogy and liberal arts pedagogy are both dominated by instructional models that treat education as a transmission of information from teacher to student rather than as a catalyst for genuine self-exploration in pursuit of holistic wellbeing. When student learn, they do not learn the subject matter in abstraction, but in concrete relation to what they already know and believe. This means that the student is in a better position to know how to integrate the subject into their own particular body and soul than the teacher. The teacher may be more expert on this technique or that book, but not at the technique in relation to my body or the book in relation to my soul.

Working at the edge demands, above all, that we—as teachers and students—be willing to endure confusion. As we push to the limits of the familiar, we are bound to become disoriented. Thus education at the edge requires trust. A student must be willing to go backwards (or what seems to be backwards), believing the path will eventually lead forwards again. The teacher must also be willing to go backwards, to accompany the student as she works through her edge, and to show by example that disorientation does not warrant despair. In Ashtanga yoga pedagogy, nothing encapsulates this need for trust better than when a teacher stops a student at a pose the student himself believes he has mastered. With time, the student may come to see the value in being set back, when it helps him rediscover his edge in a place he had stopped looking for it. Likewise, seminars abound with conversational tangents that seem to lead nowhere. But then, if pursued with a collective trust and sensitivity to the unknown, such tangents can turn up insights in places we would never have thought to look.

Both approaches are rooted in the belief that real insight transcends a person’s ability to encapsulate and represent things to himself in advance. Seeking wellbeing at the edge is a matter of remaining open, loosening the ego’s grasp on the self and making space for an unexpected self, an emergent self. If we seek wellbeing in this way, the self is no longer a detached image or a static representation, no longer a fantasy we have of who we are. The self becomes the work of the self.[12] In this work, there is no distinction between the body and its life, no distinction between the self and its wellbeing.

Note: I would like to thank Iain Grysak for his essays and for his energetic container, “Spacious Yoga” in Ubud, Bali. I would also like to thank Elizabeth Hejtmancik for her helpful suggestions and extensive revisions to this essay.

Andy Davis
Associate Professor of Philosophy
Belmont University

Notes

  • [1] Iain Grysak is a KPJAYI Level II authorized teacher of Mysore-style Ashtanga yoga currently based in Ubud, Bali. The formation of this talk was guided by two interviews with him (conducted in November 2018) and also by his written essays, found at www.spaciousyoga.com/blog.
  • [2] From an interview recorded on November 9, 2018.
  • [3] An adjustment typically involves bringing the student’s body more deeply into a particular posture (pressing the back into a deeper forward bend, helping the hands bind in a seated twist, etc.).
  • [4] ‘Image’ here is a generic term for absent sensory elements made present and could include sound images, visual images, tactile images, etc.
  • [5] It is for this reason that Aristotle reasons that all animals with the capacity for locomotion must have an imagination/ memory/ desire, while plants and stationary animals (e.g., corals) may have ‘pure’ sensation without imagination, memory and desire. See Aristotle, On the Soul Book III, Chapters 9-11.
  • [6] Bhagavad Gita 3.27 and Yoga Sutras 2.15-17 are example texts that might be used to support this problematic view (but need not be interpreted in this way).
  • [7] Aristotle implies something like this in Nicomachean Ethics Book VII, Chapter 3 (1147a25-1147b5).
  • [8] The published text outlining Jois’ method is his Yoga Mala. The method seems to be based on the method of Jois’ own teacher, T. Krishnamacharya, as he taught it to Jois in the 1930’s and 40’s (see Singleton, Yoga Body, p. 176). Krishnamacharya went on to teach in different ways (see Desikachar, The Heart of Yoga pp. 28-29).
  • [9] From the short essay “You Stop There” published January 22, 2015 [https://spaciousyoga.com/you-stop-there-lessons-from-sharath-jois/]
  • [10] For more on this see Iain Grysak’s “Teaching vs. Preaching: Embodiment as the Gateway to Authentic Understanding and Integration” published on December 5, 2018 [https://spaciousyoga.com/teaching-vs-preaching-embodiment/]
  • [11] This insight is based on comments made by Iain Grysak in a Pranayama Workshop held in November 2018.
  • [12] The insight that to-be-something is not a passive inheritance but an active doing can be explored in Aristotle’s Physics and Metaphysics, especially Metaphysics Theta (i.e., Book IX). Two recent, helpful interpretations of these arguments are Aryeh Kosman’s The Activity of Being and Jonathan Beere’s Doing and Being.

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/wellbeing-on-the-edge/feed/ 1 Teaching vs. Preaching: Embodiment as the Gateway to Authentic Understanding and Integration – by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/teaching-vs-preaching-embodiment/ https://spaciousyoga.com/teaching-vs-preaching-embodiment/#comments Wed, 05 Dec 2018 07:56:22 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=1912 One of my favorite fictional characters is John Oldman, from the “The Man from Earth” movie series. In the second installment of the series, John is a university professor of religious studies. Having had 14,000 years of experience to hone his discernment, he makes a particularly effective and popular teacher. Some of his students discover [...]

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One of my favorite fictional characters is John Oldman, from the “The Man from Earth” movie series. In the second installment of the series, John is a university professor of religious studies. Having had 14,000 years of experience to hone his discernment, he makes a particularly effective and popular teacher. Some of his students discover that he is 14,000 years old, a fact that he tries to keep hidden from the world. One of these students is particularly enthusiastic and frames John as the next messiah, asking him to share his message with the world. Having had plenty of opportunity in his lengthy life to experiment with different ways of sharing his massive accumulation and assimilation of knowledge and experience, John has learned from his past mistakes and he dispels his student’s hopes that he will be willing to fulfill the role she has envisioned for him by telling her: “I’m a teacher, not a preacher.”

That particular line stood out for me, as it encapsulates an important distinction between two very different ways of spreading and sharing information. This distinction is something that I have become increasingly aware of over the 20 years that I have been teaching yoga.

During the initial years of my time as a yoga teacher (and in the years before that), I had the habit of assuming that whatever “truths” I had discovered and benefited from would naturally apply to all other people in the same way they applied to me. Enthusiastic to share my insights, I was fond of doing so by telling people what they should or shouldn’t do in how they lived their lives. In other words, I had a habit of preaching.

My definition of preaching is: Giving another person instructions, based on the assumption that one understands that person better than that person understands himself, and is therefore more capable of making personal life decisions for that person than that person is himself.

Preaching is a common feature of human cultural pedagogy, and includes any solicited or unsolicited lifestyle “recommendations” that one imposes on others. Examples of this include: What religious or spiritual teaching to follow, what political beliefs to hold, what types of thoughts to think, what types of feelings to have, whom one should or shouldn’t have sex with or marry, what style of yoga to practice, what type of clothing to wear or what to eat for lunch on any particular day.

As a young adult, I frequently noted how widespread the habit of surrendering one’s autonomy and capacity to make informed personal decisions about one’s own life to an authoritarian figurehead was – whether that figurehead was a doctor, a parent, a priest, a scripture, a god, or a teacher. It perplexed and frustrated me that this habit was so widespread. I had always avoided this habit by considering the opinions and information given to me by those whom I perceived as “experts” in their particular field; but using that information as a part of my own decision-making process, rather than blindly accepting the information given to me by those experts. I noted many examples of instances when authority figures had made mistakes in their analyses, and I learned to hold my own understanding of myself and my own ability to make decisions for myself as being of the highest authority. It was extremely rare that I ever made a decision or choice that could potentially affect my well-being simply because someone told me to do so, without considering how I actually felt inside, in the realm of my own embodied experience, about that decision.

I also noted the plethora of intrapersonal and interpersonal effects that resulted from the surrendering of one’s personal autonomy and authority to an external authority and I recognized this as one of the main ills of fragmented, broken people and fragmented, broken societies and cultures. This unfortunate ill runs through all major societies and cultures of our world today. In “The Guru Papers – Masks of Authoritarian Power,” Joel Kramer and Diana Alstad recognize this ill as being one of the main symptoms of our species’ failure to mature in our process of cultural evolution. They suggest that we are trapped in a state of adolescence as a species, reliant on authority figures to inform us how to live, rather than taking responsibility for our own lives and our own decisions.

By cultivating critical thinking, discernment and embodiment throughout my life, I have largely avoided falling into the trappings of this ill on an interpersonal level. Nonetheless, by engaging in preaching myself, I was spreading the same ill on a cultural level by sharing my own personal truths and understandings with others in a way that undermined their autonomy. Once I began to realize that sharing my own insights in this way was contributing to the propagation of a deeply rooted human cultural dysfunction, I began to consciously shift the methods by which I shared my knowledge and experience. This shift was gradual, but a key point in this process came when I read the aforementioned “Guru Papers”. The implications of this book on my life were profound and it initiated an immediate and drastic shift in my worldview which percolated into the embodied experience of my life and actions in the world. I can pinpoint this as the time that I clearly and unequivocally understood the dangers of preaching. This was also the point where I ceased to identify as a Buddhist, which was the worldview that I had identified with (and preached to others) for the preceding decade. I also abandoned the delusion that any person, group of people, scripture, or organization in the world had any kind of special access to an irrefutable and universal “truth”, with respect to the nature of life, existence and morality.

In the time since then, I have been increasingly careful in both my personal life relationships and in my professional life teaching Mysore style Ashtanga yoga and pranayama, yoga and Buddhist philosophy, and embodiment to avoid preaching. Instead, I attempt to teach and share my experience in a way that empowers others to make more informed decisions about themselves and their roles within their relationships with the world, without the need to defer to an authority figure in that decision-making process. In my professional role as a teacher, I am careful to confine my teachings to technical aspects of the practices, and to avoid presenting conjectural opinions as if they were facts. I emphasize that the aspects of the practice which I teach can be used as tools to deepen one’s process of embodiment and subjective observation. This process naturally enhances one’s ability to make life decisions based on one’s own phenomenologically felt reality, rather than on the dictates of a scripture, teacher, culture, religion, etc.

My definition of teaching is: Sharing techniques or information in a way that allows and empowers a person to use those techniques or information to make their own informed personal decisions about their life.

A key dimension of the difference between preaching and teaching is the effect that the method of information transmission has on the recipient’s sense of trust and confidence in himself. If the information has been transmitted through the process of teaching, the recipient’s sense of confidence in his own subjective feeling based level of experience (which I sometimes refer to as animal or intuitive intelligence) should be strengthened. If the information is transmitted through preaching, on the other hand, it can have the opposite effect.

A key element of mind control is the undermining of the confidence of the subject in the accuracy of his own subjective experience. Once the subject is trained to stop trusting his own perceptions, and therefore his own decisions, his mind is ripe for the taking. This technique has been used by leaders of all sorts for millennia. Preaching has a similar effect. If the message of a preacher is in conflict with what one experiences at the phenomenological, sensation-based level in one’s intuitive animal intelligence, then one experiences an internal dissonance. In order to alleviate this dissonance, one must either reject the message of the preacher, or reject the phenomenological experience of one’s own intuitive intelligence.

A person’s subjective, internal experience can be mistrusted and rejected in favour of the message of a preacher, but it cannot be completely removed. If one chooses to reject one’s own intuitive intelligence and subjective experience, it becomes relegated to the background, where it lurks and exerts itself unconsciously. The self therefore becomes fragmented, with the conscious, adopted message of the preacher struggling continuously against the unconscious subjective intelligence of the self. This is how Jung’s “shadow self” is formed. The shadow self is sometimes mistaken to be the composed of only “negative” qualities, which one prefers not to acknowledge. In reality, the shadow self includes any aspect of the self, including positive and healthy aspects, which are not consistent with the preaching of one’s family members, teachers, peers, culture, or religion. Because these aspects of the self are not supported by the preaching of one’s greater social body, one banishes and suppresses them into a “dark” unconscious corner of one’s psyche and being.

One of the “goals” of yoga practice is to bring about a “union”, and so it must avoid any type of fragmentation or rejection of any aspects of the self. Any form of practice or preaching which promotes rejection or mistrust of some aspects of the self cannot possibly contribute to the process of union through yoga. When yoga teachers and other types of social leaders preach, rather than teach, they contribute to this process of fragmentation of the self and deepening of the shadow. This is unfortunately common in yoga and spiritual communities of today. We frequently see practitioners and teachers presenting themselves as an embodiment of a certain set of ideals which are fundamentally in opposition or conflict with what they are actually experiencing (and repressing into the shadows) inside themselves. The result of this fragmentation is inauthenticity and it leads to intrapersonal breakdown and many of the dysfunctional interpersonal dimensions that we can observe in today’s spiritual and yoga communities.

The importance of embodied, felt experience cannot be overemphasized in the process of authentically integrating and assimilating knowledge and understanding. A “truth” cannot be authentic unless we are actually feeling it in the body at the sensation-based phenomenological level; and doing so without giving preferential attention to certain feelings while rejecting other feelings. Embodiment means being aware of and immersed within everything that we feel at an organic, sensation-based level. Being embodied means BEING those sensations and feelings—not as an objective, disconnected observer, but as a subjective living, breathing and feeling experiencer.

One of the major fallacies of Buddhist practice is the assumption that it is possible for consciousness or awareness to remain objective and disconnected from the experience of sensation and feeling. Buddhist practice is often portrayed with the imagery of a battle, where objective awareness struggles to remain detached from the “enemy” of the subjective experience of volitional formations (sankaras/samskaras) around the field of the sensations and feelings of bodily experience. I have observed that many long-term Buddhist practitioners end up living a disembodied existence, with a deeply rooted—and sometimes carefully hidden—quality of self-loathing. The dualistic worldview of Buddhism—where the self paradoxically struggles to deny the reality of the self—ultimately produces a deeply fragmented and wounded sense of self.

Modern science falls into the same trap that Buddhism does, by working on the flawed premise of the possibility of objective, detached observation of the environment around us, without accepting that we are necessarily a subjective participant within a living, breathing, feeling environment. The result of this centuries-long experiment has been to propagate a struggle against more-than-human nature—rather than accepting that we ARE a subjective participant in the whole of nature—in the same way that the Buddhist struggles against his own volitional formations around his sensation and feeling based experience—rather than accepting that he IS a subjective part of his own sensations and experiences. The fragmented self-denial of the Buddhist is not unlike the broken relationship that we have with our dying planet, which we have created through our own deluded attempts to separate ourselves from being a part of the process of nature. Preaching—which asks one to deny one’s own subjective, sensation based experience—propagates this same process of fragmentation and disconnection from the truth and authenticity of the self.

Questions are sometimes raised about horrible atrocities, such as the mass genocides which have taken place throughout the (often ugly) history of our species. People often wonder how those who committed those atrocities could have done so. Even if they were “just following orders”, how could they not have known what they were doing was wrong? How could they not have rejected the orders? The answer is that they stopped themselves from feeling. Only by cutting themselves off from being embodied and conscious in their deeper somatic feelings could they follow the orders—or preaching—of those commanding them. Interviews with those who have committed these types of crimes confirm this.

We are doing the same thing in our relationship with more-than-human world today. The murder and destruction of the living, breathing biosphere of the planet earth is no different from the horrific crimes that we have inflicted upon members of our own species. The preaching of our modern cultures, such as the primacy of economic growth at all costs, necessitates cutting ourselves off from the embodied experience of what it actually feels like to destroy and demolish everything around us as part of achieving that goal. For one who allows oneself to feel everything, the cries of pain of the embodied earth can be tangibly felt inside one’s own body as one moves through the landscape of the human induced destruction of this living planet, and participating in this destruction becomes an impossibility.

The preachers of “green technology” and “sustainable growth” also fall into the dualistic trap of separation. For these people, the more-than-human biosphere is still perceived as an objective, lifeless object which is to be integrated into the structure of our current social paradigms. To place “economic value” on forests, species or ecosystems or to refer to anything as a “resource”, does not help us to develop a connected, living, feeling embodied relationship with the more-than-human world. It is only through removing the dualistic separation of self and others, by subjectively feeling and participating in the embodied experience of the whole living earth, that true healing and union can take place.

Indigenous human societies (most of which are extinct now) cultivated intimate, feeling-based relationships with the more-than-human world around them. Those relationships were necessarily carried out at the embodied level of experience. Plundering and destroying the environment around them was unthinkable, because it would have felt as wrong as plundering or murdering their closest human relatives. If modern humans are to salvage a sustainable and respectable existence on this planet, we must reconnect to our own embodied feelings of aliveness and by extension of that, cultivate an embodied feeling based relationship with all that is around us. Only then, can we truly and authentically understand the nature of our lives and the appropriate ways to conduct ourselves within the network of relationships that constitutes the living system of this breathing planet.

Embodiment avoids the fragmentation of dualistic traps. Our sensations and feelings that we experience in the embodied state of aliveness are the closest thing to “truth” that we can access. When we accept all that we feel in our own embodied experience, there is nothing to reject and an authentic process of true integration takes place. Embodied experience can only happen here and now, in the present moment. This is the place where our deepest form of intelligence—the embodied, organic animal intelligence-resides and this is the place that any teaching must be assimilated and integrated into, if it is to be fully processed into a living, breathing, authentic truth. When our knowledge and our actions are integrated at this level, we are the most whole that we can be. The true experience of union and the deepest understanding of any teaching can only happen in the subjective state of embodied aliveness.

When teaching the yama and niyama of Patanjali or the panchasila of Buddhism, I attempt to do so in a way that encourages empowered decision making based on one’s own internal experience. Most religious and spiritual teachings contain some form of a list of “dos and don’ts”, and they are often preached as a list of commandments. Telling someone “not to kill” or “not to steal” seems reasonable enough, but if we do it in a way that promotes blind acceptance, without integration of that understanding at an embodied, feeling based level, then we still fall into the traps and dangers of preaching.

Interpretations of ethical teachings vary considerably and interpretations are necessarily rooted in the cultural conditioning of the interpreter. To avoid killing or violence, for example, seems simple enough on the surface, yet when we examine it more deeply, it becomes somewhat ambiguous. The process of being alive involves the consumption of other elements of the web of life. This necessarily means that we are involved in killing and violence on a daily basis. Is it acceptable to kill animals for food? What about plants? Or fungi? Is it okay to kill trees to use as building material for a home? What about to use as toilet paper? Should we kill bacteria that thrive on our soiled dishes and would make us sick if we consumed them and allowed them to proliferate inside our bodies? Where we draw the line to discern which forms of killing and violence are morally acceptable, and which are not, is somewhat arbitrary. Should we allow the preaching of a particular culture, scriptural interpretation or preacher dictate where this line is drawn for us? Or should we allow ourselves to be informed by our own internal sensation based intelligence in terms of which actions are appropriate or inappropriate?

The late ecophilosopher Arne Naess discussed a similar type of dilemma his book, “The Ecology of Wisdom”. He described the situation of a person struggling with the ethics of an act which is perceived to be morally wrong in the context of his cultural conditioning. This person struggles deeply against his subjective feeling based intelligence, which wants to engage in the act. He ultimately wins the struggle and stops himself from engaging in the act. He then consoles himself that he can “sleep well at night” because he “did the right thing”. But, did he really do the right thing, by suppressing some aspect of his own intuitive intelligence and wisdom so that he could remain in line with the moral preaching of his culture? Naess goes on to make a distinction between “acting ethically” and “acting beautifully”. He defines “acting ethically” as shaping one’s behaviour to be in line with the ethical standards of one’s culture, regardless of whether this honours and acknowledges the intelligence of one’s embodied subjective experience. He defines “acting beautifully” as allowing one’s own embodied feeling based intelligence to inform one’s behaviour, regardless of whether that behaviour falls within the parameters of the ethical expectations of one’s culture (I’ve paraphrased his definitions to fit into the context of this essay). The question then becomes: “Did you act ethically, and therefore preserve the preaching of your culture at the cost of repressing and denying the teaching of your own embodied intelligence? Or did you act beautifully, and follow the wisdom of your own embodied intelligence, regardless of whether you received the approval of your culture for doing so?”

Preaching prioritizes the dictates of a cultural or social entity over the subjective intelligence of the individual entity. Teaching prioritizes the subjective intelligence of the individual entity over the dictates of the cultural or social entity. Ideally, the two would be in balance, where the needs of an individual, as informed by his embodied sensation-based intelligence are somewhat consistent with the needs of his culture or social body. If there is excessive dissonance between the embodied intelligence of the individual and the standards of the social organization or culture, then it is likely a sign that the individual needs to bring about some bigger life changes in his interpersonal relationships, so that he can find a situation where the truth of his own intuitive sensation-based intelligence is more balanced with the standards and expectations of his culture or social body. In turn, the culture or social body can also attempt to harmonize their expectations and standards with those that are experienced at the feeling-based, embodied level of its individual members. If a culture or social organization can succeed in doing this, then it can be said to be teaching its members rather than preaching to them.

I attempt to teach yama and niyama as tools of embodiment. For me, they are not a set of rules to be preached or blindly followed, based on someone else’s interpretation of how they apply to our personal life situations. In my interpretation, yama and niyama refer to potential situations in our ongoing relationships with our environment where we may need to bring more embodied awareness to how we feel inside, at the sensation-based level, when considering how we should conduct ourselves within those social relationships. Rather than preaching a black and white / right or wrong approach, I suggest a process of deeper sensitization and allowing one’s felt experience to guide one’s actions in the world. In this way, we take responsibility for our actions and relationships by continuously staying in touch with how we feel inside, and we use this embodied awareness as feedback for modifying our actions and relationships. How yama and niyama apply to our personal life situations is always going to be contextual, and we should be able to make our own decisions, informed by our subjective, embodied intelligence with confidence.

Ultimately, being taught will promote a union of the layers of the self, with the new knowledge consolidated and assimilated in the subjective intelligence at the embodied, feeling level of experience. This generates empowerment and wholeness of the self and leads to healthy and functional relationships with the world. Being preached to will promote fragmentation of the self through a rejection or repression of one’s embodied, feeling-based experience. This leads to disempowerment of the self and propagates the dysfunctional social structures that rule human societies today.

Acknowledgements

  • Thank you to Clayton Loizou for helpful editing and suggestions about the article.
Ashtanga Immersion course with Iain in Ubud, Bali
Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/teaching-vs-preaching-embodiment/feed/ 11 Nature Spirits – by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/nature-spirits/ https://spaciousyoga.com/nature-spirits/#comments Fri, 12 Jan 2018 09:15:55 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=1830 Spirit emerges and evolves out of the complex web of relationships which comprise the self-organizing intelligence of nature. No entity or organism exists as an independent island. An entity exists by means of its participation in relationship with other entities within a dynamic higher order system. An entity's network [...]

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Spirit emerges and evolves out of the complex web of relationships which comprise the self-organizing intelligence of nature.

No entity or organism exists as an independent island. An entity exists by means of its participation in relationship with other entities within a dynamic higher order system. An entity’s network of relationships with all that is “other” is part and parcel of the essence of the entity itself.

Nature is an intelligent evolutionary process. She is always moving, changing and evolving. She is never static or fixed. She is a person, a being, a spirit. Her innate intelligence is an emergent product of the complex patterns which spontaneously form in her web of self-organizing networks of systems within systems within systems.

Soul, spirit and self-awareness are real, perceptible and tangible phenomena which emerge out of the complexity of this self-organizing intelligence. They are properties of all complex, self-organizing systems which occur in nature, at all levels of the hierarchy of systems embedded within systems. They are not the sole property of human beings.

The inert materialism of modern reductionist science and rational analysis views the emergent magic of soul and self to be an illusion.

Supernatural religions and spiritualties view the magic of soul and self as something separate from material nature which must be infused into the organic embodied intelligence of our material existence.

Both of these erroneous perspectives developed from the modern (post-neolithic) human trend of forsaking direct phenomenological relationship with non-human nature. Both perspectives fail to recognize that being participant in the web of relationships within the system of Gaia is inseparable from the essence of being human.

The worldviews of those humans who remain in direct, participatory and felt relationship with the whole of the living earth apprehend the essence of soul and self correctly. It is only through one’s direct phenomenological experience – which necessarily means actively feeling one’s relationships with all that is “other” – that one can truly perceive the nature of reality.

All entities are people. The planet Earth is a person, whom some have named Gaia. Ecosystems, Mountains and Rivers are also people, whom some have named various nature spirits. A rock or a fallen tree, covered in colourful hairy moss and lichen is also a person. No one put the moss on the log, or gave the log to the moss. The moss and the log co-created each other through synergistic relationship within a stable but shifting system. The person that they co-create has spirit and soul.

Natural evolution never rests, is never still, and is always pulsing forward, hungry in her creative impulse. She continues to manifest novel and complex forms of spirits, souls and people. For those who spend time in consciously felt, phenomenological relation with the more than human world, this magical reality reveals itself. It speaks clearly to those who are able to open their sense doors and listen, feel and connect with all that is “other”.

Matter is not inert. It is full of magic, spirit and soul. Yet, this magic emerges from within matter itself. No external agent or supernatural creator is involved.

This is the new materialism, the new animism, the magic of our existence and life among so many other different types of lives and people. It is a perceptual path and worldview that can lead us back into integrated and sustainable existence within our home of the living person Gaia.

Acknowledgements

  • The photographs were taken while descending from the top of the 4600 m Zatra La to the town of Lukla at 2800 m on the final day of a 23 day mountaineering expedition to Mera Peak in Nepal. The people in the photographs inspired the content of the article, which was written on my phone the following morning, while in the Lukla airport waiting for our flight back to Kathmandu.
  • Aside from a few helpful edits by Clayton Loizou, the article is unaltered from what was written on my phone that morning, straddling the gulf between wilderness and human civilization.
Ashtanga Immersion course with Iain in Ubud, Bali
Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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]]> https://spaciousyoga.com/nature-spirits/feed/ 2 Brahmacharya: Exploring Relationship From an Animist and Systems Perspective – by Iain Grysak https://spaciousyoga.com/brahmacharya-exploring-relationship-from-an-animist-and-systems-perspective/ https://spaciousyoga.com/brahmacharya-exploring-relationship-from-an-animist-and-systems-perspective/#comments Sat, 21 Oct 2017 06:14:28 +0000 http://spaciousyoga.com/?p=1792 The term "brahmacharya" is found in both the Sanskrit and Pali languages of ancient India. It is listed amongst Patanjali’s five yamas and the Buddha’s panchasila, both of which address the ethical or behavioural aspects of the sphere of spiritual practice. Brahmacharya is commonly interpreted as pertaining to control or restraint in the exchange [...]

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The term “brahmacharya” is found in both the Sanskrit and Pali languages of ancient India. It is listed amongst Patanjali’s five yamas and the Buddha’s panchasila, both of which address the ethical or behavioural aspects of the sphere of spiritual practice. Brahmacharya is commonly interpreted as pertaining to control or restraint in the exchange of sexual energy. The specific details of this prescription of control or restraint vary from tradition to tradition and are generally biased towards the prevailing standards of the culture within which the tradition is embedded.

Human conceptualization and interpretation always occur through a cultural filter. To claim otherwise would indicate a deep misunderstanding of the nature of the human mind. My interpretations of scriptural concepts tend to be personalized. I do not perceive scriptures as unquestionable ancient truths which are carved in stone, but as malleable and fluid concepts which can be reinterpreted and moulded to fit into novel and emergent contexts. I have my own way of perceiving reality and my place therein, which isn’t fully consistent with any of the worldviews expounded in the scriptures of the major religions, cultures and spiritual systems of the world. I do not attempt to mould my personal behavior and inner logic in a way that makes it consistent with someone else’s prescribed version of truth. Instead, I prefer to actively reinterpret some of the common concepts from certain spiritual and cultural traditions in a way that consolidates my own subjective and inwardly felt understanding. In so doing, I maintain a sense of wholeness within myself and my relationship with the world.

I use the term “authenticity” to describe the aforementioned process of giving precedence to one’s innate internal logic and comprehension, especially if one allows this internally generated truth to guide one’s actions and behaviour in one’s relationships with the rest of the world. Authenticity often flies in the face of socially and culturally accepted norms, since these cultural norms represent an external consensus rather than genuine internal truth. Attempting to adopt a worldview, a behavioural code or a way of being that is inconsistent with one’s own personal nature is to do a great violence unto oneself, and to create a deep internal conflict and rift which serves only to fragment oneself. I classify attempts to shape one’s behavior and worldview in a way that is inconsistent with one’s phenomenological experiences to be “inauthentic.” Unfortunately, most people in the world engage in this unhealthy form of practice for the sake of cultural and religious conformity and belonging. I feel that an authentic seeker of truth should avoid doing this, regardless of the social hardships which may result from expressed and engaged authenticity.

Brahmacharya is one of the concepts that I have taken liberty to actively reinterpret. Normally, brahmacharya is restricted to a sense of boundary and restriction in the sphere of sexual exchange between human beings. I prefer to think of brahmacharya as broadly applying to a greater sense of responsibility and felt awareness in the entirety of the field of our relationships with “others” – whether those others are human or not. Modern (i.e., post-neolithic) religion and spirituality is hyper-focused on human beings, and in particular on human sexual energy. This is not surprising, as modern religion arose primarily as a tool to control and coordinate large groups of human beings by uniting them under a common worldview, purpose and code of moral conduct. One of the most effective ways to control a person is to control their sexual energy.

When the concept of brahmacharya is expanded to bring greater awareness and feeling – and hence responsibility – to the entire sphere of our interactions with others, it allows profound insight about human nature to emerge. When brahmacharya is reduced to forced control in the sphere of exchange of sexual energy, it becomes shallow and misleading, and can constrain one’s understanding of human nature to the sphere of social control.

“Born out of Nature” by Edward Foster

Human organisms are in a continuous process of exchange with our environment. We are engaged in “intercourse” with our environment 24 hours a day, for as long as we remain alive. Our environment includes everything that could be defined as “other” than us. This includes other human beings, other animals, other forms of biotic life, and all of the “non-living” aspects of the world which we are a part of – the rocks, the wind, the water, etc. In other words, one’s environment is everything that one is not.

The informational exchange that takes place between a living organism and its environment is both physical and energetic. This exchange flows both ways – we are simultaneously the giver and the receiver of energy – and this reciprocal flow within the relationship between the self and its environment doesn’t pause for a moment for as long as we are alive. When one abides in an embodied state, this fact is clearly felt at the experiential level. For pre-agricultural humans with an animist worldview and a deeply felt communion with the rest of the living Earth, this fact would have been a given and would not have required explanation. In modern times, the disembodied, abstract and objectified human-centric realm that we have created, and that most of us dwell in, makes it easy to lose sight of our perpetual communion with our environment.

There is a discernible distinction between oneself and one’s environment. Yet, because of the perpetual continuity of the reciprocal flow of information and substance between the self and the environment, it is truly impossible to define oneself outside of the context of one’s environment. On one hand, we are autonomous autopoietic units and we are recognizably distinct from our environment. At the same time, we ARE our environment. To truly understand human nature, it is important to be able to hold this dialectical perspective of seemingly opposite points of view.

In his excellent book “The Biology of Wonder”, Andreas Weber points out that we do not “process” the elements of our environment which we consume in the way that a machine, such as an engine does. An engine burns carbon based fuels in order to extract a form of energy that moves its pistons. The waste product of this combustion is then released into the environment as carbon monoxide. It is important to understand that the actual structure of the engine does not change through this process. The engine is not in communion or intercourse with its environment – it is using the environment to drive its function as an engine. The atoms and molecules which composed the engine at the time that it was built will still be present in the engine 10, 20 or 50 years later. The structure of the engine does not change through its process of using the environment. The engine is built with a specific purpose by a creator, and placed into its environment to complete a particular task.

Modern science and religion have both taken a similar perspective of role of the human being with respect to its environment. However, upon closer examination it becomes clear that the machine analogy does not obtain for the relationship between a living being and its environment. We do not extract energy from our environment to fuel our bodies in the way that a machine does. Nor are we placed into a pre-existing environment to serve a particular purpose. A human being interacts with its environment in a completely different and more intimate way than a machine does.

The human being actually merges with its environment during its interaction or “intercourse” with it. During cellular respiration, the cell does not “burn” carbon-based sugar to move or fuel its parts in the way that an engine does. The cell integrates the molecules of the sugar into its actual physical structure. The food that is consumed by a living being becomes part of the structure of the body, and part of the process of re-creating the being. Similarly, we do not excrete waste products from a combustion reaction type of process in cellular respiration. The cell breaks down parts of its actual structure, and excretes them as carbon dioxide. Actual physical parts of the being become part of the environment around it. If we examine a human body, the atoms and molecules that compose the structure of the human body are constantly changing. Every molecule in the body is replaced over a relatively short period of time. The human continuously recreates itself from its environment, and the environment similarly recreates itself from the human. Although there is a discernible distinction between the two, they are so intimately intertwined that they are part of a unified process and truly inseparable. I think that “intercourse” is a very appropriate way to describe this intimate process of exchange and co-creation, hence my application of the term brahmacharya to this process of reciprocal exchange within relationship.

Another way to understand the reciprocity of the relationship between the human self and its environment is to look at the role and function of an individual cell within a human body. Each cell has a semi-permeable membrane, which serves as a boundary by which it defines itself with reference to the rest of the environment of the human body. This membrane also serves as a gradient through which it is constantly exchanging information and substance with the rest of the human organism in a complex and dynamic interplay. Francisco Varela and Humberto Maturana considered the cell to be the fundamental unit of life in their theory of autopoiesis. For them, the cell is the fundamental unit of a “self”. The cell is an autonomous entity which continuously re-creates itself through its relationship of exchange of information and substance with its environment. Yet, the cell does not and cannot exist outside of the context of the whole of its environment. Remove a particular individual cell from a human body, and it will quickly die. The cell is an individual, autonomous “self”, yet it only exists as a self when it is functioning within relationship to the whole that it is a part of. The cell is an individual self of its own, yet it is also the human body.

Human beings have a membrane or boundary by which we define ourselves with respect to our environment. We are also semi-permeable and continuously re-creating ourselves through the exchange of information and substance with our environment. We are autonomous and independent selves, yet we also cannot exist or have meaning as selves outside of the context of our relationship with our environment. We are perpetually in the deepest form of intercourse with our environment and we literally ARE our environment.

“Tree of Life” by Edward Foster

One of the fundamental shortcomings of traditional reductionist science is that it approaches the environment as a static, objectified “thing” which we, as observers, can somehow remove ourselves from and study as if we are not a part of it, an influence upon it, or influenced by it. This same category of mistake is also made by the major modern religions of the world. All major post-neolithic religions view human beings as having been placed into an objectified environment for some divine spiritual purpose or mission. According to these human-centric religions, the ultimate goal of the spiritual path is to successfully abstract one’s true essence out of the tangle of the surrounding environment. Whether this manifests in attaining heaven (as in Western monotheistic religions), or in piercing the illusory veil and understanding that the environment is self-projected and unreal (as in Eastern oneness religions), all modern religions make the same fundamental error that reductionist science does, by interpreting the human being as an autonomous unit, which is somehow separate from, more special than, or fundamentally different with respect to our environment. We could refer to this fundamental error as the “anthropocentric part-whole fallacy”.

We shape and define our environment through our physical and informational exchanges with it. Simultaneously, the environment shapes and defines who and what we are. Rather than thinking of ourselves and our environment as subject and object, real and unreal, creator and created, or otherwise separated things, it would be more appropriate and accurate to think of our environment as a whole of which we humans are a participatory part. We aren’t placed INTO this world. We arise FROM it and WITH it, and are inextricably intertwined in relationship with it.

In systems thinking, the parts and the whole co-create one another in a reciprocal circular relationship which transcends the linear causality of reductionist science and religion. The parts define and generate the whole through their interrelationships with one another, while at the same time the emergence of the whole defines and generates the parts which the whole requires in order to exist and experience itself. In a system, the parts and whole are so tightly interwoven and interdependent, that the true nature of any one particular aspect of the system can only be properly understood by examining it within the context of its network of relationships. These relationships are fundamental to any valid definition of the thing itself. Without its relationships, any given thing cannot exist. So it is also with humans and our environment. Attempting to abstract ourselves, escape from, transcend, or remove ourselves from our environment – physically, conceptually, or spiritually, is to deeply misunderstand the truth of who and what we are.

This systems perspective is currently the most accurate way to view the nature of a human being and its environment – spiritually/religiously and scientifically. A human being – whether we are examining its physical biology, its psychology, its “soul”, or its existential purpose – cannot be accurately understood outside of its manifold relationships with its environment. The human being and its environment co-create and co-define one another and together they make up the greater whole of the entity of the living Earth and its journey through billions of years of organic evolution. To attempt to define or understand anything about a human being outside of the context of its living and breathing network of relationships within the whole of our organic home on this planet is meaningless and represents a fundamental error in understanding reality. Our dynamic and organic relationships to and through our environment are actually the most fundamental aspect of who and what we are and they are what gives us existential meaning.

The animist worldviews of our pre-neolithic ancestors (sapiens, as well as our extinct cousins of the homo genus) were likely consistent with the systems perspective of human nature. I would go so far as to suggest that certain aspects of animism are the subjectively “felt” or emotional-phenomenological dimension of the conceptual theories of modern systems sciences. The two – systems sciences and animism – fit together well, and when combined they give a fairly complete understanding (rational-conceptual as well as emotional-phenomenological) of human existence.

“Seeking Paradise” by Edward Foster

The mistake of abstracting and conceptually separating ourselves from our environment likely began with the advent of agriculture some 12 000 years ago or so. The engineering of human-created agricultural ecosystems and the accompanying convention of ownership and property likely initiated a sense of separation between the human world and the rest of the Earth. Thus were born the stratified concepts of “human” and “environment” which prior to 12 000 years ago, probably did not exist. This conceptual rift would have grown wider and wider as modern human civilization and its engineering technologies developed. As we lost our conception of our place as a participatory part in the system of processes of the whole of nature, we began to see ourselves as something special and separate from nature, who had the right to objectify and attempt to control nature for our own purposes and uses. The objectifying worldviews of the major religions and reductionist science evolved out of this trend of modern human thought and perception, and have reinforced and propagated this trend in a multi-millennia-long experiment in cognitive bias. After a few millennia of self-reinforcing amplification of this conception of ourselves, we have arrived at the monumental rift of separation and alienation from the rest of the planet Earth that we experience today – and the resulting precipice of climatic and environmental change which may be sufficient to extinguish human life forever.

Modern religion has traditionally done an excellent job of uniting, controlling and organizing large groups of human beings through a common purpose. Reductionist science has revealed incredible knowledge about the inner workings of the parts that compose the whole of nature and life. It has harnessed this knowledge to engineer technologies that even our most recent ancestors would never have dreamed possible. Both of these achievements – to unite massive numbers of people in working towards a common purpose and to harness the forces of nature to create truly miraculous inventions – are a testament to the power and potential of our species. Yet, in spite of (and because of) these achievements, human civilization now finds itself on the brink of real catastrophe. We have proliferated and applied our technologies so wantonly and without foresight that we have permanently altered our environment to the extent that it may well become uninhabitable for our own species within the next few centuries. This reality is now publicly accepted to the extent that very few people deny the predictions about climate change and environmental degradation. Yet, humans go on with business as usual, without even considering the very radical changes in our relationship to our environment that would be necessary to avert this ongoing disaster. From my perspective, this is fundamentally a problem of brahmacharya. We are not engaging appropriately or responsibly in our relationships with everything that is “other” – our environment.

The only way to alter the trajectory that we are currently on is a dramatic shift in worldview. More wonders of science and engineering or greater faith in the post-neolithic religions are not going to help us from damaging or altering the system which we are a part of to the extent that we can no longer be functionally integrated into it. The prevailing modern worldviews are not going to help us, because they fundamentally misunderstand and misperceive the existential meaning and purpose of being human. As long as we sustain our perception of the stratification of the human world and “the environment”, we will remain fundamentally misaligned with reality and it won’t be possible to re-establish a healthy and sustainable network of relationships with all of the other parts within the dance of life that is the organism of Earth.

We need a new worldview which recognizes that humans are real, autonomous entities, yet are also interwoven into the greater whole of “nature” or “Gaia” to the extent that we ARE nature. We are not any more special, privileged or meaningful than the other elements of the whole. The other animals, the trees, the rocks, the rivers, and the wind are all animate, and are all a part of us and who we are. Our dynamic interplay with all the parts creates the web of life, and at the same time we are all created by the web of life.

Animist cultures tend to live with an awareness of the necessity of regulating their interactions with the environment in the context of their relationships within a greater whole. By perceiving their role as a part within the context of a whole, they are mindful of the nature of their interconnections with all of the other parts, and the necessity of keeping all of these functional relationships healthy and viable. Rather than seeing the environment as something that is “other” and something to manipulate, exploit and consume to serve their own selfish interests for unchecked growth and proliferation, they see the environment as something that they participate in and are an inseparable part of. Every aspect of the environment is something to be deeply respected. Every plant, every animal, every rock, every breath of air is something sacred, to be treated with reverence and with as much respect and care as one would treat a part of one’s own body or one’s sexual partner. For me, this is the essence of animism, and this is the essence of brahmacharya.

Reinterpreting brahmacharya from this animist perspective is to work with respect, awareness, and reverence in the way we play the boundary between ourselves and that which is other. Brahmacharya applies not only in how we conduct ourselves sexually with other human beings, but in how we conduct ourselves in EVERY interaction with something that could be classified as “other.” It is to recognize that we are separate and autonomous selves, yet at the same time, we ARE our interactions and relationships with the other parts of the whole. Understanding the self ultimately means understanding how the self plays in relationship to the whole.

One could interpret the highest form of brahmacharya as finding the essence of interconnectedness in sexual union with another human being. But, we can also experience brahmacharya by feeling the essence of interconnectedness which exists in every aspect of our relationship with our environment. Every exchange that we have – every bite of food and every breath of air that we consume, every piece of information that we receive or take from other humans or other animals or from the wind or the trees – is an aspect of brahmacharya. Every impact we make on the world around us – everything we excrete back into the environment, how we walk on the ground, how we exhale, or what forms of information we give back to the environment – are all aspects of brahmacharya. For me, practicing brahmacharya is to take responsibility for each and every interaction and exchange that we have, and to understand that this exchange is happening 24 hours a day. We create the environment that we live in, and the environment creates us. We are inseparable from our environment. It is who and what we are. It is a reflection of ourselves. To understand this, to experience this, and to truly live in a way that honors this reality is to practice brahmacharya properly.

Once we understand this, we can examine every interaction that we engage in with our environment, and ask ourselves whether that interaction is reciprocal, functional, and healthy for the whole, or whether that interaction is consumptive, exploitative, and ultimately damaging to the whole, and therefore alienating and ultimately harmful for ourselves. It can be difficult to face the fact that modern human agricultural, industrial, and technological society has taken the path of exploitation, damage and alienation. As participants in modern human society, it is nearly impossible to avoid treading the path of the legacy that our ancestors have laid down for the past 12 000 years. But, awareness is the first step. Only by becoming more aware of our individual interactions on small scale, moment to moment levels, and guiding our personal spiritualities and worldviews back towards the Earth and our inseparable relationship with it, can we hope to generate an ethical momentum that promotes internal and external consistency and wholeness. Every interaction we have with our environment counts. Every action we engage in is felt by the living whole and contributes to the shape and quality of the whole. In turn, this also shapes us and who and what we are. Even if the effect of each individual human is negligible in the grand scale of things, I feel we have an ethical duty to act in a way that brings awareness to all of our interactions. This ethical attitude represents brahmacharya.

“The Nectar of Life” by Edward Foster

Relationship occurs through our felt embodied existence. We engage in intercourse with our environment through our organs of perception and action. If we are to practice brahmacharya by bringing more awareness to our relationships and to our exchanges of information and substance with our environment, the only way do so is to develop our sensitivity and capacity to feel in the embodied state.

Humans have progressively objectified and separated themselves from the rest of the organic living Earth over the past 12 000 years, so it is no coincidence that we have similarly attempted to abstract ourselves away from our own organic living bodies. Modern science has explored the theory that the body is nothing more than a linear causal process which arises out of inert, lifeless matter. Modern religions view the body and its natural instincts and feelings as an obstacle or temptation which gets in the way of our path to liberation or heaven. It is common for practitioners of yoga, meditation or other spiritual traditions to subscribe to the view that the goal is to transcend or overcome the physical body. The body is seen as belonging to the realm of the “lower self” and if indulged in, it leads in the opposite direction of liberation and freedom. Just as modern humans separated themselves from “nature” and began to view it is threatening, hostile, and something to be conquered and subdued through modern technology and civilization, so also we have come to view the physical reality of our own bodies with an identical attitude.

Our attempts to subdue and control nature for our own selfish desires and purposes are backfiring. Eventually, the living Earth will rebalance itself in a way that may make it inhospitable for human life. Similarly, a person who wages war against their own physical body cannot possibly expect to attain health, freedom or peace.

The pathway back home to the Earth must begin with our own bodies. If we intend to deepen and resensitize our connection to the rest of the living Earth so that we can form more appropriate and reciprocally beneficial relationships with it, we must first do that with our own bodies. Before we can drop back into and love the Earth, we must drop back into and love our bodies. If the Earth and all of its beautiful parts are to be revered and considered sacred, as they are in animist belief systems, then our own body must also be treated and perceived with the same quality of reverence. This means embracing our physicality as a vital and essential aspect of who and what we are. To feel this reverence for our organic physicality is an aspect of embodiment.

Embodiment does not mean paying more attention to the body. It does not mean taking care of the body, or being “in” the body. We do not own the body. It is not a house or a vehicle. These concepts, though perhaps well intentioned, still approach the body as an object which is fundamentally separate from our true essence. It is analogous to those who promote human beings as stewards or caretakers of the Earth. Again, this is a well intentioned concept, but it ultimately perpetuates the sense of separation or otherness between human beings and the rest of organic life.

True embodiment means accepting and experiencing that we ARE the body. The fundamental essence of human nature is that we are physically embodied beings. Any spirituality that attempts to take us away from this truth by denying the ultimate reality of our physicality can only lead to inner conflict and suffering. All of the magic and wonder of human existence happens through our physical existence. Body, mind and spirit are not separate things. They are just different aspects of one flowing process which is life. Similarly, human beings are not separate from the rest of our environment. We are just another manifestation of the creative impulse of nature itself. We ARE the Earth, we ARE nature, we ARE the environment. When one establishes an appropriate experience and perception of one’s own body, the experience of being in perpetual intercourse and communion with the rest of the living Earth flows effortlessly and naturally.

This is the “integration” that yoga and meditation help to bring about for me. I do not believe in eastern versions of enlightenment or liberation or western concepts of heaven. Suffering is an inherent part of being alive. There is nothing to fear about suffering and there is no way to escape from or transcend it. Coming to terms with suffering, rather than striving for an unattainable state of freedom from suffering, is a more grounded, effective and integrated way to exist. Embracing all of the joys and pains and the infinite variations in feeling that the human being is capable of experiencing, is to embrace the participatory essence of life itself. To be fully embodied in ourselves is to be fully embodied in the process of life and to fully experience this entire range of feeling. It is only in this state of being that we can practice brahmacharya – relationship – with the necessary sensitivity.

All of the wisdom of billions of years of organic evolution is contained within this body and this Earth. The abstract concepts and ideas that have arisen from the human intellect are much more recently evolved. The deeper, older, and wiser secrets of life can only be found – felt – by tuning in to the organic resonance of the living, breathing Earth, via our own highly sensitive human bodies. It is our bodies that are capable of listening, and receiving this wisdom. Relationships must be phenomenologically felt, and only with our bodies can we feel.

I often hear yoga practitioners speak condescendingly about others who focus on asana as a physical practice. “For him, it is just a PHYSICAL practice…” is one of the most insulting things one can say in the yoga world. I feel that ALL practices which lead us to the truth of human nature are physical. Ashtanga asana practice and Vipassana meditation are two of the most potentially powerful sensitizing and embodying techniques that exist. I have used both techniques as methods of embodiment for nearly 20 years, and for me they are simply two different aspects of the same process of spiritual and organic embodiment. The sensitivity and intuitive organic understanding which develops through long-term engagement with these practices has led me to realize that ALL of the practices are physical. Brahmacharya is also a physical practice. Not because we are using willpower to physically restrain ourselves, but because responsible, authentic, felt relationship can only occur through the attuned and sensitized physical body.

Animals understand this instinctively. Watching an animal move through and engage with its natural environment is pure yoga. The animal is instinctively one with its environment. There is no conceptual separation, there is only embodied wisdom in action. The deepest experiences in a yoga or meditation practice occur under the same conditions, when we fully drop into and surrender to the embodied wisdom of the organic, intuitive body and breath and simply flow in that state, free from the agonizing separation that occurs with the delusions of the conceptualizing mind. Nature is enlightened. Our bodies and breath are enlightened. We need to find our way back into that state of organic wisdom and being.

“Towards Enlightenment” by Edward Foster

Acknowledgements

  • Thank you to visionary artist Edward Foster, for once again allowing me to reproduce images of his beautiful paintings for this article. I also used Edward’s art in my Becoming Animal article. His artwork resonates strongly with the way I perceive human nature and our world. Please visit his website to see more of his artwork.
  • Thank you to Clayton Loizou for helpful editing and suggestions about the article.

Other language translations

  • The Polish translation of this article can be found here. Thanks to Marek Łaskawiec for the Polish translation.
Ashtanga Immersion course with Iain in Ubud, Bali
Daily Mysore practice with Iain in Ubud, Bali

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