Hopefully we have all internalized (or are beginning to realize that we ought to) the idea that each yogi and yogini should approach his or her practice without regard to what others in the room are doing. The guy next to you might have his leg behind his head – so what? You happily proceed to do your own thing, oblivious and free, unconcerned with where that guy’s leg is, always listening to your own body and honoring your personal limits, recognizing today’s stop-points as temporary boundaries that present themselves differently with every practice.
Differently with every practice. The idea of an ever-changing fluidity is key to the evolution of the perfect posture, and perhaps one of the more difficult concepts for yogis whose physical practice has grown to include some of the more advanced asanas. Once we learn to, say, bind our hands behind the back in Marichiasana A, or push into a full backbend, are we thus obligated to achieve these postures in their all-embracing glory every time we practice? With each step forward are we merely further burdened by the pressure to always progress, to keep up, to “achieve?”
Of course not. An untold number of variables can potentially affect one’s ability to achieve certain physical postures on any given day: the weather, room temperature, state of mind, time of day, previous activities (have you been sitting in front of a computer all day, or playing basketball?), etc. Except we always want to do our “best,” often mistaking what is best for us with what will serve our ego most. The experience of either pride or dissatisfaction with a posture is the ego talking. The true self couldn’t care less how deep a forward bend is, or how unwavering a balance pose. The true self is happy just to be, is thankful for the posture in any incarnation.
When approached with this mindset, asana practice is respectful and non-competitive. The idea of competition should be avoided in our practice, even in relation to ourselves. We should not try to measure up to yesterday’s practice. With boundaries always potentially moving, each individual practice should be attended to with the same precision of care as if it were the very first. In this sense the perfect posture is always evolving, always different.
Arriving at each practice as though it is the very first actually makes for a deeper, more productive practice, but it entails the hoary struggle of dropping the ego at the door before stepping onto the mat. So your practice has to begin before it seems to have even truly begun, before you have brought body to breath or grounded your feet into the earth. Of course these subtle lessons contained within the physical practice – if we practice for very long – begin to blur the boundaries between asana and life. Before class we drop our egos at the door, or at least we try, which is a good step. Maybe sometimes we forget to pick them back up, leave class without them, and stroll on out to make the world a better place.
Namaste.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Sunday, March 23, 2008
THE PERFECT POSTURE
Yoga has a reputation to some outsiders as a contortionist’s craft. The uninitiated often claim they can’t “do” yoga because they lack the flexibility to twist themselves into the often misguided pop culture images of yogis as human pretzels. This standpoint, however, sidesteps the pivotal issue: yoga creates the limber bodies, the strong muscles, and the open minds enjoyed by its practitioners. It doesn’t happen the other way around. The incremental progress is achieved through a process of growth and discovery whereby subtleties the scope of a hair’s width gradually, with practice, become more obvious. Slowly we come to see, feel, and understand what was before invisible or perhaps frustratingly obtuse. Our bodies grow into the perfect posture through study and attention, through breath and focus. Usually this picture is vastly different for each person, and for each posture.
Yoga has an intriguing ability to challenge us how we need to be challenged. Sometimes this means introducing us to our limits and inviting us to respect them. This can create a sandy seat for the ego, but the whole point is to ultimately bring us to a place of serenity. If the ego needs to be harassed and humbled for the blissful journey to progress, yoga can oblige. So what if you’d like to go deeper into a posture than your body allows – your perfect pose is the place where you are perfectly aligned not only in body, but also in breath and in spirit. If you are grimacing in pain or addled with frustration, you are not doing yoga. Don’t work so hard!
This doesn’t mean don’t show up. The hard work – as well as the blissful reward -- is in the consistency, the dedication, the slow and steady. I once read somewhere that rather than the standard blocks we use in class, a more suitable prop is a book, from which one page is torn out for each practice, taking the given pose incrementally deeper, slowly and respectfully. This is yoga. There is no hurry.
We should nonetheless continue to work toward our goals, without respect to time. Age doesn’t matter, size doesn’t matter. On the mat we are introduced to ourselves in all of our glory, fear, ability, and uncoiled potential. Maybe we have trouble relaxing, maybe it’s an overly competitive nature we struggle with, maybe it’s lack of focus or fortitude or a sense of connection. Asana, if we let it, will guide us forever closer to true alignment on multiple levels.
Therein exists a limitless opportunity for growth, an invitation to the infinite. As we place our bodies in tune with our breath, learn to respect our personal limits, and relax into the place we’re meant to be, yoga happens. This is the perfect posture. And everyone is different.
Namaste.
Yoga has an intriguing ability to challenge us how we need to be challenged. Sometimes this means introducing us to our limits and inviting us to respect them. This can create a sandy seat for the ego, but the whole point is to ultimately bring us to a place of serenity. If the ego needs to be harassed and humbled for the blissful journey to progress, yoga can oblige. So what if you’d like to go deeper into a posture than your body allows – your perfect pose is the place where you are perfectly aligned not only in body, but also in breath and in spirit. If you are grimacing in pain or addled with frustration, you are not doing yoga. Don’t work so hard!
This doesn’t mean don’t show up. The hard work – as well as the blissful reward -- is in the consistency, the dedication, the slow and steady. I once read somewhere that rather than the standard blocks we use in class, a more suitable prop is a book, from which one page is torn out for each practice, taking the given pose incrementally deeper, slowly and respectfully. This is yoga. There is no hurry.
We should nonetheless continue to work toward our goals, without respect to time. Age doesn’t matter, size doesn’t matter. On the mat we are introduced to ourselves in all of our glory, fear, ability, and uncoiled potential. Maybe we have trouble relaxing, maybe it’s an overly competitive nature we struggle with, maybe it’s lack of focus or fortitude or a sense of connection. Asana, if we let it, will guide us forever closer to true alignment on multiple levels.
Therein exists a limitless opportunity for growth, an invitation to the infinite. As we place our bodies in tune with our breath, learn to respect our personal limits, and relax into the place we’re meant to be, yoga happens. This is the perfect posture. And everyone is different.
Namaste.
Sunday, March 16, 2008
MEDITATION
We’ve touched on the topic of meditation as one of the eight limbs of the Raja Yoga path outlined in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras. People are often intrigued by the idea of meditation, but find themselves stymied by the fact that the practice itself can be elusive and often difficult to begin. The beneficial effects, however, are frequently profound and life-changing. While I don’t have anywhere near the education or experience to consider myself an authority on the topic, I do have enough personal experience to at least offer my unique insights and opinions about the practice. Without the slightest hint of hesitancy I can affirm that daily meditation has improved the quality of my life: I have fewer bad days now, I experience much lower anxiety levels, and I feel more blessed. No small feat!
All this and I’m kind of a puny meditator. I fit my 20 – 25 minutes a day in where I can, rather than at a consistent time and place, which seems to be the typical recommendation. Occasionally I bump the time up to 30 minutes, but this is nothing compared to the people I know who rise at 4:30 every morning to sit for an hour and a half. I am at least consistent about the practice itself, and I can tell a difference when it is lacking from my life. Sometimes I actually crave it, on the occasional day when life seems to be swirling around my head like a wind-frenzied leaf, rather than emanating from me. On those days meditation is literally a tangible grounding place, a centered home with a mud room for the soul’s dirty boots and psychic loose change. On other days, most days, the days that are smooth and soft as air, I drop easily into the open space created by hours of sitting in stillness, as the world breezes past unmolested by worry and angst.
This continuation of the meditative state throughout daily life is one of the reasons that meditation is the gift that keeps on giving. We introduce ourselves to the meditative state during practice (of both asana, or the physical practice and dhyana, or meditation) in part so that we can access it at other times and thus achieve an overall more peaceful and balanced existence. Sometimes, however, meditation can feel like a tedious chore, and twenty minutes can metamorphose into something that feels more like four hours. During these times our minds are trained to accept the difficulty, to breathe through it, and to come out the other side stronger and more centered, still imbued with enhanced or renewed abilities to more easily navigate the journey of daily life. Whether a short-lived struggle or a blissful oasis, meditation yields favorable results. What an incredible gift we have the ability to give ourselves.
But how exactly are we supposed to meditate? So many styles and methods exist, and I personally believe the most important thing to do is pick one and go with it. A very accessible technique for beginners which I used myself when I was first getting started is to simply sit quietly with closed eyes and, breathing slowly and deeply, count your breaths, up to 42. Go longer if you like. This counting method provides an obvious focal point for the mind, while also articulating the importance of breath. Another straightforward approach is to simply sit quietly and focus on the breath, observing the life-tide moving into and out of your body, in and out, allowing the body, mind, and breath the opportunity to merge.
From here the sky’s the limit. Some schools practice meditation standing up with the eyes open. Some people chant mantra, either silently or audibly. Some use visualization techniques, gratitude practices, and internal dialogue with their higher selves. All of these methods require focus, practice, and dedication.
While it may seem appealing to test out a bunch of different meditation techniques and in a way get to “play” with them all, many experts liken this dabbling approach to going place to place trying to find water, digging a bunch of shallow wells. They say you’ll never find the water unless you stay in one spot long enough to plumb the source, practicing one style of meditation. All approaches are equally valid -- the important thing is the practice, not its definition, as each path will eventually wind its way to your soul’s interior zen-garden. You just have to stay on the path, patiently stepping one foot in front of the other. And always remember to breathe… .
Namaste.
Tuesday, March 11, 2008
SAMYAMA
This week we’ll travel beyond the more tangibly definable practices involving breath and posture, and delve into the ethereal world of meditation and enlightenment. Dharana, or concentration, was included with last week’s discussion, but it also belongs in a discussion of dhyana and samadhi. In fact, the three limbs of concentration, meditation, and enlightenment (dharana, dhyana, and samadhi) are together referred to as the practice of samyama in The Yoga Sutras.
Concentration is pretty easy, a concept most of us understand intuitively, but the other two facets of samyama are incredibly personal, as they occur entirely within the realm of an individual’s own psyche, and are therefore subject to limitless interpretation. I have found it very difficult to pin down a solid definition for either meditation or enlightenment, for although the Sutras in effect does define all of the eight limbs, the definitions are often akin to koans that leave the mind wrapping back around into itself. You know you’ve been shown something important, but just a whisper of an echo of the reality can be contained within mere words. The proof, as they say, is in the pudding.
It makes sense that concentration is a necessary step along the path to meditation, but what exactly is meditation? Put simply, it is just sustained concentration. It’s amazing how our monkey minds like so much to hop from tree to tree, even when we ask them nicely not to. I read somewhere that all it takes to achieve samadhi is the ability to sustain focus on the meditative object or idea for just twelve breaths. Last week I mentioned how yoga affords us the opportunity to start over when need be; the meditative limb virtually requires it, as the mind is pulled back, and back, and back again from the brink of distraction and returned repeatedly to the point of focus. People spend years, lifetimes, engaged in the practice of meditation, but very few are considered “masters.” So, through a continual effort at starting over, at gently reminding our minds (and by the way, who’s that beyond our minds, beyond our thoughts, asking our minds to quit being such monkeys?...) we learn to meditate, or at least we try again and again.
And eventually, hopefully achieve samadhi. Samadhi is actually described as a state of completely merging with the object of meditation, so that no distinction may any longer be perceived between the observer and the observed. This idea hints at the door to quantum physics that soon opens following the discussion of samyama in the Sutras. My personal interpretation of this idea of “absorption” is that this state provides a glimpse within the universal reality that, on a physical as well as a spiritual level, everything (all forms of matter, the air we breathe, and even our thoughts) exists as pure energy. In this light it doesn’t matter whether the object being meditated upon is a candle flame, or the sound of Om, or a mantra, or the breath. Because it’s all the same, it’s all energy, it is, if you prefer, all God -- so absorption in one is the same as absorption in another.
“Enlightened” individuals are often characterized as luminescent, bliss-filled beings hovering gracefully over the ground. Some experts in yoga philosophy suggest that the reality is much more accessible than the above image implies, that enlightened beings merely recognize the unity of all creation, they are one with the world in which they inhabit, and they flow easily and without resistance through the river of their lives. Others define this state as existing wholly in God-consciousness. Enlightened people no longer have to struggle, as they have learned to fully embrace the “oneness” experienced through meditative absorption. Before one achieves full enlightenment, however, individual, distinct moments of enlightenment may be experienced – perhaps we’ve all had them at one time or another?
These are obviously heady topics, and perhaps represent paths more oblique and seemingly impenetrable than some yogis care to explore. This is fine! It’s enough to let the ideas roll around unexamined in your consciousness if you so choose. Or you might, after investigating the more spiritual components of yoga, be inspired to begin a daily meditation practice. Yoga fits where you need it, whether that is only on the mat or inside of every moment of your daily life. It’s your life, it’s your yoga, you get to choose. Freedom. It’s a wonderful thing.
Namaste.
Concentration is pretty easy, a concept most of us understand intuitively, but the other two facets of samyama are incredibly personal, as they occur entirely within the realm of an individual’s own psyche, and are therefore subject to limitless interpretation. I have found it very difficult to pin down a solid definition for either meditation or enlightenment, for although the Sutras in effect does define all of the eight limbs, the definitions are often akin to koans that leave the mind wrapping back around into itself. You know you’ve been shown something important, but just a whisper of an echo of the reality can be contained within mere words. The proof, as they say, is in the pudding.
It makes sense that concentration is a necessary step along the path to meditation, but what exactly is meditation? Put simply, it is just sustained concentration. It’s amazing how our monkey minds like so much to hop from tree to tree, even when we ask them nicely not to. I read somewhere that all it takes to achieve samadhi is the ability to sustain focus on the meditative object or idea for just twelve breaths. Last week I mentioned how yoga affords us the opportunity to start over when need be; the meditative limb virtually requires it, as the mind is pulled back, and back, and back again from the brink of distraction and returned repeatedly to the point of focus. People spend years, lifetimes, engaged in the practice of meditation, but very few are considered “masters.” So, through a continual effort at starting over, at gently reminding our minds (and by the way, who’s that beyond our minds, beyond our thoughts, asking our minds to quit being such monkeys?...) we learn to meditate, or at least we try again and again.
And eventually, hopefully achieve samadhi. Samadhi is actually described as a state of completely merging with the object of meditation, so that no distinction may any longer be perceived between the observer and the observed. This idea hints at the door to quantum physics that soon opens following the discussion of samyama in the Sutras. My personal interpretation of this idea of “absorption” is that this state provides a glimpse within the universal reality that, on a physical as well as a spiritual level, everything (all forms of matter, the air we breathe, and even our thoughts) exists as pure energy. In this light it doesn’t matter whether the object being meditated upon is a candle flame, or the sound of Om, or a mantra, or the breath. Because it’s all the same, it’s all energy, it is, if you prefer, all God -- so absorption in one is the same as absorption in another.
“Enlightened” individuals are often characterized as luminescent, bliss-filled beings hovering gracefully over the ground. Some experts in yoga philosophy suggest that the reality is much more accessible than the above image implies, that enlightened beings merely recognize the unity of all creation, they are one with the world in which they inhabit, and they flow easily and without resistance through the river of their lives. Others define this state as existing wholly in God-consciousness. Enlightened people no longer have to struggle, as they have learned to fully embrace the “oneness” experienced through meditative absorption. Before one achieves full enlightenment, however, individual, distinct moments of enlightenment may be experienced – perhaps we’ve all had them at one time or another?
These are obviously heady topics, and perhaps represent paths more oblique and seemingly impenetrable than some yogis care to explore. This is fine! It’s enough to let the ideas roll around unexamined in your consciousness if you so choose. Or you might, after investigating the more spiritual components of yoga, be inspired to begin a daily meditation practice. Yoga fits where you need it, whether that is only on the mat or inside of every moment of your daily life. It’s your life, it’s your yoga, you get to choose. Freedom. It’s a wonderful thing.
Namaste.
Sunday, March 2, 2008
ASANA, PRANAYAMA, PRATYAHARA, AND DHARANA
We’re gradually working our way through the eight limbs of Raja Yoga, or the Royal Path, and just as yama and niyama fit snugly together as a unit, so do the four limbs we’ll cover this week. Ultimately, of course, all eight limbs are meant to function together, with each facet of the practice lending strength and integrity to the others.
We’re all familiar with asana, so I won’t spend much time on it here. Asana is the physical practice. It’s the primary focus of most yoga classes, composed of various postures, but the relationship of asana to pranayama, pratyahara, and dharana can easily be overlooked (or simply ignored, which is every practitioner’s right). So how exactly does asana relate to these other three limbs?
Intimately. There are those who say that without pranayama, or control of the breath, the physical practice is not really yoga. Rather, it’s just calisthenics – still good for you, but lacking enough spiritual oomph to really classify as yoga. I’m tempted to agree with this viewpoint, but I also believe that an individual’s yoga practice is such a personal thing that my piddly attempt at subjectively assigning a definition to what another person is doing could very well be misguided. So I won’t go there.
Suffice it to say that when I am involved with my own practice, I always include pranayama, primarily the ujjayi breath which is employed during Ashtanga practice. In a soft form or basic hatha class, pranayama can consist of simply focusing on the breath as it comes into and out of the body, as well as practicing other specific breathing exercises, such as robin’s breath or tension release breath. In either case -- maintaining the ujjayi breath throughout an entire practice, or simply maintaining focus on a full yogic breath – consistent pranayama coupled with asana both requires and enforces concentration, or dharana.
Through concentration and control of the breath during asana practice, the ability to disappear into the breath, to separate one’s self from the body, becomes more and more possible. These are the tools we use to hang out in any of the Warrior postures for an extended length of time, to sit in Chair indefinitely, to perform the umpteenth Sun Salutation. This is how we practice pratyahara, or separation of the self from the senses. Without focus, and without breath, I believe separation from sensory input would be virtually impossible.
The argument can be made that it’s possible to practice pratyahara simply through sitting in meditation, or even during Corpse posture. I certainly agree that if one is going to sit in meditation, then pratyahara is going to inevitably be involved, but the argument can also be made that the practice of asana, pranayama, pratyahara, and dharana are together intended to prepare a yogi or yogini to sit in meditation, which is dhyana, the seventh limb.
So, like most philosophical tenets, The Yoga Sutras present us with countless opportunities for interpretation. Some yogis believe that the “moving meditation” of a fully developed asana practice satisfies Patanjali’s prescription for meditation, or dhyana. On the other hand, like I said earlier, some believe that the first six limbs merely prepare the practitioner to sit in meditation, and to ultimately become enlightened. If you’ve ever tried to sit cross-legged in meditation, then you no doubt understand how physically challenging it can be. A weak, inflexible body is not adequately prepared for this task, as it requires a strong back, a strong core, and open hips, knees, and ankles. Of course, a chair or other suitable prop can be used, but the classic meditation posture is cross-legged or some version of lotus, on the floor. Regardless of your stance on the meditation issue, it does seem to form the bridge from the physical to the metaphysical, so we’ll save further discussion of dhyana for next week.
Mind over matter. Calmness and serenity in the face of difficulty. Moving meditation. These are the skills that eventually translate to our everyday lives, skills that allow us to drive happily in traffic jams, handle screaming toddlers with a sense of humor, and smoothly navigate the often murky waters of daily life. And days when we do lose it, when our tempers snap or we balk at the enormity of the realities with which we’re faced, we have our mat to bring us back to center, to remind us that life – like yoga, like meditation, like the perpetual cycle of one sunrise after another – is so often a process of starting over again. Yoga not only gives us permission to start over again when we need to, it gives us a place to start and a roadmap. One step leading to the next, with every step dependent on the others, every breath, every posture, every moment a new beginning.
May your practice be all of this for you. Namaste.
We’re all familiar with asana, so I won’t spend much time on it here. Asana is the physical practice. It’s the primary focus of most yoga classes, composed of various postures, but the relationship of asana to pranayama, pratyahara, and dharana can easily be overlooked (or simply ignored, which is every practitioner’s right). So how exactly does asana relate to these other three limbs?
Intimately. There are those who say that without pranayama, or control of the breath, the physical practice is not really yoga. Rather, it’s just calisthenics – still good for you, but lacking enough spiritual oomph to really classify as yoga. I’m tempted to agree with this viewpoint, but I also believe that an individual’s yoga practice is such a personal thing that my piddly attempt at subjectively assigning a definition to what another person is doing could very well be misguided. So I won’t go there.
Suffice it to say that when I am involved with my own practice, I always include pranayama, primarily the ujjayi breath which is employed during Ashtanga practice. In a soft form or basic hatha class, pranayama can consist of simply focusing on the breath as it comes into and out of the body, as well as practicing other specific breathing exercises, such as robin’s breath or tension release breath. In either case -- maintaining the ujjayi breath throughout an entire practice, or simply maintaining focus on a full yogic breath – consistent pranayama coupled with asana both requires and enforces concentration, or dharana.
Through concentration and control of the breath during asana practice, the ability to disappear into the breath, to separate one’s self from the body, becomes more and more possible. These are the tools we use to hang out in any of the Warrior postures for an extended length of time, to sit in Chair indefinitely, to perform the umpteenth Sun Salutation. This is how we practice pratyahara, or separation of the self from the senses. Without focus, and without breath, I believe separation from sensory input would be virtually impossible.
The argument can be made that it’s possible to practice pratyahara simply through sitting in meditation, or even during Corpse posture. I certainly agree that if one is going to sit in meditation, then pratyahara is going to inevitably be involved, but the argument can also be made that the practice of asana, pranayama, pratyahara, and dharana are together intended to prepare a yogi or yogini to sit in meditation, which is dhyana, the seventh limb.
So, like most philosophical tenets, The Yoga Sutras present us with countless opportunities for interpretation. Some yogis believe that the “moving meditation” of a fully developed asana practice satisfies Patanjali’s prescription for meditation, or dhyana. On the other hand, like I said earlier, some believe that the first six limbs merely prepare the practitioner to sit in meditation, and to ultimately become enlightened. If you’ve ever tried to sit cross-legged in meditation, then you no doubt understand how physically challenging it can be. A weak, inflexible body is not adequately prepared for this task, as it requires a strong back, a strong core, and open hips, knees, and ankles. Of course, a chair or other suitable prop can be used, but the classic meditation posture is cross-legged or some version of lotus, on the floor. Regardless of your stance on the meditation issue, it does seem to form the bridge from the physical to the metaphysical, so we’ll save further discussion of dhyana for next week.
Mind over matter. Calmness and serenity in the face of difficulty. Moving meditation. These are the skills that eventually translate to our everyday lives, skills that allow us to drive happily in traffic jams, handle screaming toddlers with a sense of humor, and smoothly navigate the often murky waters of daily life. And days when we do lose it, when our tempers snap or we balk at the enormity of the realities with which we’re faced, we have our mat to bring us back to center, to remind us that life – like yoga, like meditation, like the perpetual cycle of one sunrise after another – is so often a process of starting over again. Yoga not only gives us permission to start over again when we need to, it gives us a place to start and a roadmap. One step leading to the next, with every step dependent on the others, every breath, every posture, every moment a new beginning.
May your practice be all of this for you. Namaste.
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