When I first began practicing yoga, my main ambition was to look as good or better than other students. I loved the outer beauty of the poses, and was determined mine would be the most beautiful. I would push my body past its limits to go deeper in poses. My natural hyper-flexibility, which I always assumed was an advantage, was slowly becoming my enemy as I contorted my joints beyond what was healthy. To the untrained eye, my practice was a work of art, something you might see on the cover of Yoga Journal. To anyone who knew better, I was creating injuries that I will probably be working around my entire life.
Due to hyperextending my knees, I now have minor hip and hamstring issues, but the real victim is my shoulder. From the combination of hyperextending my lower back into deep backbends (instead of opening the upper chest) and overworking my shoulder in chaturanga and handstands, I now heavily modify my practice. I have gone from mirroring the "best" yogis in class to standing out as "weaker" because I don't extend my arms in Warrior 1. But my practice has never been safer, deeper, or more consistent than at this moment.
I had to retrain my body to move from the inside out, to align myself with what I knew was going on inside and then allow the outside to reflect that. To physically move from the core body instead of my limbs, to move from intuition instead of ambition, to move from the soul layer instead of the physical or mental layer- this is moving from the inside out. Just as everything else in yoga, it starts in the physical practice and spills out into how we live, how we treat ourselves and others.
In (Amanda's) classes, we'll be exploring poses in slow flow and aligning from the core body, possibly incorporate some Yin yoga. Philosophical emphasis will be on pratyahara (inner body awareness) and the panchamayas (five layers of existence). We'll also delve deeper into the practice of pranayama.
Want some homework? Heart of Yoga by TKV Desikachar. We'll be discussing it in the blog later this month.
How do you move from the inside out?
I pulled out my copy of 'Heart of Yoga' from Teacher Training. Such wonderful topics:
ReplyDeleteBeginning from Where We Are
Joining Breath and Movement
Constancy and Change
The Qualities of the Mind
Nine Obstacles on the Yoga Way
July is going to be a great month to explore these ideas - moving from the inside out.
Krishnamacharya is responsible for the yoga we practice today. Desikachar lived and studied with him.
ReplyDeleteSri Krishnamacharya was very adamant that people had to have a daily practice of yoga. His yoga teachings were based upon individual need not a standardized approach. He predicted that women would have a great part in spreading yoga in the world.
He believed that the goal of yoga was peace not power, through the communication of "a Greater Power or Absolute Source." He taught that we cannot practice meditation; all we can do is make the condition right in the body and mind so that meditation -the merging with our natural state- may spontaneously occur and understanding come.
I honor the knowing that comes from within so that change occurs outside.
You have provided "darsana" a certain way of seeing deeply inside our self and "tie the strands of the mind together."
Om Shanti