sutra pants on!

Most people know me as someone who gets on her yoga mat 5-6 days a week to pound out a strong practice, I would say this is accurate. I did my teacher training program five years ago and when I completed the training I never handed in the required essay for the philosophy aspect. Its been haunting me ever since! Last week I found myself in a situation where I was feeling completely emotionally drained, I couldn't even get myself together enough to take a yoga class. While sitting at home in bed under the covers, not coming out for anyone, not even someone with candy, I found myself thinking a lot about my life. One night, in the wee hours of the morning (I can't even tell you what time) I decided to turn on the mac and see what seeped out of me. To my surprise this is what I was left with... I hope you like it. The people who know me best will be proud of me for doing this, as I am generally not a 'talk about feelings/yoga/philosophy person', but I am happy and honestly a bit relieved to know its in there somewhere. 

The yamas and the niyamas, nonviolence, truthfulness, nonstealing, nonexcess, nonpossessiveness, purity, contentment, self discipline, self study and surrender. If the goal of yoga is to bring forward the values of the yamas and niyamas to ourselves and to our students, why stop there, why not bring them to life in general. I feel as though the practice of yoga is one that takes a lifetime to master, and also one that spreads wider than the four walls of the studio space. If practicing yoga is supposed to bring enlightenment, why contain that enlightenment to your practice space when you could integrate it into your entire life. Obviously, talking yamas, niyamas and sutras with friends on the street might seem ridiculous to most people, but in the same way that a picture speaks a thousand words, sometimes you don’t have to say anything to get the message across. I believe that when you begin to spread the insight of the yamas and niyamas to your students, the wisdom travels further than you can possibly imagine. The following essay is a brief action plan for bringing the wisdom of the yamas and niyamas into my teaching and my life.

Osmosis is the movement of water molecules through a selectively-permeable membrane down a water potential gradient.[1] More specifically, it is the movement of water across a selectively permeable membrane from an area of high water potential (low solute concentration) to an area of low water potential (high solute concentration). It may also be used to describe a physical process in which any solvent moves, without input of energy, across a semipermeable membrane (permeable to the solvent, but not the solute) separating two solutions of different concentrations.[2] Osmosis releases energy, and can be made to do work,[3] but is a passive process, like diffusion. (wikipedia)

         In some cases people learn by having a teacher pound out information, in a classroom filled with chairs and desks. Some information can be transmitted from person to person with ease and without any mental or emotional friction. I feel that the values outlined in the yamas and niyamas are not so simple. Everyone has their own idea of what yamas and niyamas mean. On occasion students flock to teachers of philosophy and meditation to deepen their understanding of yogic thought and life, but for the most part, the students I see on a daily basis are generally not in the mood for serious talk during their 65 minute power flow class. In this case, I believe in the power of learning through osmosis. The mind is similar to a selectively permeable membrane, technically, the blood brain barrier (separates the brain) is a selectively permeable membrane, if only we could teach it what to permeate. When you are dealing with people in an intimate setting such as a yoga class, you have your students captive for a short amount of time and you chose what to put out there into their personal space or energy field. Given that the practice of yoga is generally an occasion for opening and deepening, it’s a great time to begin the osmosis of ancient wisdom. By personally containing information as a teacher, and by placing yourself in a space where opening and personal development is taking place (ie. a yoga class) you create the opportunity for information to move from one concentration gradient to another (ie. from yourself to your students). I believe that by teaching what I practice I am exposing my students to the yamas and niyamas in a way that is completely non offensive (that should be a yama) and easily received. Some teachers are comfortable talking openly about yogic philosophy in classes, for me its more about letting positive energy flow through myself into my students when they are most receptive.

         Often I find myself in a challenging class, comprised mainly of young fit individuals who have come to sweat their faces right off and onto the floor. In the back, or even sometimes front of the room there are always a few people who are clearly not practicing ‘yoga’ at an advanced level, but they have come to be carried away in the intense energy of the room. Sometimes I think these people are gaining the full benefits of an intense yoga practice just by sitting there, but how is that possible? I have been that person in the back of the room, with 80 experienced practitioners all around me, and I know that what I was getting out of it was not being passed to me through the teachers words, nor through the musical selections or the personal adjustments. The energy and power and intensity was transmitted through something I don’t really understand, but I imagine it to be somewhat similar to osmosis.

In my opinion there are other ways in which to inform students about the benefits and principles of the yamas and niyamas in class, rather than just letting the info transfer from one person to another (osmosis). I believe that in some cases physical demonstrations of poses are necessary, but I believe that yoga teachers get caught up in demonstrating way too often which in many cases leads to injury and eventual ‘burnt out’. I think that in order for teachers to honestly take care of their bodies, learning to teach without using the body is quite important and a demonstration of ahimsa or nonviolence. Any situation be it a yoga pose or series of poses that are practiced that are not serving the practitioner and perhaps causing some physical irritation is in my opinion self violence. I believe that when teachers take care of their own bodies they set a good example for their students and display ahimsa. There is always the odd teacher who can pull it off, but I feel that many teachers push their bodies to their limit, which is not ahimsa.

        

Svadhyaya is the practice of self study. The maintenance of a teacher’s yoga practice can sometimes fall secondary to other aspects of life ie. work or teaching. I think that a big part of self study is self practice, regardless of what type of yoga practice is best for a specific body, the maintenance of the practice is key. When I go to class and there are other teachers in the room it makes me feel better about going to those teachers classes more often. Knowing that the people I train with are also students of their specific practice empowers me to remain humble and embody the ‘beginners mind’, which is spoken of in yoga. I think that by taking classes and practicing at a studio, other students recognize that you are still a student even though you are also a teacher and recognize that as a positive thing. This is how I both practice and teach svadhyaya.

Self discipline is something that teachers and practitioners of yoga need to be constantly reminded of. Discipline takes time and being able to create habits which are disciplined is an integral part of maintaining your yoga practice. I teach my students to be disciplined by encouraging them to work only as hard as they want and to rest when they need to so they will have what it takes to come back to the poses and their practice. I want my students to know that although the class may be challenging, being disciplined does not only mean pushing as hard as possible until the point of collapse. It means giving as much as you want and then finding the strength to pull back and keep the body happy so you can come back to practice the next day or next week. To me discipline is being able to practice many times a week and being able to pace myself through my practice. Essentially yoga is a lifelong practice, so being able to practice even small amounts daily seems more disciplined that hitting one monster class every week (personal opinion).

When I practice yoga I allow myself to surrender to whatever I’m feeling in the moment. This is potentially why I don’t like to practice the same series of poses day in day out. I like to surrender my practice to how I’m feeling and what I perceive my body needs at the specific time. Surrender is something that I encourage my students to connect with every time I teach. I accomplish this by continually noting that if anyone wants to vary their practice or modify due to any reason they are more than welcome. I realize that this is only one aspect of surrender, but it just seems so relevant to me at this stage in my life/yoga practice. Personally, when I take a led yoga class I really appreciate freedom to modify and adjust the practice being taught to fit my body’s needs. I think that allowing students to modify their practice in a led class allows them to find more surrender in their practice. I feel that once you can find something in your yoga practice, you can begin to find it throughout life in general. Surrender is something that most people need more of, given that we live in a somewhat overbearing and overcomplicated society. Ron frequently speaks about finding actions in one pose and then finding the same actions in more complex poses. To me this is similar to the idea of  finding the values of the yamas and niyamas first in yoga practice followed by life in general. Life is the ultimate complex pose.

These are just some ways in which I feel comfortable integrating the yamas and niyamas into my teaching. At this stage in my life, I’m not on the program of whipping out some serious philosophy talk in my classes so I find other ways in which to impart the ancient wisdom onto my students. I think there are a million ways to integrate the yamas and niyamas and finding a way that is true to your own teaching style is essential. I recognize that I have not outlined all of the yamas and niyamas, but in the spirit of satya, I don’t feel completely comfortable speaking on every yama/niyama at this point. Integrating yoga philosophy into my classes is a work in progress, but I’m feeling that each time I practice I connect a tiny bit more with the true essence of my yoga practice and thus I am growing each day. Thank you Marla for allowing me the extra time to get this together, I feel that sometimes you just have to wait for the right moment to allow things to flow.