KOMEN CANCER STUDY FEEDBACK: A summary of views by Jeremy Jones
A brief item written by Haralee Weintraub in ‘Associated Content’ refers to the use
of yoga and other exercises to assist in the recovery of breast cancer survivors. It's
a great pity there aren't any more details, but two random groups were monitored,
one practicing yoga and another practicing strengthening exercises. Both groups
showed significant improvement in overall health and morale, especially weight loss,
improved flexibility and bone density. Fewer falls were also reported. The item
has inspired a number of interesting responses from readers, briefly summarised below
– my apologies if I’ve misquoted anyone…
Dr. Lea Brindle commented that it was good that they had gone beyond the purely physical
(yoga as a form of exercise, etc.) and at least infer that there are emotional benefits
as well – but no mention of the psychological and energetic benefits of free-flowing
prana healing the bodymind. Paul Collins commented on the need to tackle the root
cause of cancer – probably suppressed anger eating away internally. Without tackling
this root cause, the disease is likely to recur.
Andrew Thomas wants to shout aloud from the rooftops that there’s something other
than surgery and chemo that will help and it’s called yoga! He adds that with all
illnesses we need to look at the root cause – often diet and/or repressed anger.
He describes cancer as “a disease of hatred” but accepts that this might be a rather
simplistic viewpoint. Normality is what happens with regular yoga practice and cancer
is an abnormality. Drugs are symptom removers, rather than normality restorers.
Andrew raises another important point about the attitude of the patient post-diagnosis.
The resigned “that’s me finished then” types (who are highly unlikely to be found
in any yoga class) keel over relatively quickly. The “is there anything I can do
to help myself?” types have a much better chance of survival.
Kathryn Varley points out that she has had experience working with post mastectomy
patients on a one-to-one basis. Such patients have severe body image problems and
difficulty telling left from right. She adds that yoga nidra is an invaluable practice
to aid recovery and reduce the massive stress that all cancer patients suffer from.
With skilful guidance, it also allows the patient to explore their personal boundaries
and open up to grief, an essential part of the healing process.
My own view? Cancer is a complex disease. The tumour is not the disease; it is
a symptom of the disease. An accusatory, finger pointing attitude of “it’s your
own fault because of your poor diet, suppressed emotions, smoking etc.” is unhelpful,
to say the least. It’s rather like a secular version of the doctrine of karmic rebirth;
“you are suffering because of a misdeed in a previous life”. If I did something
wrong in a previous life, why can’t I remember it, so I can learn from my mistakes?
It’s a rationalisation of our own resignation and resignation is a common psychological
feature of many adult cancer patients. Anyone with an interest in cancer should
read “The Cancer Biopathy” by Wilhelm Reich. Reich’s much derided “orgone energy
accumulator” (for orgone read prana) actually works. Unlike Reich’s detractors,
I took the trouble to build one and used it successfully to self-treat my own bladder
cancer and a damaged intervertebral disc. The full details are beyond the scope
of this article (at this rate I’ll hog the whole issue!) but I’m happy to provide
details to anyone who is interested. (jeremy@yogacollege.co.uk)
A brief afterthought - the bone density findings don't surprise me. One of my (very
enthusiastic) lady students of a "certain age" had a bone density test and the technician
was absolutely astounded by her results. "Whatever you're doing, keep on doing it"
was her comment. I’m sure there’s a place for yoga in the treatment of osteoporosis.
YOGA IS NOT... by Godfri Devereux
Because the misunderstandings of yoga go back millennia, it is extremely difficult
to undertake its practice authentically.
So many of the practices, and their applications, that have accrued to yoga are at
odds with the nature of life and consciousness themselves.
At the heart of this problem is the notion of control. Only too often yoga has been
mistakenly undertaken as a process of developing total control over body, breath
and mind. This misconception peaks in the notion of eliminating the mind. At its
wildest extremes it proposes not only the dissolution of the human bodimind but also,
supposedly, the entire universe. To ascribe to the method of yoga the notion of control
is to project a dualistic mode of being onto a non dual system and situation.
Control as an impulse, motive and process is fundamentally dualistic.
It is based on the anxiety inevitably arising within a sense of separate, autonomous
self. Within this sense, the separate, autonomous other becomes a threat. To minimise
this threat the other must be brought under control: nature, nations, tribes, societies,
and families, individuals: even desires, impulses, feelings. This creates a culture
of alienation, manipulation and conflict:: us against them. In effect a psychological,
social and political dualism. This is a condition to which all individuals and groups
are subject, to one degree or another: at least to begin with. It is a condition
based on the nature of perception itself.
A condition which is at the root of all psychological, social, economic and political
suffering, a condition which is in effect a disease: that of dualism.
Yoga, and life, has been distorted and misrepresented through the inadequate and
distorting prism of dualistic thinking. A prism within which nature and spirit, energy
and consciousness, the observed and the observer are set against each other on the
lever of control. This rests on the experienced separation of a perceiving subject
from perceived objects. A separation that is upheld by the scientific and academic
modes of enquiry, which are by nature opposed to the mode of enquiry that yoga inherently
is. By applying this separatist prism to yoga it has been reduced to yet another
mechanism of psychological and social control.
The dualistic packaging of yoga has led to endless confusion and suffering: denial
of the validity of feelings, sensations, desires and emotions; resentment of the
body; aversion to nature: in effect to fear of life itself. This amounts to an existential
schizophrenia reflected in and supported by a cultural worldview wherein conflict
is the engine of society.
This divisiveness is extremely hard to dislodge as it rests on the innate dualistic
mechanism of perception itself and is supported and expressed by innumerable cultural
and social power mechanisms.
Yoga as honest, open enquiry is an opportunity to go beyond the perceptual dualism
underlying our collective nightmare of culturally endorsed anxiety and conflict.
It is not about exerting ever more refined and potent control over ever more subtle
and elusive phenomena. It does not require the powers of a super being. In fact the
reverse. For yoga is nothing other than coming back to who, what and where we most
fundamentally and meaningfully are. It is a return to the very heart of being human.
This does not require that we develop superhuman physical or mental powers. It does
not depend on our manipulating our consciousness into ever more subtle states. It
does not require that we repress or deny our senses, our emotions, and our feelings.
We do not have to transcend our bodies and dissolve the universe back into ‘Pure
Consciousness’. We do not have to impose, by the might of our will, our conditioned
ideals on the unconditional nature of that which actually is.
This is all the stuff of fantasy. All we have to do is look. To look in such a way
that we finally begin to see. We have to begin to see through cultural distortions
that we take to be real. This looking is what yoga is. An enquiry into what is actually
happening, that reveals and releases imposed interpretations and power mechanisms
into the wisdom of life itself. This enquiry is conducted within the bodimind, through
conscious action. It is not an intellectual enquiry: although the mind will enjoy
and reflect it with conceptual observations. It is based directly and primarily on
sensation.
Sensations which are being continuously generated by organic and mechanical processes.
Sensations which are in effect the innate language of life speaking through the genetically
imprinted and functioning wisdom of the human body.
This is a wisdom that no mind, book, library, university or system can ever equal.
The human design contains the fruits of 3,500,000,000 years of research and development.
Nothing has been overlooked or forgotten. Every cell of the human body is encoded
with the most sophisticated intelligence available.
An intelligence that speaks directly and continuously through sensations.
By becoming intimate with these sensations the experience of being human is totally
transformed. This intimacy necessarily includes an intimacy with the mechanism by
which sensations are interpreted (mind) and the context within which they arise (consciousness).
The transformation that it brings about is as profound and priceless as it is subtle
and satisfying. The need to control is replaced by an irreducible willingness to
enjoy. An enjoyment that rests fully and irrevocably on a deep trust in the intelligence
of life functioning as both body and mind within which the subordinate, though crucial,
role of mind has been recognised beyond any doubt.
This is not a perspective that the mind can talk itself into. It is a disposition
that rests on profound experience of the innate relationship between body, mind and
consciousness: having been revealed clearly enough to not only be experienced fully
but also clearly understood. This is a far cry from yoga as it is proselytised today.
Yet it is far more accessible and satisfying than the dualistic and destructive propositions
with which yoga has been lumbered for millennia.
We need make only one very simple enquiry: can life be trusted? This enquiry cannot
be given to any cultural authority. It must be given to life itself, by accessing
its wisdom in and as the human design.
A wisdom that speaks through the binary simplicity of sensations with neither the
desire nor capacity to distort or to deceive.
Intimacy with sensation becomes possible through the systematic application of conscious
movement and action. This application may begin as a cultural project. But if it
is to succeed it must be given over to the wisdom of the body as quickly as possible.
Then the intrinsic relationship between body and mind will soon become clear, and
eventually the relationship that they have to consciousness also.
Within this revelation the need to control, and its subsidiary need to know, dissolves
into the unified flow of life. Neither the knower, nor the controller has any further
authority. External circumstances are met with the organic unity of body, mind and
consciousness functioning effortlessly and spontaneously. What actually happens is
responded to organically without any further need to establish permanent ascendancy
of pleasure over pain, spirit over matter, good over evil, right over wrong. The
natural flow of life as an endless rhythm of changing circumstance and sensation
then provides a satisfaction and delight that knowledge and control never can, while
relieving them permanently of their mistakenly assumed authority.
SANTOSHA — IS CONTENTMENT PROCESS, DESTINATION OR STATE-OF-MIND? by Andrew Thomas
In my mid thirties I experienced a personal renaissance. If you had asked me before
that if I was contented the answer would always have been “NO”. In the latter part
of the first half of my life I had the Porsche 911, lots of foreign holidays, the
large house and lots of cash to fling around, but contented I was not. My late thirties
saw me in absolute anxiety - business near-failure, marriage break up, deep depression.
I had everything except I now know that I had nothing and down there somewhere was
the “still small voice”, telling me to do something useful for humanity. Thirty
years on after osteopathy training, yoga and tai chi training, I now know why the
feelings of desolation were a part of everyday life.
In my yoga teaching, whether in my own classes or workshops or teacher training courses
that we run, the issue of contentment or santosha comes up regularly. The context
is often the class with new recruits striving to make their (it has to be said) male
bodies more flexible. I see huge aggressive adrenal effort being put in because
this is the pattern of a lifetime. To then talk about santosha comes as something
of a surprise to them and also a revelation. It is in this area, in my view, that
the great gains can be made. Men have been inured to the harsh environment of maleness,
which is equated with aggressive strength, since birth. As one Zen master put it,
“since the beginning of bottomless time”. To see another man perform a yoga posture
(another class member) with ease and apparently effortlessly is to open closed eyes.
It is during this type of episode that I introduce the notion of santosha as a state
of mind, and not something to be “striven” for. One can simply decide to “be contented”,
with the accent upon “be”.
I know that this is not understood internally and spiritually — that is by the spirit
— but it is accepted intellectually and it is this that the alumno, the recruit,
can gradually come to actually practice in himself or herself. Be contented — be
contented with the posture as you are performing it, avoid self-criticism and curtail
self-doubt — just do it with no expectation but with the certain knowledge that just
doing the work will ensure success. It is of no value to have the occasional positive
thought in a sea of negative thoughts — what is required is to convert the negative
to a positive so that the latter is the normal mind-set. This can be done simply
by, at an early stage, giving oneself the mantra that “I am contented with my yoga
work just as it is”. In this manner one then can come quickly to recognise that
santosha is partly process. It is certainly not destination in the normally accepted
sense of being at the end of a journey. There is no need to wait! In my view, it
is mostly a state of mind or a state of just being. You do not have to put in decades
of work in yoga to be contented. You can have it right now. Practise it every day.
Contentment is, perhaps, an ART!
A VISIT TO THE NATIONAL MOSQUE IN KUALA LUMPUR by Jim Gough-Olaya
I was on my way back from Australia. It was 4 o'clock and we had to be at the airport
by 8 for the flight to UK. We were walking around the Tropical Gardens in Kuala
Lumpur. A sticky, energy sapping humidity surrounded us, soon followed by the monsoon
rain. We ran for the only shelter around – the Mosque.
Thus without any premeditation, I found myself within the main Mosque talking to
an instructor called Hamid. We were being treated most courteously and it was with
some trepidation that I raised the subject of Yoga. However I pressed on becasue
Mike Gould had asked me to check out some stories that Yoga had been banned in some
Far Eastern countries and here we were. So as long as this was conducted carefully,
I thought ' why not? ‘ Indeed asking questions was easy.
He started by sitting on the floor in the lotus, lifted himself with his hands inquiring
with a smile if I could do that. So I obliged hoping this was not going to be a
can-you-do-this? session of Yoga postures. He may have not expected a Westerner
to perform this. Whatever the reason we were now facing each other and could engage. This
is how it went.
Hamid: ‘Is Yoga a religion?’
Me: ‘No Yoga is not a belief system. I do not have a belief but am at ease when Yoga
people have a religion. ‘
Hamid: ‘Do you pray?’
Me: ‘What is prayer?’
Hamid: ‘Prayer is taking your mind to God.‘
Me: ‘I don't know what God is, and I am ok with that.‘
Thus the conversation continued till I asked what the official view of Muslims practicing
Yoga was. To this he replied that the physical side of Yoga was good but that the
mental side was to be avoided. When asked what was mental and what physical he drew
a circle on a board, drew line bisecting it and then wrote ‘MENTAL’ on one side and
‘PHYSICAL’ on the other. When I pointed out that mind and matter cannot be so neatly
separated, Hamid frowned. I realized that this was dangerous ground. I felt that
a mistake here could have severely negative consequences to many Muslim yogis.
Thus, no more delving.
Perhaps it was wrong to clamp up and endure the hour-long attempted conversion. Could
a closed mind be opened with debate? Who knows? Let me leave it that Hamid was a
charming person who helped two travellers in the rain, even going the extra mile
to drive us to the airport, asking for no reward other than the wish for our conversion.
YOGA PARADOXES by Yogilea (Dr Lea Brindle)
If you have been practicing Yoga for a while now, it will probably be quite apparent
that Yoga and, indeed life, is full of paradoxes – indeed, you might even be beginning
to think that Yoga IS a paradox itself!
I recently moved from London to the South West seeking less pressure, cleaner air
and generally better prana. While most of my expectations have been met I have been
presented with many new challenges too! For example, although it is generally much
quieter where I now live the sounds around seem much louder! For instance, because
there is so much less traffic noise I am acutely aware of the cars & motorcycles
that waft across the hills & valleys. Also, because there are very few aircraft here
(I used to live close to Heathrow Airport) I am so aware of the light aircraft and
helicopters that do fly over occasionally! Because it is normally so quiet here the
sounds there are seem much louder! I am not sure if this is just ironic or an example
of a paradox but, hopefully, you’ll see what I mean.
As you know, letting-go is at the heart of Yoga asana practice. Going deeper into
a posture requires us to stop “trying” and forcing ourselves to overcome what we
may see as our physical limits. Instead, it requires us to breathe, be aware of tension
and resistance (whether in the body or the mind) and to allow these to gradually
dissolve. This awareness and recognising the need to let go, or surrender, makes
Yoga fundamentally different from, say, body balance, Pilates, stretch & tone, etc.
Take the example of the bridge posture (setu bhandasana) - if once “in the posture”
we begin to notice held tension e.g. in the face, jaw, neck & shoulders & buttocks
(and especially in the mind) and are able to consciously start letting-go we can
begin to melt away tension, enabling us to go deeper into the posture. So, following
an out-breath where we allow the posture to soften we can, on an in-breath, deepen
our bridge, opening, for example, the heart centre more fully. And then another out
breath to soften and let-go, and so on.
So here is another paradox - by “trying” we actually increase tension and halt any
progress in a posture. Conversely, by surrendering and letting-go we allow the posture
to deepen. Then it’s as if we become the posture and it happens to us rather than
us creating the posture. This is the opposite of how we typically are taught to live
our lives! We learn to strive for success; not to just let it happen!
Another paradox is that by bringing awareness to our practice we become aware of
our mind which can cause more thinking. This then can detract from our felt sense
in the body. That is why, when we notice that we are thinking (which, of course,
we do all the time during our practice) it is important to bring awareness back to
our practice – our breathing, body awareness, the need to surrender and so on.
Having expectations, goals, postures, etc. we want to achieve in our practice often
gets in the way of actually doing Yoga. Again, paradoxically, once we let go of these
expectations, etc. a weight lifts off us freeing our minds we are just as we should
be once again. So, paradoxically once we let go of our desires we have everything!
Because letting-go is at the heart of Yoga sadhana (our Yoga practice) another paradox
becomes evident. Although we need to let go of attachment, and our ego, will, etc.
in order to deepen our practice, achieve enlightenment or whatever, we cannot do
this without getting on to our mat, into our meditation routine, etc. in the first
place. Here ego and will, of which both get in the way of our Yoga practice, can
provide the force required to initiate our practice which then requires letting go
or surrender!
Taking a more abstract view, the Sankhya philosophical system, often thought to be
at the root of modern Yoga theory & practice, has an essentially dualistic rationale.
Sankhya is an ancient (circa AD350) philosophical system and possibly the first truly
systematised (i.e. written down & subject to logical discourse) Indian philosophy.
It means literally the “enumeration” (or counting – five elements, five senses, the
structure of our minds, the three gunas, etc.) of our universe and also means “Right
Knowledge.”
Right Knowledge requires discriminating pure consciousness (or purusha) from all
matter and, in fact, everything else (prakrti). Purusha and prakrti are completely
separate yet inter-dependent as we shall see. A metaphor that is often used to describe
this relationship is that of pure, white light (purusha) shining through a vase containing
coloured water, revealing the nature of prakrti in the coloured light thus displayed.
Another metaphor often used is of the sun shining (purusha) and causing a flower
(prakrti) to turn towards it and begin to open up its petals. As the flower opens
up to the light of purusha it reveals more and more of it’s intimate nature. Thus,
prakrti is the seen and purusha is the seer or the witness. So here at the root of
this fundamental Yoga philosophy is another paradox: in Sankhya the world is divided
into two ontologically separate aspects and yet we can only “see” prakrti though
the light of purusha. Conversely, we can only experience purusha (pure consciousness)
through the material world of prakrti. Although separate they can only exist in relation
to each other!
What, one may ask is the relevance of Sankhya theory for Yoga practice? Let’s take
the relevance of the gunas for, say meditation. Dedicated meditation practice can
lead to us exploring the most subtle (satvic) states of mind. However, through identifying
with even the most subtle states of mind we inevitably involve our ego and lose the
basis for seeing purusha as it is. Having got close to a satvic state through our
meditation practice, once we recognise it for what it is we immediately lose it!
Inevitably, our satvic state either becomes too peaceful and the resultant complacency
causes a decay into a dull and tamasic state. Or if we begin to feel a sense of achievement
rajas may result. Pulling, pushing or other attachment to an enlightened meditation,
a good posture, etc. will, through hanging-on to the ideal of sattva, result in either
a tamasic or a rajasic state. Our everyday practice of Yoga, on & off the mat, constantly
places us in these double binds or paradoxes.
So, paradox is not merely a by product of our sadhana – our Yoga practice – it appears
to be integral to Yoga itself. By experiencing paradox and coming to terms with it
(gleefully seeing its funny side and even laughing at our confusion) we learn more
about ourselves which, for me, is one of the core purposes of Yoga, that is, self
development through awareness.
In this article I have tried to give you a flavour of my awareness of paradox in
Yoga and no doubt you will have your own experience too. I would be really interested
to hear about this and of any examples you may have of Yoga paradoxes – both on and
off the mat. Please do write or email me at yogilea@yogasadhana.co.uk
If you have, thanks for reading this. Yogi Lea (Dr Lea Brindle)
THE CHANGING FACE OF YOGA TEACHING – COLLEGE V. FITNESS CULTURE by Jeremy Jones
The article below was written with Yoga teachers and student teachers in mind. It
was printed in “Yoga and Health” a few years ago and created something of a stir.
I still occasionally get asked for copies. It has been updated slightly but is substantially
unaltered.
Some contributors to Yoga publications have expressed grave reservations about the
way that Yoga is being taken up by sports/fitness centres with the attendant risk
of degeneration into a form of “soft aerobics”. In this article I hope to address
these entirely understandable anxieties and suggest ways that teachers can adapt
to the rapidly changing society that we live in without compromising the essential
spirit of Yoga.
A few words about my own background and experience might not go amiss. I have been
teaching for over a decade – a mere novice compared to some readers of Y & H, I suspect.
However, for most of that time I have been (more or less) a full time professional,
having given up my old work as a service engineer. The need to pay the rent has taken
me into some unlikely venues and given me a lot of varied experience, often in difficult
circumstances. My venues have included two prisons, a sports centre, two fitness
centres; a special needs school (for the “stressed out” staff), our local civic centre
and two community associations, as well as a number of adult education and private
classes.
Yoga teachers (and their more thoughtful students) may well feel that a sports/fitness
centre is a totally unsuitable venue. Classes entitled “Fatburner” and “Butts ‘R’
Us” (I kid you not) may seem like very uncomfortable bedfellows! However, we must
also ask ourselves whether the culture of an adult education college is any more
sympathetic. More about this later, but suffice to say that I believe that Yoga is
strong enough to adapt to changing circumstances as it has for millennia. Yoga has
survived official hostility and (in some countries) persecution; public hostility
and ridicule, the sneering tendency, the freak show mentality and the occasional
scoundrel and charlatan. I think it is strong enough to survive the commercial pressures
of the fitness culture. However, a lot of responsibility rests on the shoulders of
teachers.
If we cannot adapt to a different style of venue (only the outer shell, when you
think about it), we cannot expect our students to be able to. The sports/fitness
centres are only responding to public demand; if they cannot find suitably trained
teachers, they will be tempted to look for less well-trained ones. That would be
a disaster for Yoga, bringing the whole ethos into disrepute. After all, it only
takes one cowboy plumber to damage his profession.
When I first started to practice Yoga nearly two decades ago, there were only two
routes into a class. You could enrol through your local adult education college (as
I did) or, if you were lucky, you might find a private class by word of mouth. In
those days, this set up worked reasonably well. It was an educational ghetto, but
it was a comfortable ghetto. Colleges had fewer funding and results pressures, and
if a private class took a year to get off the ground, it wasn’t the end of the world.
Times have changed. The colleges have been totally seduced by the examination system
and box-ticking culture. Any course that cannot provide tangible, measurable “evidence
of learning” (not my jargon!) is regarded with some suspicion. Yoga, as we all know,
must be experienced rather than observed. How can I measure how a student is feeling?
I once spent some time devising an elaborate questionnaire about psychological well-being.
It contained questions such as “Do you often feel angry?” “Do you ever feel depressed?”
“How many units of alcohol do you drink per week?” etc. When I showed it to a colleague
she was rightly appalled. “You can’t ask intrusive questions like these”, she commented.
The questionnaire was duly binned. The thorny question of student assessment is a
different issue altogether, but we can now see how the comfortable adult ed. overcoat
no longer fits quite so well.
Another issue is the ludicrously short academic year – usually only 26 weeks, hardly
enough to give students the continuity they need. In some colleges, there is a marked
reluctance to encourage students to re-enroll at the end of the summer term. “Time
to move over and make room for someone else” seems to be the attitude. The term “conveyor
belt education” springs to mind. This is, of course, entirely appropriate for examination
courses, but not for Yoga, where regular long-term attendance is essential for motivation
and progress. In the past, my long-term students have sometimes found themselves
languishing on college waiting lists, though that situation has now changed as a
disillusioned public (and tutors) vote with their feet and avoid the now soul destroying
college set-up with its “teach to the test” culture and endless paperwork.
In addition to student grievances, Yoga teachers in adult ed. colleges are carrying
a few of their own. This is not the place for a lengthy whinge, but here in Essex,
tutors have suffered pay freezes, classes cancelled at short notice and bureaucratic
muddle – hardly conducive to financial security and peace of mind. They feel underpaid,
undervalued, bogged down with bureaucracy and taken for granted. I understand that
these feelings of alienation are common in other areas also. I am a passionate believer
in the adult ed. ideal of affordable education for anyone who wants it but I have
now, after much soul searching, bowed to the inevitable and taken two of my classes
out of local college management and, effectively, privatised them. The answer to
these adult ed. problems would indeed seem to be the private class, but these are
not so easy to set up these days. Halls do not come cheap and the teacher needs considerable
marketing skills and resources. Gone are the days when you could hire a village hall
for next to nothing, place an ad in a shop window, open the doors and the Yoga-starved
multitude would beat a path to your door. There are many competing pressures on people’s
time and money. Moreover, the public is getting choosier about where they spend their
spare time. They are not prepared to put up with a venue that is cold, draughty,
dirty or difficult to get to, and I for one don’t blame them.
There is another human psychological hurdle that is seldom aired. Many people (especially
the male of the species!) are highly resistant to formal “educative” instruction,
often because of negative childhood experiences at school. In their mind’s eye, college
equals tedium, sports centre equals fun. The needs of these missing millions are
just as valid as those education enthusiasts who are just as much at home in a Yoga
class as they are studying Russian history. In my opinion, any reason for starting
Yoga is a valid reason. If someone starts for the “wrong” reason, e.g. to improve
appearance, it doesn't matter one iota. As they progress, other more positive reasons
will emerge. It is interesting to observe that my Tuesday evening class at Dovedale
Sports Centre has a much higher proportion of men and a younger average age than
any of my Adult Ed. classes. This brings us to another important point. Adult education
has, for perfectly good reasons, a strict over sixteen policy. I believe passionately
in encouraging youngsters who are interested in Yoga. Sports and fitness centre’s
(and community associations) have a much more relaxed attitude towards age. Even
if they only attend a couple of times, the seed is sown. In recent years, I have
taught a number of teenagers and a girl of eleven. At the other end of the age range,
I have taught a lady of eighty and another of ninety one. The eighty year old had
to give up because the college in question arbitrarily cancelled the “Yoga Over Fifty”
class. I rest my case.
Most sports/fitness centres operate their classes on a “drop in” basis, without formal
term structures. This system, understandably, rings alarm bells with many teachers.
Where is the opportunity for growth and personal development? We could ask the same
question with today’s adult ed. set up. Here in Chelmsford, my beginners’ class was
cancelled. There was no advanced class, so all my classes were mixed ability. At
the end of our meagre 26-week year (now 27 weeks), there is a lengthy break of about
13 weeks, then everyone starts again at week one – small wonder that some don’t come
back for the start of the new academic year. I get round this problem by offering
a ten-week “summer Yoga” course, but a less busy teacher might have problems filling
such a course. The answer to the “drop in/drop out” culture is not to fight it, but
accept it as part of modern life and adapt our teaching accordingly. Adaptation is
not the same thing as uncritical acceptance. I don’t much like today’s T.V. culture,
but I still have a set in the corner of my living room.
So, how do we adapt? It’s easier than you think. Teaching styles vary enormously,
but try to visualise a typical Yoga lesson. They usually (though not always) start
with a relaxation, followed by some gentle “looseners” or “warm-ups”. The lesson
invariably ends with a relaxation. There is no reason why any of these should be
varied much because of varying ability or experience. It is the “guts” of the lesson,
after looseners and before final relaxation, which is problematical. It is absolutely
essential that the teacher is familiar with a wide range of postures and other practices.
S/he also needs to know how each posture relates to other postures and suitable alternatives
for the less (and more!) able. I am not able to comment on the current British Wheel
of Yoga diploma syllabus, but the one I trained under was excellent in this respect.
If you are lacking in variety in your repertoire of postures (and other practices),
invest in some good Yoga books and get practising! It is not a sign of weakness or
incompetence to face up to any technical deficiencies we may have, but a sign of
strength and humility. Yoga books are not the only source of information. I have
picked up ideas from magazines, newspapers, books on complementary therapies and,
of course, other teachers. In fact, I have to plead guilty to acts of wholesale theft,
but in mitigation, I am always happy to reciprocate if asked. You often have to wade
through a lot of dross to find the occasional diamond, but it is usually worth the
effort. Not only will it make you a better teacher; it will also help your personal
practice enormously. Simply teaching the postures we were taught years ago when we
were students is in my opinion, no longer an option. Our classes become impoverished
and our students bored. We must grow so that our students can grow. Once we have
become familiar with a wide range of practices, it is a simple matter to juggle the
different degrees of intensity according to the ability and motivation of the individual
student. We should never lose sight of the fact that we are not teaching a class
of twenty, but twenty individuals, all with different emotional and physical baggage.
An example of posture adaptation might be useful. The camel posture (Ustrasana) puts
in the occasional appearance in my classes. The essence of this posture is a kneeling
back bend. The bend is quite strong and we cannot see the feet. The head is tilted
back so far that it is almost inverted, while most of the body is facing forward.
This makes it very difficult and intimidating for the inexperienced student. I simply
demonstrated the full posture, then the same posture using a chair to support the
elbows, then (for the less bold/able) the “sphinx” posture, a very gentle prone backbend
similar to the cobra (Bhujangasana) but with the forearms resting on the floor. Obviously,
the class received the usual safety warning about tilting the head back if there
are any problems with the neck. Nobody knows the body as well as the sitting tenant.
To suggest otherwise is sheer arrogance. I therefore leave it to my students’ own
judgement which version they attempt, but I always qualify my information by saying
“beginners and near beginners are strongly advised to use a chair or try the sphinx
posture” or words to that effect. This principle holds good for almost any posture.
We find the essence of the posture, then think of other postures that have a similar
essence. The flank stretch (Parsvakonasana) is a powerful sideways stretch. Rolling
forward is an ever-present pitfall. We can rest the elbow on the knee rather than
place the hand on the floor, or try the gate posture (Parighasana), a gentler sideways
bend. I appreciate that these postures are not exact equivalents, but they are close
enough.
In my early days at Dovedale, I wasted an inordinate amount of class time talking
about issues of safety and equipment. Every time a new face appeared, I felt obliged
to repeat myself. I now get round this problem by giving each new student two handouts,
one headed “Yoga Safety”, the other “Recommended Equipment and Clothing”. I also
have a handout entitled “Suggested Reading” for those who wish to dig a little deeper,
including some material of a more spiritual nature such as the Gita and Upanishads.
The opinions in these handouts are very much my own, but if any teacher wants copies,
they only have to send me an e-mail.
When I first started teaching at Dovedale, I was terrified that my memory would let
me down, so I listed all the equivalents on my lesson plan, a fussy and time consuming
exercise. I am now confident enough to just list the basics and improvise any necessary
alternatives. The class has now been running continuously for many years with only
a two-week break for summer holidays and one week at Christmas. It has a large nucleus
of committed regulars as well as a shifting population of occasional visitors. Playing
the numbers game is a bit silly, but I couldn’t help noticing, when I first started,
that it was rather better attended than the circuit training class that took place
at the same time. Indeed, we occasionally had problems fitting everyone into the
class. The centre receptionist sometimes turned people away. A short beginner’s class
before the main mixed ability class eased the pressure of numbers and provided new
users with an invaluable stepping-stone.
This brings me to another point that readers might want to raise namely that of noise
levels. Aren’t sports/fitness centre’s a bit noisy? At Dovedale there is certainly
some noise, but in my experience, it annoys the teacher rather more than the students,
who simply ignore it. As the class is run for their benefit, not mine, I have learnt
to live with it. My other classes in health and fitness clubs are blessed with almost
complete silence for most of the time, though there is sometimes a problem with the
noise of weights being dropped in the gyms. I have to admit that some colleagues
I have talked to have less happy experiences. Air conditioning that sounds like an
aircraft taking off, pounding rock music and noises like copulating dinosaurs have
prevailed. The moral seems to be to discuss these issues with centre management before
committing yourself to a class, either as student or teacher.
“Isn’t it all a bit commercial?” you might ask. Well, yes and no. A fitness centre
has to show a profit, but not many teachers can afford to run a class at a loss and
colleges have to have a very hard-nosed attitude towards money these days. What is
most important is that the class is conducted with humanity and integrity and the
responsibility for that rests firmly with the teacher. I don’t get paid by numbers,
so provided my classes are viable, I am spared commercial and financial pressures.
However, I know some colleagues have been offered deals where they are offered a
percentage of the “door money”. Everyone to their own taste, but I would avoid such
a deal like the plague. The strength of the fitness/sports centre’s rest in their
large customer bases and marketing skills. Most teachers (myself included) are ill
equipped by temperament, training and resources to take on such marketing tasks.
It is a far cry from handling the occasional telephone enquiry at home. However,
if you have confidence in your marketing skills and you have a sympathetic and reputable
centre to work with, why not? I should add that the need to earn a living is not
the same thing as commercialisation. An ethically ideal but empty class helps nobody.
“What about the culture gap?” is another understandable concern.
I would be guilty of dishonesty if I said that it did not exist. However, in my
experience it is no greater than the culture gap that exists in the colleges, simply
different. Yoga has been very fortunate in recent years. We have had a very sympathetic
press. Hardly a week goes by without a glowing newspaper or magazine article. New
students and centre managers are much better informed about Yoga than they used to
be and they are not afraid to ask if there is anything they need to know. True, some
people do perceive Yoga as a form of “soft aerobics”, but part of the duties of a
teacher is to disabuse people of this illusion. An occasional aside, often during
relaxation, is usually enough. Another duty, as I see it, is to resist, as far as
possible, commercial pressures that look as if they are becoming destructive. So
far, I have not had to face this problem.
It would be naïve to assume that the fitness industry is beyond criticism, but it
seems to me that we need to ask ourselves what, or rather who is Yoga for? My experience
teaching in prisons has led me to believe most strongly that it is not just for those
who think of themselves, rather piously, as spiritually aware. It is for the man
with a beer in one hand and a cigarette in the other. It is for the thief trying
to finance his next drug fix. It is for the prostitute looking for a better life.
It is for the adrenalin addicted business executive. It is for the harassed mother
who is screaming at her children. It is for the violent bully unable to express his
frustrations. It is for everyone and anyone. Like Jesus, we must talk to publicans
and sinners. We aren’t going to meet them in the temple.
REFLECTIONS ON WILL AND SURRENDER by Pete Yates
We might think that meditation is one thing. But not so. There are many styles of
meditation and their particulars largely depend on the metaphysical and cultural
contexts out of which they arise. For this reason, meditation methods are often ways
of cultivating our characters and our subjective lives in order to bring them into
conformity with some culturally sanctioned ideal which is in turn justified by some
metaphysical presupposition.
In almost every tradition, however, we find a minority of practitioners who grasp
this state of affairs and find it “all too human” for both their taste and their
intellectual conscience. I might mention here, the Yoga sage Patanjali, the mythical
Padmasambhava who is supposed to have originated “the higher Tantra” of Vajrayana
Buddhism, numerous early Zen masters, the 13th century Dominican Meister Eckhart,
the contemplative Taoists Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu, and such modern pundits as J. Krishnamurti.
This latter trend tends to emphasise the fact that our attempts to “improve” ourselves
by systematically eroding our egos are themselves about as egotistical, egoist and
egoic as it’s possible to be.
How do these two tendencies pan out in practice? On the one hand, there is a project
of producing some conformity to an ideal, (Buddhist, Christian, Shaivite, New Age,
post-modern or whatever), through some practice or set of practices which will of
necessity have an ascetic character. Attaining the goal of the practices is conceived
of as being like winning the lottery: one supposedly becomes self-sufficient, peaceful,
magically able to fulfil one’s wishes – and here’s the golden egg: one no longer
suffers. The goal is also usually conceived of as being very distant and hard to
achieve. Let’s call this “ascetic spirituality”.
On the other hand, there is meditation without a goal. This is then of necessity
a “letting-be”, a radical openness to “what actually is”, a deep acceptance of who,
what and where we are. And since there is no goal, there is no question of either
ease or difficulty and no consideration of time-spans to be spent on this or that
‘stage’ of the ‘journey’. We should also add, there is no question of method. Let’s
call this “openness”.
Here I should tell you that my approach is the latter one, not least because the
metaphysical underpinnings of ascetic spirituality are of necessity incoherent, but
also because asceticism has invariably morbid results. Furthermore, the exquisite
sublimity and beauty that resides in the most ordinary moment makes the intoxication
produce by asceticism seem course and completely without the significance often attributed
to it.
So we aimless ones don’t have methods, and scarcely anything to teach. All we have
is a pointing towards what you already have. What seem like methods are really only
tricks. One of the tricks we do use is to indicate how you might comport yourself
within your meditation. This doesn’t ask you to do this or that, imagine this or
that, repeat this or that. It asks you to exercise your choice and be a certain way
as you find yourself alive and conscious within a life which is unfolding, as it
will and as it must, moment to moment.
At first it seems like there are a lot of choices, but really there is only one.
We can be orientated towards our own existence with a tight and fearful attitude
or an attitude of openness. The latter attitude is one in which love and the intelligence
of love automatically arises in one’s heart.
This choice actually mirrors the two approaches to “spiritual life” outlined above.
If one is fearful, perhaps because an over-active super-ego is incessantly shouting
that we are not good enough, then one will attempt to apply “methods” to achieve
the goal of moral perfection, and through that, some peace of conscience. Or our
attitude might be fearful because we rightly recognise life’s great capacity to make
us suffer and then seek some escape. We may then entertain the fantasy of bed-of-nails
Yoga, whereby, supposedly, we will learn to become impervious to pain. But that
which arises from fear will always smell of fear and the price for turning off pain
will be the turning off of delight too.
If one chooses openness in the sense of radical openness to what is, one has also
chosen to love oneself, life itself and others. One has also of necessity given up
on fear as an orientation to life.
But fear seems, at first glance, to be a primordial, rational and necessary driver
of human thought, feeling and behaviour. After all, it is quintessentially human
to project our consciousness into the future, register our essential vulnerability
and the inevitability of our death, and to act out of fear of these ‘facts of life’
to secure ourselves against them as far as possible. As a collective driver, this
tendency is responsible for the practical aspects of culture such as medicine and
agriculture and indeed for civilisation itself. But a meditation of letting-be with
awareness, of settling down into the stream of life, demonstrates very clearly that
our primordial life-energy is love and that fear is a kind of crystallisation or
fixation of that primordial energy. It also becomes apparent that love is the more
practical of the two, however counter-intuitive that might initially seem. How wonderful
that our most basic gift is love!!!
ARTICLES PUBLISHED IN FEBRUARY 2009
