Chanting: Why do it?

Thank goodness for this practice of ashtanga yoga, not just the physical practice - but all eight limbs of it. My new favourite limb is the singing limb - where is that located you may ask, in the niyamas?

Yes, svadhyaya!

Is it located in the inner limbs - does it happen during meditative awareness, dhyana? 

Yes! 

What about asana, can you sing in this limb too? 

Heck, why not!

Dash is almost two years old. Since he was born and since the time I became pregnant in the fall of 2013, I have matured as a yogi in many ways. I have gone backwards in my practice and became a beginner all over; then forwards again as I built what was lost back up. 

I bring my teachers into the room to practice with me. They have inspired me to be great and go beyond what I know. My dearest friends and teachers - Randa Chehab, Christine Hoar, Guruji, Sharath, David Garrigues and Dena Kingsberg...they have all taught me nuggets of the yoga practice and I remember their touch and their insight each and every day I practice. 

I absolutely love this practice, I long for it and smell it - Surya Namaskar B is like a little slice of heaven in my mind.

My newest teacher is my Sanskrit teacher, David Miliotis. His website is Here. David teaches me about the yoga sutras and guides me in my daily chanting practice. I look towards seeing one of my teachers of asana once or twice a year if I am lucky - but David I am happy to see more often - once or twice a month if I can so I can learn how to sing and chant the story of yoga. 

The best part is that he lives in Los Angeles, and I live in Edinburgh! We use Skype to connect. It isn't difficult to connect with people whom you wish to learn from. Email, Skype, viber, messaging, hand written letters...reach out!

When you chant you are able to understand YOUR yogic practice better. Chanting I have found helps me understand the asana practice. This is difficult to understand but think of it this way: you see an apple and you smell it and feel it - it looks good. But until you actually bite into it and chew it do you really know what it is like. It is like this - chanting helps you savour and taste and absorb what you are practicing better. Like asana practice, in the beginning you are methodical, robotic almost, memorizing and just getting everything in the series done safely and in the right order. This is like chanting as a beginner, we repeat and learn how to articulate our tongues in the right way and it is often a bit difficult and tiresome. 

Soon though, with practice and time - you can sing the sutras! This would be just like linking the vinyasa with the asana and the breath and dristi - you find a rhythmic smoothness and ease, you almost laugh through the practice with joy since it is easy, free flowing and meditative.  It only becomes this way when you do it often and for a long time.

Chanting also relieves the stresses and pressures of the asana practice and gets me courageously taking a deeper look at myself. Chanting reveals what is happening on that rectangle purple platform, the yoga mat. What is really happening when I do Buddhasana? Sitting and chanting, sitting and absorbing the meditative qualities of the Sanskrit sounds  - this brings out the story of this posture.

Singing and chanting also means that there is joy. Bringing joy and ease into your practice is a healthy way to begin going deeper. We can't take ourselves too seriously, so by enjoying what we are actually doing more we will feel it and experience it on a deeper level. It can be a bit uncomfortable in the beginning, but it will be pain-free and harmonious with time.

As a total beginner to chanting and kirtan or other types of singing - where to begin? Get a recording or record someone great. Have a Skype private lesson with a teacher. Get yourself contemplating what yoga means by weaving your way through the sutras - I promise it will spit you out a few lessons on your Marichyasana D.

I am courageously weaving my way through the third chapter and almost ready to begin studying the fourth chapter of the Yoga Sutras and I am definitely still a beginner. I lead free chanting sessions at Meadowlark on Wednesdays and Fridays. Until I've chanted it for ten years I will remain the beginner. 

If you practice deeply and devotedly any type of the yogic practice - whether it is asana, pranyama or meditation or chanting, you will reach stillness and acquire a meditative mind. And I believe the nirodhaha will come. Actually you don't even need the yoga sutras to explain it to you - though for some of us, the extra information does help guide us along in a very profound way.

Chanting Happenings:

Chanting Workshop 10-11 June - Meadowlark

Weekly:
4 pm Meadowlark Yoga - free
9:15 am Meadowlark Yoga - free

Unraveling in Aberdeen

We moved this past week from Edinburgh to Aberdeen. This stressful time of clean-the-house, pack-the-car, say-goodbye-to-friends, and then move-to-a-new-city is one that requires some recovery time.

Thank you, Ashtanga Yoga Edinburgh!

I begin this new chapter in Aberdeen with rest. Rest is reading books ("The Autograph Man" and "Wolf Hall"), practicing, chanting, making ghee, taking walks, cooking, journaling, and writing letters to friends.

Long walks along my new favorite river, the Don, involve navigating pathways and trails that somehow just end! Though I am often lost, it is familiar to live right among the trees. In less than five minutes I am right at the river's side taking in the smells of the river: sharp detritus of rotting logs, bright green freshwater moss, piles of leaves, and abandoned forts that animals have built left like abandoned Scottish castles.

Intertwined foliage creeps everywhere, all around me, right inside me. It is lush, it is organic, it is juicy. Nature inspires me to practice, so I bring the memories of the natural world in. Can I feel this enamored while in Poorna Matsyendrasana? I shall try.

I have also been cooking as much food as possible with the guidance of Yotam Ottolenghi. Yotam transforms vegetables with heat and fire into a metamorphosis of joy. He may blind side you by asking you to garnish your masterpiece with a voluptuous egg. Deliciously daring!

Yogic practice has been a very relaxed affair; home practices have been sprinkled with peace. There haven’t been any early morning cycling/walking escapades through dark streets to get to practice. Practicing in your living room is sometimes the best place to approach any difficult asana.

Now, after morning coffee I stroll to the runway and the riches of this practice we love come right out. All it takes is a clean room without clutter and a lot of effort. Practice doesn’t need to be a gruel of sweat left drying on your mat like a heap of exhaustion, either. Use the right amount of effort in order to make it successful and joyful. 

Along the River Don, there are many kinds of geese and ducks flying about tending to what needs to be tended to before flying south in the coming cooling months. The cold wind in the air is nature’s warning; these birds know it, and they are hurrying about in their preparations.  

I too am gearing up to teach and join the yoga community in Aberdeen, though I may not be as busy as these birds! I am offering a few workshops in the coming weeks and in the meantime, I shall continue to admire the birds’ efforts and learn from the most glorious guide, nature.

******

Teaching schedule in Aberdeen/Edinburgh:

14-15 September, Love Yoga - weekend workshop, book Love Yoga

30-September -7 Oct, The Yoga Spot - week of Mysore intensive. Book The Yoga Spot.

21-25 October Ashtanga Yoga Edinburgh - week of Mysore intensive, book AYE.

Swinging in the Trees

Ashtanga Yoga Edinburgh has the most incredible windows that look out into a glorious park, The Meadows. This morning while in my practice, I came up from Prasarita Padotonosana A, and when I looked straight ahead, my view was of giant healthy trees. I became so attached in the beauty of these trees for a moment, I became heavy and earthy, just like them. It was clear I was envious of their ability to be so voluptuous and I wanted to be one. [This may happen Patanjali says when we attach ourselves to what we meditate upon - see what happens if we do not stay attached by clicking here - Yoga Sutra 3.38.)

They each had huge bases that appeared to make the surrounding environment around them - including me gazing at them - so small. Their barky bodies - hardy and furry with protection - reminded me that to go upwards and grow, there must be a strong downward force - imagine the roots on those babies!

With all the "supta up!" such as lifting and swinging and jumping back and forward in the ashtanga yoga practice, it is important to remember to go down into the earth as well - especially while practicing the standing asanas. 

For the arm balances of the Advanced Series as well as throughout the primary and intermediate - there is a huge emphasis on the ability to lift up off of the ground. Once you have figured out how to go up, it is just as important to figure out how to land and how to go back down. Often I feel myself going upwards and not enough downwards or even outwards - the opposite of the action I am working so hard to do. When this happens there is no ease and a lot of effort: I feel myself over working, trying too hard and well, just practicing without any results.

An old friend once told me, "If you are going to be stupid, you better be tough." 

The pairing of opposites is latent within a yoga practice and must be present in one's daily efforts - in order to join the physical practice with the mental one. Patanjali uses the word "dvandvah" (Sutra 11.48) which is translated as "duality" to describe these opposites. 

There are three yoga sutras about asana - and this is the last of the three suggesting that when the yogi has perfected asana (effortless effort and benevolent steadiness) then he or she is "undisturbed by dualities". Iyengar, "Light on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali". The "dualities" can be anything like hot or cold; joy or sorrow; pain or pleasure...they can also be upwards and downwards, forwards and backwards, and directional - think of the inner vayus that fill the inner body like wind in all directions.

An image like a billowing tree in a picturesque Meadow helped me realize that for every arm balance that needs a ton of effort to move upwards to hold, there needs to be a downward force like no other to vacuum (pull up) the energy being pushed down.

We can take this metaphor all the way though and use it to train our minds. Really the same effort we use to hold on to something that we attach ourselves to is required in order to let it go. For each effort in one direction, the same or more is required to get yourself out of it.

Catch yourself using too much intellectual energy on this one? Try admiring a beautiful tree, see how earthy you feel in it's presence; then, see if you can use it's medicine and wisdom to help you lift up into Eka Pada Bakasana A or Galavasana in the Advanced Series. If this works for you like it does for me - then I think you have understood what Patanjali is talking about. On a physical level, of course. 

Smiles and Blessings...happy practices to you.

Jewellea Photography

Svadhyaya

Keeping a practice journal (or even a blog) may reveal all your secrets that are hidden in the yoga practice. Once I let the ink take over, they pour out onto the paper. This type of exposure allows you to accept what has happened and where you are now - and this is a great taste of what the yamas and niyamas are all about. 

Writing and sharing your practice: reading your own voice of the practice is like watching yourself do a self practice. There is a sense of ownership and wonderment about what you are practicing. What is often revealed is how the medicine of yoga is actually working. Sometimes information comes out in letters to friends and teachers, too.

Janu Sirsasana A-C, for example. When I first started to write about my practice, I had a sweet crush on these asanas. Some days we would fight as my toes were crunching...other days I would feel a truce as the A-C exposure led my hips towards greater sensibility. 

Once you start writing about what you are actually feeling on the mat, you can notice how you are handling your emotions when you are practicing yoga. Are they always in check? Are you a bomb waiting to go off because you are repressing something that wants to come out? Or are you one who melts down during your practice? Are you totally flat, moving methodically through the yoga asanas with nothing, nothing happening on the inside?

We all know that each Series has a dragon that lives in each one, maybe more than one, even. We have plenty of meditative  tools to face these 'dragons'. Breath, bandha, dristhi, vinyasa, dharana...but more than the practice tools we have devotion and passion to practice.  

You are forced to do something with these emotions. This anger, meltdown, obsession (whatever it may be) then becomes a guide which leads you towards compassion. These terrible asanas then become more like loved rivals as you dig deeper and deeper towards understanding them - and understanding yourself. This passion for understanding (Union!) is what cracks us open, and exposes us.

These demons also challenge our egos, our sense of "I"-ness and our entire beings of whom we think we are. It is no wonder that some days while practicing karandavasana I often wink after all my hard three tries, "Till next time, sweet wee duck, thank you for kicking my !$*(#!"

Sometimes in baddha konasana I enter this posture as if I were going into a cave, into a place of worship. During this posture one dives into the hips and into the pelvis, and if we are sensing each and every breath, we become softer and kinder to those around us - sharing the forgiveness and tenderness we found within ourselves with others.

Then in the advanced series (A), there are all sorts of recluse demons hanging out around every bend in the road: Virancha, Durva...Kukku...Bhaka...so many monsters in this one to make you fearless, to soften and harden you, to burn out any kleshas. For good. And I often meet them at the door with my best team. 

If we aren't experiencing an emotional exposure from our practices (I mean any practice - no matter whether they be a daily practice of Sun Salutations only, or a long vigorous advanced practice), then I believe we are missing the point of yoga. Work out the problems you have with those enemies and iron them out. For the asanas that you are having problems with, some serious therapy (research and study) may be the medicine. 

If you are a flatliner, or are experiencing a lull in your practice, try giving your practice a wee break from asana (tone it down, do less) and add in some study and philosophy to your daily asana? 

Sutra 2.1 offers svadhyaya - self and spiritual study - as a full yogic practice in itself. Patanjali also includes svadhyaya in the niyamas - the second limb of ashtanga yoga. Since svadhyaya is a part of the niyamas, this suggests it is worth our effort to include them into our study of yoga. And on a daily basis. So if we are cleaning our bodies and minds on the mat through asana, then why not clear out what is left upstairs through writing and self reflection then, too? 

Philosophy of Yoga and chanting the YS of Patanjali - Fridays and Sundays at AYE - join me!


From Rumi:

The Guest House

This being human is a guest house
Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, depression, a meanness
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor!

Welcome them and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows 
who violently sweep your house
empty of it's furniture
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes, 
because each has been sent 
as a guide from beyond.