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Iyengar Yoga/I am not a Yogi

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I have a confession to make. I’m not doing yoga how you’re supposed to. I don’t even want to. But I’m going to keep doing it anyway, and even teach.

I just finished a 5-day Iyengar yoga course near Dharamsala. Iyengar yoga was founded by B.K.S. Iyengar, who is basically the biggest yoga all-star in recent history. Definitely top three. This course was taught by Sharat Arora, a student of Iyengar’s, so this is the closest I’ve ever gotten to the source. I should start by saying that I enjoyed the course thoroughly. Sharat is an amazing teacher, full of life and inspiration. In five 3.5-hour sessions, my practice has been fine-tuned, and in some places completely overhauled.

Here’s the deal: Iyengar yoga is focused strongly on proper alignment and balance of the body. It doesn’t care much about strength or flexibility, and all sorts of props (blocks, belts, chairs, bolsters, blankets, etc) are used to make it possible for anyone to get into the best alignment in each pose. The teacher put a lot of emphasis on relaxing into each pose while maintaining alignment in order to release all the tension in the body.

Philosophically, the idea here is that balance in the body creates balance in the mind, and releasing tension in the body slowly eliminates tension in the mind, which is the root of craving and aversion. All this is more compelling and intricate when properly described, and my experience has suggested to me that it’s completely true. The teacher remarked that only this type of balance is “yoga.” All the forms which emphasize strength or flexibility are not real yoga, rather acrobatics or calisthenics. And on the my fundamental level, I have to agree with this as well.

The problem with strength or flexibility yoga, is that the poses continually create more craving to do harder poses, or to go deeper into the ones you know. Most recently for me this has been about handstand and scorpion. I want to be able to stand comfortably on my hands, and I want to be able to touch the back of my head with my feet. This is generally kind of weird, is not sustainable for the whole life, and is definitely not aligned with yogic thinking. Iyengar yoga does a lot better in this regard. There aren’t that many poses, they’re all accessible, and even more so with the props. You don’t have to go deep into the pose to get the benefits. As long as you keep proper alignment, you’ll reduce the tension in your body and become calm, more free from desire.

But I still want to be able to do these harder things. I want to deepen my yoga practice and my poses, to be stronger and more flexible. The more I learn about actual yoga philosophy, the more I realize that this freedom from desire is not really what I’m looking for in my practice. Maybe from meditation, but not from the yoga itself. Instead, I use the poses to balance my life on a larger scale. I plan to keep doing all sorts of things that create imbalance in my body: running, rock climbing, having worldly possessions and desires. To be totally immersed in the yogic life, all these things must be given up. Other physical activities just create tension and desires.

They’re also fun. The occasional frisbee tournament or running race is thrilling. Getting strong for rock climbing allows more rocks to be climbed. Life may not be able climbing more rocks, but I like it. Basically, all these imbalanced activities also create powerful experiences. Experiences broaden the mind, expand horizons and comfort zones, give meaning. A wealth of experience is not necessary for finding enlightenment or “inner peace,” and in fact based on this line of thinking, probably makes those things harder to reach.

These other forms of yoga, however, are wonderful for reducing the tension created by imbalanced experiences, for calming the mind, and for living a more examined life. Some people might be ready to go full steam ahead along the yogic path (not nearly as exciting as it sounds), and this pure form of Iyengar yoga seems to be a real way to do that. But I’m not ready to give up the experiential life, full of ups and downs and all-arounds. The world is big. There are so many good people to meet. For now, for me, yoga will make all those experiences better.

North! Haridwar, Rishikesh, Dharamsala

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I’ve made it north. Chennai to Delhi, Delhi to Haridwar, Haridwar to Rishikesh, Rishikesh to Dharamsala. I’m acquiring stories to tell faster than I can tell them. Similarly, I’m getting inspired faster than I can act. Plans for businesses to start when I’m back home, places all around the world to travel, classes to take, ideas to share. But very little time to make any of it happen. I’m realizing this is the nature of traveling. It fills your cup with novelty and experience, but doesn’t leave a lot of room to put energy back into the system. So, I’ll have a busy summer and fall.

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Train rides!

From Delhi, I caught an overnight sleeper bus to Haridwar, on which I got to share a twin-sized birth with a very nice man. Fate smiled on me and he was pretty thin, and had the idea to sleep head-to-toe. Turned out to be quite comfortable. In town, I met up with my friend Kelly from Seattle, who I’ve been traveling with since. For more in-depth impressions on Haridwar and Rishikesh, check out her latest blog post here.

Very briefly, Haridwar is a holy city for Hindus, and is packed with tourists and pilgrims from around the country. It’s nearly absent, however, of westerners. We stayed for two nights, checked out some cool temples and watched a fire ceremony that happens every night on the Ganges, the holiest river in the county. We ate some really good dal (lentils) and poori (fried dough – this is breakfast here). It was nice to be in a place without many white faces, just the opposite of what we found in Rishikesh.

Rishikesh is a holy city for Hindus as well, but it’s also popular for westerners because of the yoga scene and the fact that the Beatles spent some time there. More or less, the Ganges separates the hectic, crowded, Indian side of town from the chilled-out western side. A lot of people come to Rishikesh to stay in yoga ashrams and basically seclude themselves to do internal work. I’ve been to a couple ashrams, and at this point in my trip I’m not feeling any need to isolate myself. So we stayed in town on the chill side of the river.

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Laxman Jula, the chill side of Rishikesh

There are definitely some cool things happening in Rishikesh, but largely it’s the same scene as all the other popular traveler towns. Lots of cafes with peace signs painted on the walls serving western food and muesli very slowly while you sit on the floor with other westerners, play guitars and drink coffee. Normally, these are some of my favorite things to do, but it feels inauthentic here. It’s our idea of what India is supposed to be like, so we’ve manifested it here. Also, a bit too much pot-smoking and dreadlocks for my taste (fashion note: apparently the new way to have dreadlocks is to shave half your head and keep the rest).

But we had a good time. We did some yoga, checked out some far-out meditation workshops, and went rafting down the Ganges with a group of 19 year-old boys from Agra. It was great to catch up with Kelly and throw around some ideas about Seattle and the future. After a few days we caught another overnight bus, this time to Dharamsala, the home-base for the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan government in exile.

This was almost a week ago, and I’m loving it here. Most people don’t stay in Dharamsala itself, which is a relatively large and bustling city. We’re up the hills in Mcleod Ganj, which is where the Dalai Lama’s temple is (he’s not in town right now unfortunately). Farther up there are a couple smaller towns which are great for walking around, but which have the same muesli-vibe we caught in Rishikesh. The Tibetan community is really strong in Mcleod Ganj, which gives the place a wonderful feel. There are all sorts of organizations around to support the refugees, and I’ve just started helping a bit with English conversation classes. The air is clean here; the mountains are beautiful. We’re just in the foothills of the Himalayas (6,000 ft), which I’m planning to explore more deeply in the next few weeks.

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Mcleod Ganj

I’ve also met back up with Samyak Yoga, the group I did my yoga teacher training with. It’s great to see them again, drop into a few classes, and feel immediately like I’m part of a community here. Today I started a 5-day intensive Iyengar Yoga course, which will be a whole different way of looking at the practice, focusing entirely on alignment of the body. There is strong coffee here (without the pot-smoking and peace signs to go with it), and the desserts are the best I’ve had in the country. Indians love sweets, which tends to make their treats one-dimensional along the sugar axis. The Tibetans have it better figured out, with a good balance of sweet, salt, and chocolate.

Seeing the Tibetan community in exile first-hand has also opened my eyes to the insanity of the struggle going on across the border. It’s a desperate situation. All those “Free Tibet” stickers and t-shirts have been changing over to “Save Tibet,” which is much more accurate at this point. This is a story for another time.

Basically, you are probably getting the idea that there is a huge amount going on over here. My days are full and the energy around is powerful. There is so much good stuff to do, and now I’m down to my last month in India. The trip is simultaneously flying by and endless: one of the mysteries of time. I’m excited to get back to the States to pursue some of these ideas, but still savoring the experiences of the trip.

Comfortability/This Trip is Awesome

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I just passed my two-month anniversary in India, and at about the same time had a major breakthrough. I realized a week ago that I am totally comfortable here now. This trip is awesome. Somehow all the difficulties and obstacles that I was facing before have vanished. Jaya Ganesha! (He removes obstacles, and I sing to him a lot). I’m completely comfortable with no toilet paper, no hot water (had my first hot shower for two months this morning. So good.), last-minute bus tickets, long train rides, and most importantly, major uncertainty.

That’s really the biggest thing, and it’s the part that troubled me the most at the beginning of my trip. It only took a couple wild rickshaw rides to get used to the driving here, but the uncertainty has taken longer. I would stress out about not having a place to stay, not knowing when I’d eat next, find water, or have a toilet. Here’s the thing about India: there are people EVERYWHERE. Everywhere. So there is always a place to eat, and someone to help you if you’re desperate. I’ve got a good sense now of what food is safe to eat (almost all of it), who to trust (almost everybody), and when to keep walking. I’ve realized that the only difference between doing a lot of research to find a cheap and good hotel a week in advance desperately searching for one at the last minute is probably only about $2. There is usually space to do yoga. Having travel companions has been hugely important. A couple friends (or soon-to-be-friends) can make a stressful day of squeezing onto local buses without really knowing where you’re going into a noteworthy adventure. 

With this comfort has come a great sense of freedom. My plans are entirely flexible, which has been great. I have a general goal to be in the north in about 10 days, which I think I’ll almost be able to make. It’s okay if I’m late – it looks like I’ll have a 60 hour train ride first, and I’d love to stop by Varanasi. In the past week I’ve been in Tamil Nadu, which I had no plans to visit before I arrived in India. With a couple travel companions, I checked out temples in Madurai, went to a Sivananda yoga ashram for a few days, and now am in Kodaikanal getting ready to head to a permaculture/yoga farm in the mountains. It’s dreamy here. The landscape is a bit like northern California, but with more jagged cliffs. Kind of like southern Italy or Greece.

I feel like I’ve seen so much, but I’ve barely left the bottom 10% of the country. There is so much here, it’s unbelievable. My ideas of what India is all about are constantly shattered. Most of the places I’ve visited I would love to come back to for even longer (and I have a feeling I’ll never want to leave this farm). There is a zen meditation center right near where I’m staying now, which I’d love to visit but might not have time/they might be booked. This is the norm – there is more to see and do than I possibly have time for, and almost all of it I had no idea about before I got here. This sense of endlessness is wonderful, and it makes me want to travel so much more. The world feels enormous, but more and more approachable. The more I discover about myself, the more natural I feel where ever I am.

Open eyes, open heart.

This trip is awesome.

Amma, Opening the Heart

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From Verkala we decided to take a few-day excursion up to Amma’s ashram, the home of the famous hugging saint. I hadn’t heard of Amma before arriving in India, but some people were talking about her during the yoga teacher training. She is said to be fully enlightened, and communicates her love and wisdom by hugging. She’s given over 30 million hugs so far around the world. The organization which has grown up around her in the last couple decades also does great humanitarian work throughout India and around the world. We were planning to stay two days, ended up staying five, and could have stayed much longer if other experiences weren’t calling out so loudly.

Even after five days there, I still don’t know what to think of the Amma experience, or even where to start relating it. Partly it felt like a cult, partly a relaxed and friendly ashram, and partly like the real thing: tutelage under an enlightened guru. There is powerful energy there, and it seems to be stronger the more you’re willing to surrender to the experience and to Amma herself. Her hugs are very good. It feels a little like Jesus Camp for people who have been turned off by Christianity. The place sets off all sorts of warning bells for me, but something about it felt completely true and authentic.

Part of my intrigue with the place relates to thinking I’ve done and conversations I’ve had recently about the heart. Specifically about opening the heart and living vulnerably, rather than living from the head. I’ve found that I approach life very rationally, and look at almost all difficulties from a logical perspective. Often I view creative problems from a rational, head-derived perspective, even though those aren’t head-problems. Even my yoga often comes from a place of speculation and over-thinking, rather than one of feeling and emotion. All that said, I’ve created quite a good story of heart-work going on in my life, and I’ve learned to project that that is what’s going on, even when it’s not. Sometimes I really do feel that my heart is leading the way, but not often enough. Too often I use my intellect to know how I should respond, and do that rather than acting from the heart.

I’m not sure this makes much sense from an outside perspective. The basic idea though, is that everything I do will be that much more meaningful if it truly comes from my heart, not through a veil or facade I’ve built up over years of analytic thinking. My yoga, my art, my music, my relationships. So it’s a big thing to work on, and I feel like being at Amma’s gave me a good environment to get focused on it, to practice opening up. Even just being on stage with her while she’s giving hugs (which she does about 10 hours a day), I could feel an energy creating pressure in my chest, perhaps peeling away some kind of sheath around the heart. The more I was willing to accept this experience, the stronger it would become. By the end of the stay, I felt much more open than when I arrived. There’s no way for me to know if this kind of energy is real or imagined, but at a certain point it doesn’t matter. It heals and helps, and that’s what counts.

One piece I thought about a lot during the stay was the balance of feminine and masculine energy in the heart. A lot of advice about the heart is based around learning to love oneself. I think this is crucially important, but I have never quite related to it because it comes somewhat naturally to me. Maybe this is the masculine approach to the heart; it’s the baseline I’m starting from. The piece that I think is much harder for me to internalize is the other side, the place where women naturally come from – giving the heart away. I don’t want to draw too many broad generalizations here, but this has been more or less my experience. Naturally, women tend to nurture and give their energy away, men tend to protect and keep their energy close. To balance the heart, I think I need to practice more giving my heart away, surrendering, devoting my energy to someone else’s good work.

I have some ideas for doing this, mostly involving volunteer service. I’m hoping to serve a Vipassana meditation course when I’m up north next month, maybe volunteer with an organization in Dharamsala, and definitely get more connected with community groups once I land back in the states. Meanwhile, I’m trying to approach my stay in India with open eyes and an open heart. It can be hard, but it is totally worth it. I can already feel a change in my perspective, and in the way people interact with me. I think this is the biggest work for me to do on this trip.

Verkala, Muladhara Chakra

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I just finished eight days in Verkala, a beautiful paradise cliff town in Kerala, India. This is the place most like the stereotypical paradise I’ve ever been. Fresh papaya, pineapple, grapes, oranges, melons, coconuts everywhere. Still cheap by American standards. With a room at a beautiful homestay (kitchen and yoga terrace included), I was spending about $10-$18/day. Life here can be much cheaper, but this price essential got me a life of luxury.

 

When we arrived in town, I felt a weight immediately lifted. I realized that travelling in inherently insecure. You never know for certain when or where you’ll next eat, sleep, or use the toilet. In yoga terms, these are all functions of the Muladhara chakra, or root chakra. If it’s not satisfied, you can’t progress to higher levels of existence: creativity, courage, emotional connection, communication, wisdom, and universal connection. When the root chakra is closed or blocked, you get stressed, feel uncertain and insecure.

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This is the best my phone can do, but you get the idea

 

Arriving in Verkala immediately opened my root chakra. The place is so calm, familiar without my ever having been there before. The main hangout is built up on a cliff overlooking the Arabian Sea, which is basically the ocean. There are palm trees swaying in the wind, and everyone expects there to be a lot of travelers, so you don’t feel like a spectacle walking around. There is still a slight feeling of being a commodity there, but nowhere near as much as in Kovalam. Kovalam is much more oriented toward full-package tourism, while Verkala is full of fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants backpackers. Basically it feels like it could be home. It would be easy to stay a month and work on some big projects.

 

With my root chakra opened up, I felt a surge of creative energy. I decided to get started writing a book, to ask around for students looking for yoga classes, to paint and draw and read. The stay ended up being fantastic. I listened to live music four nights in a row, including my first Indian classical music concert. With some friends from the yoga training, I practiced yoga twice most days. By the last day I taught a class of eight students at 6:30 am on the beach. I taught a few classes of three or four students before it, but this felt like my first real yoga class. Teaching felt great. I’ve got a lot of familiarity and confidence to gain, but it’s so rewarding to help people have the experience of yoga.

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My students!

It’s sad to leave Verkala, but there is a lot more left to do. One of our next stops will be Kanyakumari. It’s the southernmost tip of India and has a view of the confluence of three oceans. There’s apparently not much to do there, but it’s said to be the physical manifestation of the Muladhara chakra in India. There are seven places in India that correspond to the seven chakras, with Kanyakumari as the furthest south, and Mt. Kailash, now in Tibet, as the farthest north. Mt. Kailash is the crown chakra, and is one of the most holy places in the world. But for now, I’m happy to have my root chakra taken care of.