Volume 19 Issue 1 February - April 2010
PRESIDENT’S LETTER
Inside This Issue Asana Column Sutra Column Studio Spotlight
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DON’T FORGET TO RENEW YOUR
MEMBERSHIP
IN
IYASE & IYNAUS
General members can renew on our website or send in the form on the last page of the newsletter. Certified teachers need to renew through IYNUAS. Email the membership chair at www.iyase.org with any questions.
FUTURE ARTICLES: If you have information that you would like to be included in future IYASE newsletters, please send an e-mail to Lori Lipton Ritland, Newsletter Chair, at: newsletter@iyase.org
Happy Spring!! If you are like me you are anxious to see what the work from last fall will bring. Do the bulbs look like I expected, are the seeds putting on new growth? IYASE is in a similar stage of growth and we are looking forward with anticipation to a number of upcoming events. We can credit much of this growth to the hard work of last year’s board, to the commitment of the current board and to your continued support of the Lotus Fellowship Fund. This revenue has allowed your regional organization to grow into a national leader in producing programs that support and nurture our members. From workshops to scholarships we are working to expand the awareness and understanding of Iyengar Yoga in the Southeast. Outgoing board members Cher Columbus, Joe Adlesic and Ruth Ann Bradley, were involved in more fine work during their tenure as board members than I can chronicle in the space allowed this article. But I can say that in addition to their hard work, their creative problem solving and endless good humor will be sorely missed. Thank you for your service. 2010 is a year of exciting possibilities. I know that Geeta’s presence and teaching at the Portland Convention will inspire and uplift our certified teachers. Their students will enjoy the benefits of Geeta’s teaching through their teachers and so our community will be doubly inspired. We are trying to coordinate an opportunity to get together during the Convention. Check the website or watch for an e bulletin as plans develop. We will be sponsoring a membership drive to take place sometime in October. As our largest source of revenue it is important that we continue to grow our committed community of Iyengar yogis. Our plan is to involve teachers and studios around our region to offer a special class for new members to IYASE. Diana Martinez who is serving as membership chair will be contacting you to discuss your ideas and your inclusion in this new program. Also this fall we will be conducting an election to replace two outgoing board members. Although board members are members of IYASE but need not be teachers. They serve for 4 years and are the motor behind all of IYASE’s programs from planning to implementation. Our nominations committee will be putting together a slate of individuals to run. If you are interested in serving in a leadership role on your regional board please email me at president@iyase.org We continue to do well financially, and ended last year with a balance of $29,489.69. We generated $13,763.27 in revenue with expenses of $11,933.55. This gave us a small increase in income of $1,829.72. While our financials are positive they hardly reflect the growth needed to expand our program offerings. As we continue to spread the light of Iyengar Yoga through our region, we will need to find creative ways to maximize our impact with minimum financial obligation. Please come to us with your ideas for IYASE. These are the seeds that planted now will continue to bloom and grow for future Iyengar yogis. Namaste, Phyllis
ASANA COLUMN by Lisa Walford Workshop held at Yoga Source, Virginia February 2010
P
erhaps the most insidious culprit at work in our society today is stress. Stress increases blood pressure, breathing rate, and muscle blood flow and impairs digestion and releases hormones which chemically alters the body into “flight or fight.” However, by changing our internal environment, we can reverse the physiological effects of chronic stress. Lisa Walford’s sequence focuses on the subtleties of our internal bodies; combining supportive and quieting asanas, directed breathing and techniques for conscious relaxation. Supported Supta Svastikasana (2 folded blankets) ( 5 minutes)
Supta Tadasana with Urdhva Baddhanguliyasana Supta Padangusthasana I & II (support beneath thigh bone) (3 minutes each side) Supported Setubandha Sarvangasana (4 blankets as in Yoga: Path toward Holistic Health, B.K.S. Iyengar) (10 minutes) Supported Adho Mukha Virasana (bolster + 2 blankets to support front of torso) (3 minutes) Supported Adho Mukha Svanasana (3 minutes) Viparita Karani (10 minutes) Savasana (5 minutes) Virasana on blocks, Meditation (10 minutes) Supported Savasana, Pranayama Ujjayi stage 2 long exhale Viloma 1, supine Seated Pranayama Ujjayi stage 8 even inhale & exhale Savasana Lisa Walford holds a Senior Iyengar teaching certificate and has been teaching yoga in Los Angeles since 1982. She continues her studies annually with the Iyengars. She is also the curriculum director for the Teacher Training Program at Yoga Works and was instrumental in its development. She is on the advisory board of the International Association of
Yoga Therapists and the Yoga Studies program at Loyola Marymount University. She is also the curriculum director for the Teacher Training Program at Yoga Works and was instrumental in its development. She is on the advisory board of the International Association of Yoga Therapists and the Yoga Studies program at Loyola Marymount University. Yoga Source, Richmond, Virginia’s premier yoga studio, is centrally located in the heart of Carytown. They strive to create a home for the practice of yoga that encourages each student’s individual growth while fostering a sense of community. For more information, visit www.yogarichmond.com.
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2010 WORKSHOPS May 21 - 23
May 21 - 23
June 4 - 6
June 11-13
June 19
Dean Lerner Asheville, NC (828) 225-1904 sarah@onecenteryoga.com
Karin O'Bannon Teacher Training:Third in a 5 weekend series Audubon Yoga Studio New Orleans, LA (504) 821-9885 Becky@AudubonYoga.com
John Schumacher Workshop for Teachers: How to help students with special issues Unity Woods Yoga Center (301) 330-0430 susan.mann@yoga.com
John Schumacher IYASE Sponsored Junior Intermediate Teacher Training Stillwater Yoga Studio Atlanta, GA Tedrah@comcast.net
John Schumacher Advanced Asana Class: Back Bends Unity Woods Yoga Center Woodley Park, MD (301) 656-8992 uwyc@unitywoods.com
June 20
John Schumacher Advanced Pranayama V and VI Unity Woods Yoga Center Bethesda, MD (301) 656-8992 uwyc@unitywoods.com
June 25 - 27
Lois Steinberg Intensive Inner Life Yoga Studio LLC Morgantown, WV (304) 296-1744 sbleher@msn.com
Sept 10 - 11
Dean Lerner Intensive Inner Life Yoga Studio LLC Morgantown, WV (304) 296-1744 sbleher@msn.com
Sept 10-12
Lois Steinberg Unity Woods Yoga Center Bethesda, MD (301) 656-8992 uwyc@unitywoods.com
Sept 24 - 26
Simon Marrocco Asheville, NC (828) 225-1904 sarah@onecenteryoga.com
If you have addittional workshops that you would like included in future IYASE newsletters, please submit through our online workshop submission form on www.iyase.org 3
SUTRA COLUMN
Finding Gems in Duality: Ahimsa and Satya by Siegfried Bleher
I
t is virtually impossible to avoid dualities in daily life: political parties that are in constant contention, interest groups with competing agendas and needs, apparently incompatible aims and needs of family members or friends, and our own wealth of often conflicting desires, emotions and commitments. In fact, Patanjali tells us that, owing to fluctuations, the qualities of nature, and subliminal impressions, even pleasant experiences are tinged with sorrow (sutra II.15, B. K. S. Iyengar, Light on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali). That is, change and fluctuation go hand-in-hand with suffering. But change could not occur without polarities and duality. If dualities are unavoidable, what can we do? Do we persistently battle to maintain one side or the other of a duality (i.e. my side)? Do we quietly ignore them, hoping they will go away, or do we throw our hands up in frustration? Is there an effective way to relate to dualities? What do the Yoga Sutras say about duality? In a series of three articles I will describe what I feel Patanjali, the author of the Yoga Sutras, says about duality explicitly, and what he says implicitly. In sutra II.48, Patanjali tells us that dualities lose their capacity to disturb us once we perfect asana. One can even argue that the progression in our practice of asana, and the way we practice asana in the Iyengar method, also progressively trains our mind to see beyond duality. We practice opposing (paired, dual) actions in order to deepen a stretch: we stabilize one part of the body with one action, and perform a second action that pairs with the first action. Doing each separately has its own results and benefits. Doing both together has a third result, one that is deeper than either action performed separately. Once I see this third result, several beneficial things happen. To start with, I gain the intended physical benefits: I get the proper rotation in my shoulder, or the proper lengthening in my hamstring, without creating problems elsewhere. That is one intended physical effect. Another intended physical effect is that I become aware of the organic effects of each pose. Beyond the physical benefits, there are the mental/ emotional and spiritual benefits. For example, I gradually train my mind to focus on less physical things, to notice and appreciate the more subtle koshas1. It is in the process
of noticing more subtle koshas that my practice may pick up a spiritual aspect. If I came to yoga already feeling a connection with what is spiritual, then the process of noticing the subtle koshas shows me the connection between my spiritual nature and my physical nature. My thoughts and feelings turn to the larger picture that fits yoga within the context of my life as a whole. The yamas and niyamas, although I may be aware of them as general rules of conduct when I first come to yoga, begin to take on a palpable reality and direct significance to my life. As I study these and how they relate to my life, I begin to notice their interplay with each other how I cannot practice one effectively without accounting for all the others. In this and the following two articles I ask whether I can learn something about my daily life and my asana practice by looking at the yamas and niyamas as dual pairs. In this article I focus on a pairing of ahimsa and satya; in the second article, a pairing of santosa and tapas; in the third article, a pairing of svadhyaya and Isvara pranidhana. YS II.30 ahimsa satya asteya brahmacarya aparigrahah yamah. Non-violence, truth, abstention from stealing, continence, and absence of greed for possessions beyond one’s need are the five pillars of yama. Ahimsa means non-harming, non-violence, wishing no harm in word, thought or deed. Satya means truthfulness, honesty, sincerity. Since these two yamas are each good qualities to cultivate and practice in themselves, maybe they are not necessarily related. But now and then I run into situations where a decision I must make hinges on the interplay between ahimsa and satya. I want to praise and encourage my daughter in all she does, but I also want to give her honest guidance; I am upset about something someone said, but I am trying to move away from judgment; I know where I want to go in urdhva dhanurasana, but my body is resisting my efforts. What do I do? Can I decide and act in a way that honors both ahimsa and satya? One of the most useful observations I heard a few years ago (from John Schumacher) was to note that ahimsa is listed before satya. I don’t take this to mean that sometimes I continued on pg. 8
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STUDIO SPOTLIGHT
Celebrating 14 Years By Suzy Pennington
M
y story begins in 1996: I had taken Iyengar Yoga classes for 3 years with Bob Glickstein, Director and Founder of the Yoga Center of Columbia Maryland. I was working for CitiCorp in their marketing department (strongly disliking it) and teaching marketing as Adjunct Professor at the University of Baltimore School of Business (and liking it). Then my life fell apart. In one week I was laid off, told I’d never have kids, and the woman - who had been like a mother to me - died. I despaired. Through these times of personal upheaval, great change can occur. My acupuncturist recommended I take a year off if possible and rediscover myself. I realized I had done very little self-discovery since college despite having a B.S. degree in psychology. My husband agreed to the plan and off I went to the Yoga Co-Op in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico for an extended stay.
yoga could be an international career. I thought about a different approach to leading my life that I had up until then. I thought, “I have the power to make change in my life.” Later, while in Puerta Vallarta, I had a vivid dream about a white room on the second floor of a shopping center
white room in my dream! A man came out, introduced himself as Eric, the new acupuncturist, and asked me who I was and what I did. Not being employed, I replied that I had just gotten back from Mexico where I had taught Yoga. He exclaimed that he had been looking for a Yoga teacher to join his practice! After talking to him
The people there waiting for class asked me if I taught Yoga. I told them ‘no’ but they convinced me it was me or no class at all. I taught the class; everyone survived and I was excited. I’d found something new to do. where people were working and providing service for each other. This dream was so powerful it stayed with me for several days.
and Bob, my Yoga teacher, I enrolled in a teacher-training program, and it was decided that I would teach Yoga there.
Arriving back in Baltimore, my neighborhood health store had gone through changes as well. I wandered around, went upstairs and saw the
So I began the studio with no teachertraining, no business plan and no continued on pg. 6
One morning the Yoga teacher did not show up. The people there waiting for class asked me if I taught Yoga. I told them ‘no’ but they convinced me it was me or no class at all. I taught the class; everyone survived and I was excited. I’d found something new to do. I imagined the possibility that teaching
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Studio Spotlight cont'd
“
I thought about a different approach to leading my life that I had up until then. I thought, “I have the power to make change in my life.”
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money. In fact the business almost began before me! I named it after the Susquehanna River, the mighty head river of the Chesapeake Bay. My first class was held on April 1, 1996 with 3 students who had heard about the class from friends. I had no equipment so I used old beach towels for blankets and borrowed chairs from the juice bar next door. In the first class I had an international tennis celebrity, Pam Shriver drop in! Boy was I nervous. I saw this as a sign that the business would thrive. One month later my husband was sent by his company to Malaysia for
four months and I was expected to go with him I was able to join Ann Barros, a California Yoga teacher in Ubud, Bali at the Gandhi Ashram. The firsthand experience of living in both Hindu and Buddhist countries brought the study of Yoga home. I also had time to do a lot of reading. When I got back from Malaysia I finished my teacher training and began the business in earnest. Like most small business owners I put all the money back into equipment and marketing. It grew slowly and steadily, taking all my knowledge and skill. Small business is so different from corporations that sometimes my business degree got in the way: For example, the rate of change in the marketplace is so much faster than for a large business. I also learned not to intellectualize so much and to trust my instincts. And I had to learn to do it all myself at first, no assistants! In September 2000 I was awarded my Iyengar teaching certificate from the National Iyengar Association. This took four years of study. Later that year I went to India to study for a month with B.K.S. Iyengar, in Pune, India. It was a rigorous lesson in both philosophy and yoga and I still feel grateful for the opportunity. Now, April 2010, Susquehanna Yoga is celebrating 14 years of service to the community. We have 7 teachers, 3 of whom are Iyengar Certified. We have 24 classes a week which include Levels 1, 2 and
“
Small business is so different from corporations that sometimes my business degree got in the way: For example, the rate of change in the marketplace is so much faster than for a large business. I also learned not to intellectualize so much and to trust my instincts.
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3 and a special seniors class and several off-site corporate classes. We also teach a lot of privates each week. Over the years Susquehanna Yoga has hosted workshops with the esteemed John Schumacher, Aadil Palkhivala, Dean Lerner, Bob Glickstein, Bryan Legere and Bobbie Fultz. I still conduct retreats each year to Mexico; and have added Switzerland, France and Italy. I continue to study Yoga all over the world when possible and every week with my teacher John Schumacher. What an interesting journey this has been…and exciting for where the journey will lead.
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ANNUAL INTERMEDIATE JUNIOR
TEACHER TRAINING WITH JOHN SCHUMACHER June 11 - June 13, 2010 Stillwater Yoga Studio Atlanta, Georgia IYASE c/o Tedrah Smothers 1815 Crump Memphis, TN 38107 Tedrah@comcast.net
678-559-5216 or deweesescience@yahoo.com
MEMBE RS H I P D RI V E The Iyengar Association of the Southeast (IYASE) is pleased to announce its first MEMBERSHIP DRIVE. Coming in October, 2010. The purpose of this drive is to increase the awareness of the benefits of Iyengar Yoga and to honor B.K.S. Iyengar, who has enriched our lives beyond measure. All the teachers and studios in the South East Region are encouraged to participate! More details will follow in future publications. If you have any questions, please send an email to: membership@iyase.org.
IYASE 2010 BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Contact Tedrah if you have any questions about the workshop. Kquvien Deweese will assist you with local information:
President: Phyllis Rollins president@iyase.org Treasurer/Vice President: Margaret Carr vicepresident@iyase.org Secretary: Becky Lloyd secretary@iyase.org Membership: Diana Martinez membership@iyase.org Newsletter: Lori Lipton Ritland newsletter@iyase.org Teacher Training: Tedrah Smothers teachertraining@iyase.org Scholarship: Alex Cleveland scholarship@iyase.org Website: Susan Marcus web@iyase.org Additional Members: Karyl Tych
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Cont'd from pg. 4
have to lie to practice non-harming, but rather that before I speak what I consider to be truth, I need to consider whether harm will come from it. When my daughter asks me if she is dressed well before school in her mixed color socks, her favorite pants with a large hole in the knee, and traces of the school playground various places on it, what do I say? If I stick to how I truly feel about it, I will say No, this is not a good choice of clothing for school and I will want to backpedal when I see her bright face drop like a stone. If I encourage her to go as she is with a hearty thumbs up, she will leave happy, but may come home upset about her classmates comments. Why didn’t I tell her to change? I can stay stuck with this kind of duality, sometimes choosing one, other times choosing the other, without ever feeling like I am doing the right thing, just hoping that it will all work out somehow. Or, I can embrace my conundrum as a chance to find deeper understanding. If I consider the potential harm that can come from speaking truth, and I consider the potential harm from not speaking truth, then I come to several realizations. Several questions arise in my heart and mind when I embrace ahimsa and satya together: 1. Whose truth is it, my own truth, limited in experience and understanding, or some kind of absolute truth? Is it my truth, or their truth that matters in a particular case? In my desire to be helpful, I once aided a blind person cross a busy intersection. As I continued on my way, I turned around to see them promptly re-crossing the intersection to go back the way they came. I didn’t bother to ask if that is what they had wanted. 2. What purpose or aim (artha) am I serving when I speak truth? Am I serving asmita, my sense of self and ego, or raga (desire) or another klesa (sutra II.3)? Or am I serving a larger truth? Am I boosting my sense of pride that I am practicing satya, or am I
connecting more deeply with the other person and with purusha when I speak truth? (See for example, sutra II.21.) 3. Is there a difference between knowing the truth and speaking the truth? In other words, is there ever a situation when I can know the truth in my heart but choose not to speak it, knowing that speaking it will cause harm? 4. If I decide to hold my tongue in favor of non-harming, am I saving someone else harm and causing myself harm instead? If I suppress my disagreement or my fears or displeasure, then will I not eventually suffer the ailments that come from chronic psychological stress? And won’t my discontentment eventually come out anyway, but in a harmful and reactive way? Is there a third option that is more of a win-win solution to my conundrum? 5. If I convince myself that I am acting from compassion (karuna), then am I acting with full awareness of the possible consequences, and in full awareness of the other personís needs? If I attempt to correct a student in a pose, for example, do I know that their resistance to an instruction is due to inertia, or a lack of understanding, or lack of confidence? What if it is due to a long-forgotten physical or psychological trauma or a recent injury that wasn’t listed on their health form? What if their deeper need in the moment was to gain trust in me, to know I can honor and validate who and where they are in the moment? What will my correction do then? I may not see answers right away to any of these questions. But if I embrace the dual and complementary nature of ahimsa and satya, then these questions arise naturally. And if I accept and reflect on them, then eventually answers may come. I may first of all come to realize that what is true for me is often different from what is true for another. I may also realize that how I speak has the potential to harm and separate, or to soothe and bring
closer: there is often an underlying message in what we say, carried by our emotions and intentions. And that message can have healing or harming properties. Even when we are clear about our intentions we may still not have access to the words that will encourage and validate, or those that convey cultural and ethnic sensitivity. My practice of these two yamas becomes a practice of discernment (viveka) that deeply touches the subtle layers of the being called manomayakoshas and vijnanmayakosha (mind and discernment).
Finally, I may come to realize that when I accept another person’s truth as valid, as my own truth too, then I may in that moment connect to a larger truth that underlies my apparent separateness from that person. Within the timeless space created by that momentary realization there appears in my mind and heart a third win-win solution to my conundrum that resolves my doubts and sense of conflict. I may know that this student who is not getting an instruction is creating an opportunity for both of us to heal, each in our own way. And that is completely a shared experience that leaves me with a greater empathy and capacity to help others, and her with a greater capacity to trust. It also leaves us both with a greater awareness of a timeless realm where there is no separateness. continued on pg. 9
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I YAS E S c ho l arship s IYASE has awarded 11 scholarship awards to-date. SIX for the IYNAUS Convention, ONE for study at RIMYI; FOUR for teacher training. • Scholarships Offered Through IYASE. • Scholarships for IYASE Sponsored • Teacher Training Workshops. • Scholarships for Certification Assessment. • Scholarship for Study at the Ramamani • Iyengar Yoga Memorial Institute.
For important 2010 deadlines, go to www.iyase.org *May 11 deadline to apply for IYASE Jr. Intermediate Teacher Training with John Schumacher in Stillwater, Georgia.
In the aftermath of Hurrican Katrina, IYASE established a discretionary fund to help our members emerge from difficulties and tragedies. The monies donated to the Lotus Fellowship Fund will be distributed based on need for such things as scholarship, assessment fees, prop replacement, or anything else deemed appropriate and necessary by the LFF committee. Donations will be accepted year-round and when you send in your check for membership each year, please consider adding a donation to the Lotus Fellowship Fund. Renew Your Membership in IYASE and IYNAUS. General Members can renew at iyase.org or send in the form on the last page of the newsletter!
Cont'd from pg. 8
When I practice asana I can also practice ahimsa and satya together. Satya in this case is the accuracy of the image I have of the process and the final aim of a particular asana. That image is really a fluid thing that responds and adapts to instructions I hear, to the sight of the pose practiced by others, and to
the feedback my body gives me. The moment this image loses its fluidity is the moment I replace the present with a frozen thought, and it is the beginning stage of harming myself. Even if I attain to the effortlessness that is the hallmark of perfection in asana (sutra II.47), is there not a fluid dynamism in the asana that transcends any frozen image, as Guruji B. K. S. Iyengar shows by his continuing practice? I learn the nature and meaning of each pose in layers and stages (bhumi, sutra III.6) and, as I learn, my image of that asana changes and evolves. I begin to see alignment in the pose is not just a structural alignment of my muscles and bones, but also of connective tissue, organs, and also of attitude and intention. I have to temper my aim of accuracy with an honest assessment of my present state. In my attempt to honor both ahimsa and satya when I practice, I am drawn to also consider santosa and tapas, the focus of the next article in the series. Footnote 1: Kosha, which means sheath, íappears in the Taittiriya Upanishad. The koshas can also be considered to be layers. There are believed to be five or more koshas, or sheaths, that encase the soul, each one progressively deeper (i.e. more internal) and more subtle: the outermost annamayakosha (the sheath of the physical body), pranayamayakosha (the sheath composed of energy, the breath, which also overlaps with the organs and emotions), manomayakosha (the sheath composed of the sensing and perceiving mind emotions also overlap with this layer), vijnanamayakosha (the sheath composed of the discerning and reasoning mind, the intelligence), and anandamayakosha (the sheath composed of bliss). Note that even though the metaphor of layers useful, it is also limited. The more subtle of the layers are not bounded by the skin of the body as the physical body is, may be experienced to overlap with and extend beyond the physical body.
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