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| I recently purchased "Yoga: The Iyengar Way" and I'm interested in practicing the suggested courses in the back of the book. Though I'm having difficulty understanding the order of the practices. These are the instructions for Course II:
"The folliwng is a suggested course for daily practice. With time spent consolidating, it takes about 18 months to complete. Lessons A, B, C, and D relate to each week of practice. In the first month, alternature lessons 1A and 2A, 1B and 2B, 1C and 2C, and 1D and 2D. Then repeat the first month. In the third month, alternate lessons 2A and 3A and repeat 1A; 2B and 3B and repeat 1B; 2C and 3C and repeat 1C; and 2D and 3D and repeat 1D. In the fourth month, consolidate practice so far. Repeat this scheme of practice 3, 6, and 9 by repeating the previous 3 months' lessons. Finallly, after lesson 9, spend six months soconsolidating all the lessons: 1-9, A-D."
If anyone is familar with this book and/or instructioins would you fill me in on how to follow along?
Muchas gracias!
Aaron |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 2479
  
Location: A Blue State |
I like that book, but I have not tried to follow the sequences it offers!
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| aaron:
To get a proper answre to your question, phone or email Silva/Meera/Shyam Mehta.
Neel Kulkarni
www.authenticyoga.org |
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| It is confusing.
What I found was that I needed to take the time to sit down, write out the lessons (and their page numbers), put them in order and follow the list.
Write it down with each lesson mentioned on a new line. Then you can refer to the lesson and move through it.
The sequences are good, but I think they're better deliniated in Light on Yoga.
Christine |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
 
| All of the newer books have gone to showing thumbnail photos of the poses and laying out the sequences much better. It makes following the practices MUCH easier!
I have a new book that I LOVE with split pages on a spiral binding. It is called Yoga Your Way and it has practices ranging from 10 - 90 minutes. I think it will really be helpful for keen beginners. |
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| thanks for the suggestions. I might ask my teacher or some of the other yogis at my studio. Funny thing is that whenever I follow a prescribed list of poses my practice doesn't feel as fulfilled because I am not gettting what my baby needs specifically. Perhaps I'll refer to the lists in the back of the book just to make sure that I am touching on all the poses that will make my practice more well rounded and challenging. I tend to, like a lot of people, avoid poses that make me feel "uncomfortable". |
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| oops...I meant to say that I am not getting what my BODY (not baby!) needs specifically. |
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| I wrote all the asanas in a seperate book and re-ordered them slightly. I put them in sections (standing/seated/backbends etc) which made things alot clearer.
I work through them at my own pace. Somedays I don't get through all the asanas in the lesson so I just pick and choose what feels relevant for that day. I try to get familiar with the poses before I jump on the mat (ie skim through things the night before or 10 mins before practice.)
I was doing this for awhile but got distracted with a different practice. I am heading back to Light on Yoga starting tomorrow though.
I wouldn't get to stuck on the suggested time frames, just go at your own pace and see what happens.
k
Edited by twisti 2005-02-23 1:30 AM
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 2479
Location: A Blue State | I've been working with sequences from Light on Yoga for the past
8 months or so, and I really like them. Both in the sense of the daily sequence
and in the sense of the weekly sequence.
I found it most convenient to type up each practice on a separate sheet (rather than
working out of the book), and of course I added things here and there that I wanted
to cover as a part of my weekly practice. I also followed my teacher's advice to put
the shoulderstand sequence after backbends, rather than before as it appears
in LOY.
It took me a while to get calibrated on the times for those practices. The first time
I went through them, they were typically 1 1/4 hours. But, as I really began to understand
the poses and their order (and as I acquired some of the asanas I had skipped initially),
the sequences turned out to be 2 to 2 1/2 hours long.
At this point, I really don't need the sheets since I know these sequences from memory.
Still, having the page around can be good encouragement for those days when you
start saying "I'm tired, let's quit early". You look at the sheet and say, "Oh, only
ten more poses to go...".
It's interesting that Light on Yoga doesn't always seem to correspond to the
way that Iyengar yoga is taught today. The poses are the same, but the various
preparatory poses that we always do in class are nowhere to be found in LOY.
Alignment is not always made clear, although Guruji's backbending alignments
are just about perfect in the photos. While I still think that LOY is the best book
on yoga available today, at least, for those practicing advanced asanas, I also
think that there is a considerable need for an updated version that follows today's
teaching.
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
| Yes, there are some changes to LOY. There are a few poses (parsva sirsasana is one, I think) where he specifically says not to follow the photo "it was a young man showing off" is what I think he says! I have also heard he points to photos at the institute and says "that man knows nothing about yoga." When you consider that he did LOY in his 40's (working from memory, my book is upstairs) and he is now in his 80's it makes sense that over time he has refined and changed some things. He has now practiced and taught more than he had when he did the book. But we still use those photos as the source material when doing assessment etc.
The newer books coming out now (the Yoga Your Way is one I like) show the preparatory poses and modifications, which is really helpful. |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 2479
Location: A Blue State |
The young man in LOY is approximately my age, although
he was considerably more experienced with yoga than I am.
I feel a certain resonance with that "young man", since the things
he describes agree with the age of my mind, among other things.
The particular pose you mentioned (parsva sirsasana) is significantly out of
line, if I remember the photo correctly. But so what? I doubt that anyone can
produce a complete book of yoga postures using only one person to
model the poses. In my observation, nobody has got the whole spectrum
of yoga perfectly at their disposal. I include in this comment every yogi
of whom I have any knowledge, although some come closer to perfection
than others. I think that Guruji is perhaps being a bit hard on his younger
self, who was, if nothing else, bold enough to try to capture so much yoga
in one book.
Who wrote Yoga Your Way? I don't know this book.
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| Dear Tourist and BG:
This event proves the fact that
a) Perfection of a pose is very important.
b) However, there is NO such a thing as perfected perfection of a pose, as more perfection is perfectly possible always.
c) It is IMPossible to achieve the complete knowledge in the material world for a human intellect.
d) How much one wants to perfect is left to that individual. There are pros and cons of 'Below Average' perfection. and Pros and Cons of trying to achieve Perfect Perfection.
Neel Kulkarni
www.authenticyoga.org |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
| Yes, LOY was a monumental task! I think they say it took several years to get all the photos just right because BKS was doing all the modelling and it took forever to figure out the right angle to best show the pose, how to get rid of shadows etc. No digital editing back in the day!
Yoga your Way is new. I just ran across it in a bookstore. It is by Cindy Dollar, who is a student of Patricia Walden's. It is a practice oriented book but includes some philosophy and has a nice, light tone and really good photos. The only down side I can see (for women) is that it for some reason does not include a menstrual practice (which I know you guys LOVE to do!  ) and the guidelines for practice during menstruation are too brief to be helpful. Other than that, I love it because it has 10, 20, 30, 45, 60 and 90 minute practices with different focuses, nice clear pictures and good descriptions of the usual modifications etc. And it is cheap! only $20 here in the Great Whilte North. |
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| What level is Yoga you Way aimed at? How advanced to the practices get tourist?
I just found it on amazon pretty cheap  |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
| Kristi - it is a pretty well rounded book although I confess I've not yet actually done any of the practices. They include headstand, supta virasana and some other poses that are considered beyond introductory in Iyengar classes - 40 poses, I think. I would definitely recommend it for beginners or anyone who was just starting to practice on their own. People who aren't good at creating their own sequences might also like it because it suggests themes for practice such as extending, twisting, restoring etc.
Gotta go teach! |
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| tourist - 2005-02-24 6:47 PM
Kristi - it is a pretty well rounded book although I confess I've not yet actually done any of the practices. They include headstand, supta virasana and some other poses that are considered beyond introductory in Iyengar classes - 40 poses, I think. I would definitely recommend it for beginners or anyone who was just starting to practice on their own. People who aren't good at creating their own sequences might also like it because it suggests themes for practice such as extending, twisting, restoring etc.
Gotta go teach!
Thanks tourist
And for someone who has been practicing awhile.... stick with LOY?
Hope your class went well,
k |
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confusing Course II
