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 PostureModerators: Moderators Jump to page : 1 Now viewing page 1 [25 messages per page] | View previous thread :: View next thread |
| Yoga -> Ashtanga Yoga | Message format |
vibes |
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Extreme Veteran Posts: 574   | What is the ashtanga view on good posture? | ||
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| Bay Guy |
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Expert Yogi Posts: 2479   Location: A Blue State | The ashtanga view is "99% practice, 1% theory". So I don't think your question has a theoretical answer! ... bg | ||
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| vibes |
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Extreme Veteran Posts: 574 | Thanks Bay Guy! Im fascinated by this subject as you can probably tell. But surely it is possible to find words to describe good posture? There are no bad words,its just how we use them,so surely an experienced ashtanga practioner can describe? Or are you saying that Ashtanga yogis are to phyiscal and lack sensitivity on this? Surely not.When a teacher describe a posture while teaching,surely one should know the process of getting in and out of a posture so its good? or is it unimportant how one does a posture? | ||
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| Bay Guy |
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Expert Yogi Posts: 2479 Location: A Blue State | Certainly I would not say or imply the negative remarks embedded in your post. What I wrote was a famous quotation of the late Jois. The ashtangi yogis that I know are really very thoughtful and broadly aware of the very diverse teachings of yoga in the US today, as well as the common knowledge about exercise and human anatomy. Very much like the yogis I know who adhere to other styles. ... bg | ||
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| Iraputra |
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Veteran Posts: 113 Location: Uppsala, Sweden | Asana, the third limb of Ashtanga Yoga. This is my understanding of the Ashtanga view on good posture. Does it have the qualities of firmness and ease? We do postures to keep the body disease-free and for preserving vital energy. Correct postures are a physical aid to meditation, for they control the limbs and nervous system and prevent them from producing disturbances. The most important part of an asana practice is the breath -- thereby reaching into the next limb of Ashtanga Yoga, Pranayama. Rishi Vamana is known to have said: Oh, yogi do not do asana without vinyasa (movement/breath). The Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga (AVY) style of asana practice is based on a variant of Surya Namaskara, the Sun Salutation. The vinyasa is what binds the string of asanas together. You can listen to the breath and from that, with a high degree of certainty, determine if the posture is good. Of course you can also look at the posture and possibly detect some misalignment, but that also requires some knowledge of the individual body and what alignment it is capable of. I think we probably all know, at least considering that most of us reading and writing on a message board like this probably are beginners or teachers, that their are a lot of obstacles on the way to 'good posture'. Those are both physical and mental by nature, and all this calls for the need of guidance - a good compassionate teacher who has walked at least some of the path ahead of us - while at the same time you need to be aware of your own physical limitations and mental challenges, presenting themselves in the course of practice, that calls for both increase bodily awareness and some contemplation on the yamas and niyamas, the first and second limb of Asthanga Yoga. Since the asanas performed in the AVY style/method (or in any good yoga method) prepares for the next asana(s) in the sequence, good posture also depends on the ability of the student. An advanced posture (e.g. padmasana) can be very good for an advanced practioner, and very bad for a beginner. Good posture also entails that you engage your bandhas appropiately. The bandha is a sustained contraction of a group of muscles that assists the practitioner not only in retaining a pose but also in moving in and out of it... And finally, but not least, good posture means to direct your attention inwardly, rather than outwardly, and by the proper drishti (focused gaze, a means for developing concentrated intention) while also focusing on the breath, this is quite possible - and thus the AVY asana practice is connected with Pratyahara (withdrawal of senses from external objects) and Dharana... Practising asana like this, yoga gives you purification of the body, the nervous system, and the mind. Eventually, probably after many years of practice, the seat (asana) should be easy and steady (i.e. good posture) enough for deep meditation. "Posture is then when effort ceases and meditation on infinity occurs" (Patanjali, Yoga Sutra II:47) So, good posture is necessary to allow for good meditation to happen. Stilling the mind is possible, if you follow this method/path that has been followed, tested and proved by yogis for thousands of years. Gregor Maehle has some really good stuff on 'good posture' (asana) in "Ashtanga Yoga: Practice & Philosophy", p. 3: “Many obstacles to knowing one's true nature are manifested in the body, for example disease, sluggishness, and dullness. The body profoundly influences and, if in bad condition, impinges on the functioning of mind and intellect. Through the practice of yoga <i>asanas</i> the body is made "strong and light like the body of a lion," to quote Shri K. Pattabhi Jois. Only then will it provide the ideal vehicle on the path of yoga.” -- He has a lot more to say about asana, and on p. 225ff you can also find his interpretation of the yoga sutras (Patanjali) on the topic. | ||
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| lashannasmall |
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| I am an Ashtangi and my view is the same as most every one else's. Maintaining the natural healthy curve of the spine is accepted across most disciplines. Classically, Ashtanga truly was taught in a "no mind" type of way. Old school Ashtanga teachers just tell you to do the practice and everything will work itself out. Don't have to know why or how, just practice and health and peace of mind are obtained. As long as your practice was consistent and you followed the formula, you had a whole mind body wellness program. | |||
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| Iraputra |
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Veteran Posts: 113 Location: Uppsala, Sweden | lashannasmall - 2010-01-22 9:48 PM I am an Ashtangi and my view is the same as most every one else's. Maintaining the natural healthy curve of the spine is accepted across most disciplines. Classically, Ashtanga truly was taught in a "no mind" type of way. Old school Ashtanga teachers just tell you to do the practice and everything will work itself out. Don't have to know why or how, just practice and health and peace of mind are obtained. As long as your practice was consistent and you followed the formula, you had a whole mind body wellness program. I definitely agree with you on that one. The more I learn about yoga in general, good posture etc, and doing what is sensible and good for the student, the more I think it is important to really learn, study, practice (and eventually teach) yoga correctly and safely from the beginning - avoiding at least the worst pitfalls of bad practice habits. Starting with samasthiti and learning what is good posture in this first asana is an important foundation for every following asana. It may sound strange to some, but standing correctly in samasthiti actually takes quite a lot of practice for most beginners. It's hard work and a lot of sweat, yes (at least in some asanas)! Pain, no (never, then you're doing something wrong)! | ||
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lashannasmall - 2010-01-22 6:48 PM Classically, Ashtanga truly was taught in a "no mind" type of way. Old school Ashtanga teachers just tell you to do the practice and everything will work itself out. Don't have to know why or how, just practice and health and peace of mind are obtained. As long as your practice was consistent and you followed the formula, you had a whole mind body wellness program. The "no mind" way was also the way with banks, medical doctors, lawyers, insurance companies and all sorts of people who were selling products or services. The problem with this approach was already well known to the ancient Romans (caveat emptor!). This also was the way of teaching where teachers taught (and often still do) what to think, instead of how to think. It is a big improvement that today people want to know the why and the how. We not only need more of this in yoga, but especially in areas like medicine. Since we are the persons who are not only paying for the service (yoga instruction, medical care etc) but also the persons that will personally have all the benefits and problems therefrom for the rest of our lives, we need to be part of the decisions of what we do to our bodies (or minds) and why. If all yoga teachers or doctors or whatever were totally competent, all knowing and had absolutely no self interest in the matter, simply trusting them could work. Since not all are or ever were, personally understanding what is going on is crucial. Why would a sane person want to give responsibility and/or authority over their mind and body to another person who doesn't even know you and has often conflicting interests to your self interest? The best relationship with a yoga teacher, a medical professional, a banker etc is where you are partners in the result that you are seeking. It is best to remain in all partnerships (including marriage) with your eyes wide open, trusting only based on personal experience that your partner is trustworthy. I am not promoting cynicism, but rather openness and honesty. (FYI I have been happily married for over 40 years, so I do have some experience in successful partnerships.) The authoritarian relationships of the past have given way to a more cooperative paradigm because it works better and is more successful for all. Until you understand the why and how, you are going on blind faith. Sometimes that faith is appropriate, but often it is not and without understanding what is actually going on, you will not know the difference until later when it is too late. | |||
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| lashannasmall |
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| Hmmm...You kind of misunderstood what "no mind" means but I don't have time to go into it. The yoga sutras, the Gita and the Pradipika do a much better job then I ever could. But I will say this, Ashtanga is born of the experience. It is like trying to explain to someone what chocolate tastes like. The mind has a limited ability to figure it out without experiencing it. Eventually, you just have to taste chocolate to understand. I am not talking about cults and mind control and stupidity. I am talking about immersing yourself into something and learning as you go. That is essentially what life is in general. Our birth certificate doesn't tell us why we are here, through living life and experiencing it, we figure it out. There used to be a time when it was understood that the Guru had wisdom to be conveyed. You sat at their feet and you learned. You understood that they had experienced things that you yourself hadn't and that they had unique insights. You went to them to learn the secrets of yoga by immersing yourself into the teachings, then you formulated your thoughts on it, and then you left them and went out and taught others. I am not saying that I am a Guru because I am a yoga teacher. I was talking about the tradition of Ashtanga and how it was taught and passed on through students. " | |||
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lashannasmall - 2010-01-23 4:45 PM Hmmm...You kind of misunderstood what "no mind" means There used to be a time when it was understood that the Guru had wisdom to be conveyed. You sat at their feet and you learned. You understood that they had experienced things that you yourself hadn't and that they had unique insights. You went to them to learn the secrets of yoga by immersing yourself into the teachings, then you formulated your thoughts on it, and then you left them and went out and taught others. Hi Shanna, Actually, I do understand. I just don't agree. You are talking about a time in the past (sometimes in the present) where the King had absolute, life or death power over everyone, the father had absolute power over his wife and children, an employer had absolute power over his employees and a teacher had absolute power over his students. (Remember that probably only 1% of people at this time were literate and most people did not understand even the simplest laws of nature.) Since this absolute totalitarian, authoritarian system did not allow for questioning and was totally top down, the student had no other frame of reference or other input besides what the teacher said and simply mindlessly followed. This system was also bad for the teacher as he had no feedback and could do or say whatever he wanted. This system led to much abuse (and still does in cults). The reason that modern science is based on freedom of thought, questioning and continual feedback is because the ancient system did not work very well. We have evolved. Many of us enjoy life in free and open societies. Creativity is creating something new, not repeating something old. Creativity is intuitive, but not mindless. There is a continuum from control to surrender. The rigid control of yourself is just as unhealthy as the total surrender to another person or idea. Health and growth is in finding a balance between these opposing forces. You do not get wisdom from another. You have to create your own. It is a result of understanding, which comes from questioning, growth and creativity. Today we elect our leaders, choose and question our teachers, can change our economic status, travel, read, have all manner of inputs (including this forum)and have more control over our minds and lives than in the past. Although we still have the option of blindly following, it is now an option and not a requirement. We now have the option of thoughtfully understanding, and I personally see no reason to give that up for mindlessly following. Namaste, Jim PS There is no secret knowledge. Holding out the hope of secret knowledge or special powers is a very clever scam, but still a scam. It is an age old way of sucking a sucker into a cult and usually involves the sucker turning over their mind, their money, and often their body to the leader or leaders who have the "secret knowledge/special powers" that you will learn "when you are ready" which means never. This is true for secret knowledge claims of yoga, martial arts, the Freemasons, Scientology, secret societies like the KKK, and all manner of cults. Let the buyer beware! | |||
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| lashannasmall |
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| No, actually you don't understand. I am not talking about power. I am not talking about secrets. I am talking about wisdom. It is something that is not appreciated in our society anymore. To learn, sometimes we have to listen. Listening does not require questions or thoughts. It just requires open ears, heart and mind. It requires the presence of the watcher that knows the difference between egoic thoughts based on past experiences and faulty reasoning. It is present to learn from the wisdom of those that came before us, and then has the ability to bring it into the present. There is nothing wrong with questions coming from an open heart and mind, there is something wrong with questions coming from a closed heart and an egoic mind. "No mind" is the space where creativity comes from. It is clarity so powerful and pure that thoughts are not needed. You just "do" and you "know". | |||
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| let me give you a couple examples of "no mind": A famous composer wrote an opera for a famous tenor who was not only a great singer but also a great actor. Towards the end of his big aria, he would always walk to the back of the stage and look out of the window, and then come forward to sing the finale of the aria. Since he was so good and the composer had written the aria specifically for him, everyone copied his actions for many years. Many years later when the tenor was a very old man and teaching a master class, a young singer said to him: "Why do you go to the back and look out the window? You are not waiting for anyone and there is no dramatic justification for doing so!" The famous tenor answered: "You are absolutely correct. I only went to the back and looked out of the window as I usually had some phlegm in the back of my throat and wanted to spit it out before I had to sing the high C at the end of the aria." I totally agree that we need to honor our intuitive selves and other forms of learning, but if it doesn't logically make sense, it doesn't make sense. There is a similar story that may or may not be true that illustrates this point: A woman learned from her mother to always cut the end off the turkey before baking it. She asked her why and the mother answered that she had always done it that way and she had learned to do it that way from her mother. Several years later the daughter asked her grand mother why she cut off the end of the turkey and she answered that she always cut off the end of the turkey before baking it because her oven was so small that the whole turkey wouldn't fit. Whether you are following a cult leader, a saint or a honored tradition, if you are doing so with "no mind" you are wasting the most precious asset that we humans have. Compassion is of the mind as is rational thought. Thoughts are always there whether we acknowledge them or not. | |||
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| "no mind" does not actually exist. An empty mind or the cessation of thought is an illusion. An actual empty mind is brain dead. When you focus your eyes on something that is very close, the distance seems to disappear. It is still there, we are only focusing on that which is close so that our attention is diverted from that which is far. When you focus your attention on your breath, a mantra or whatever, you are bringing your breath or the mantra into the foreground of consciousness and your thoughts (the words in your head) recede into the background. They do not go away. If you repress verbal thought, you are not stopping thought but only your conscious attention on this one of many outlets of thought. Please understand that I am not against either meditation or the relaxation of our consciousness from our silly tapes that we so often replay in our minds. I am only saying that the contents of our minds remain the same, regardless of which content we choose to concentrate on. Relaxed focus and awareness (both internal and external) have wonderful benefits, but the actual cessation of thought is not one of them. Yes, we live in a culture that worships verbal thought to the expense of intuition and aural, kinetic, spatial and many other kinds of thinking. That does not mean that verbal thought is to be repressed but rather that we each need to encourage our less dominant thinking modalities and develop better balance. This is similiar to what we do in our asana practice. Thought is just like breathing. When you take your conscious attention away from your breathing, you do not stop breathing, you only stop your conscious awareness of your breathing. | |||
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| lashannasmall |
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| "No mind" refers to identification with the ego, Love. Not the stopping of thoughts. You still don't understand the concept but I wish you the best. | |||
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| Dage |
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Member Posts: 16 | "You kind of misunderstood" - "actually you don't understand" - "You still don't understand": for a change, how about something like "I fear I didn't make myself sufficiently clear, what I want to say is..." ? Something else to everybody: When discussing good posture of current Ashtanga asana practice, why refer to Patanjali or other ancient texts? From what I read, there was nothing similar to first, second or other series practiced in ancient times. Apparently no ancient iconography of yoga postures. Could be that this is a more recent development, late 19th, early 20th century: "Singleton shows that, contrary to popular belief, there is no evidence in the Indian tradition for the kind of health and fitness-oriented asana practice that dominates the global yoga scene of the twenty-first century. Singleton's surprising--and surely controversial--thesis is that yoga as it is popularly practiced today owes a greater debt to modern Indian nationalism and, even more surprisingly, to the spiritual aspirations of European bodybuilding and early 20th-century women's gymnastic movements of Europe and America, than it does to any ancient Indian yoga tradition." (book description of Singleton, Yoga Body, OUP 2010) To put my point differently: Imagine Hume, Frege or Russell had practiced Ashtanga. They may have developed and enjoyed a nice practice without indulging in profound yoga wisdom talk adorned with references to ancient scriptures. | ||
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| RE: Yoga Body by Mark Singleton: Singleton's radical, meticulously documented, sensitive analysis makes perfectly clear that what has come to be regarded as a veritable icon of Indic Civilization -- postural yoga -- is, in fact, unambiguously the hybrid product of colonial and post-colonial globalization. --Prof. Joseph S. Alter, University of Pittsburgh. Author of Yoga in Modern India: The Body Between Science and Philosophy "Mark Singleton's Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice is an outstanding scholarly work which brings so much insight and clarity to the historic and cultural background of modern hatha yoga. I highly recommend this book, especially for all sincere students of yoga. --John Friend, Founder of Anusara Yoga "I have been reading yoga texts and practicing yoga for 40 years, and I have taught a university-level academic course on yoga for the last 15 years, so it takes quite a good deal to teach me things about yoga I did not already know. This book has done so. It has been extremely informative and is rich with historical details. The quantity of field research is quite extraordinary, the prose articulate, the diction intelligent, and the narrative sound. It is a must-read among yoga teachers and serious students, and has the potential to transform much of the yoga world. This book will echo loudly through the global yoga community." --Prof. Kenneth Liberman, University of Oregon. Author of Dialectical Practice in Tibetan Philosophical Culture "From the moment I started reading Mark Singleton's Yoga Body I couldn't put it down. It is beautifully written, extensively researched, and full of fascinating information. It stands alone in its depth of insight into a subject which has intrigued me for forty years." --David Williams, Maui, Hawaii. The first non-Indian to learn the complete Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga syllabus. "Mark Singleton has written a sweeping and nuanced account of the origins and development of modern postural yoga in early twentieth-century India and the West, arguing convincingly that yoga as we know it today does not flow directly from the Yoga Sutras or India's medieval ha?ha yoga traditions, but rather emerged out of a confluence of practices, movements and ideologies, ranging from contortionist acts in carnival sideshows, British Army calisthenics and women's stretching exercises to social Darwinism, eugenics, and the Indian nationalist movement. The richly illustrated story he tells is an especially welcome contribution to the history of yoga, demonstrating the ways in which an ancient tradition was reinvented against the backdrop of India's colonial experience." --Prof. David Gordon White, University of California, Santa Barbara. Author of The Alchemical Body, Siddha Traditions in Medieval India "Mark Singleton gives us here a groundbreaking, pioneering work. By carefully tracing the key 'missing links' in the development of contemporary notions of hatha yoga, he presents a far richer and nuanced picture than previously known. Quite simply, this is a book that cannot be ignored, destined to be reckoned with in any further study of the topic. Thoroughly researched, extraordinarily well informed, and lucidly argued, I recommended it very highly to all serious practitioners and students of modern yoga who want a deeper understanding of its evolution." --Carlos Pomeda, founder of Yoga Wisdom for Modern Life. "Mark Singleton's book Yoga Body traces the evolution of the ever expanding practice of asana world-wide. His work offers a much needed historical perspective that will help correct much of the mythology and group-think that is emerging in the modern asana based 'yoga world'. Any serious asana practitioner who wishes to understand the place of asana in the greater tradition of yoga will do well to read it carefully." -Gary Krafstow, the founder of the American Viniyoga Institute, author of Yoga for Wellness and Yoga for Transformation Product Description Yoga is so prevalent in the modern world--practiced by pop stars, taught in schools, and offered in yoga centers, health clubs, and even shopping malls--that we take its presence, and its meaning, for granted. But how did the current yoga boom happen? And is it really rooted in ancient Indian practices, as many of its adherents claim? In this groundbreaking book, Mark Singleton calls into question many commonly held beliefs about the nature and origins of postural yoga (asana) and suggests a radically new way of understanding the meaning of yoga as it is practiced by millions of people across the world today. Singleton shows that, contrary to popular belief, there is no evidence in the Indian tradition for the kind of health and fitness-oriented asana practice that dominates the global yoga scene of the twenty-first century. Singleton's surprising--and surely controversial--thesis is that yoga as it is popularly practiced today owes a greater debt to modern Indian nationalism and, even more surprisingly, to the spiritual aspirations of European bodybuilding and early 20th-century women's gymnastic movements of Europe and America, than it does to any ancient Indian yoga tradition. This discovery enables Singleton to explain, as no one has done before, how the most prevalent forms of postural yoga, like Ashtanga, Bikram and "Hatha" yoga, came to be the hugely popular phenomena they are today. Drawing on a wealth of rare documents from archives in India, the UK and the USA, as well as interviews with the few remaining, now very elderly figures in the 1930s Mysore asana revival, Yoga Body turns the conventional wisdom about yoga on its head. | |||
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rexall - 2010-02-08 8:11 PM This is very interesting, of course. Would any of yooze guys care to offer a few specifics about the differences/distinctions between "ancient" (for lack of a better word) and contemporary asana? ==>Read the book. There is too much information to summarize in a single post, but: "Ancient" asana was simply sitting exercises so that you could sit in meditation longer (practiced mainly by religious aspirants). Medieval asana had to do with things like magic, spells, possessing other people's bodies, violent acts, immortality etc.(practiced mainly by mercenary soldiers and occult practitioners) Later, asana practice was contortionism as a tool for begging (practiced mainly by beggars). "Contemporary" (late 1800's, but mainly 1920's, and especially 1950's to present) asana has to do with health and well-being (practiced firstly as a physical regimen for young men, but now practiced by all kinds of people worldwide). Does this fit with Paul Grilley's (and others) thesis that yoga asana was more like what is now referred to as "yin yoga"? ===>No, not at all. Thanks. | |||
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