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Veteran
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| Hello
Let’s open a discussion about the “qualities” of asanas. While staying still in the asanas, (like we do in the Iyengar way) one can more easily concentrate on those “qualities” and I find this most important ! I am talking about the “quality” of each different asana, the result it brings to our inside world, the feelings it is creating inside us, the impact it has on our way of thinking. Like for example: Utthita Trikonasana makes me “meditate” on the perfect ness and the harmony of geometrical shapes. Handstands make me overcome my fears, by offering me great amounts of self-confidence. When I have to accomplish a really difficult task for which I feel too weak, I change my temper into a “heroic” one, by staying in Virabhadrasanas and then everything seems much easier. Uttanasana together with all kinds of forward bends, are my “shelter”, my “recourse” whenever I want to get rid of this “bad world”. Backward bends, open my heart widely and make me love this world again, I become more “social”. And “centered ness” and spirituality are the qualities that automatically spring inside, whenever I sit in Baddha Konasana. Are you feeling the same, or similar things ? Do you agree that this is maybe the most important (and most interesting) “part” of our hatha yoga practice ?
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| Those affirmations are present in Ananda Yoga:
Check out my recent blog posting I wrote a little about it.
I hope you continue to use them, they're so inspiring  |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
  
| Swami Radha (from the Sivananda lineage) wrote a book called "Hatha Yoga: The Hidden Language" and they teach courses on it at Yasodhara Ashram in BC. It looks at all these things. Prashant Iyengar apparently often teaches about looking for the "mystical message" of the pose, as well. Great stuff! |
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| Thanks for the book recommendation Tourist |
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| i love swami radha's stuff. that book is awesome! |
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| Kristi wrote: Do you agree that this is maybe the most important (and most interesting) “part” of our hatha yoga practice ?
===> I agree that it is very important and important part of HathaYogaPractice. However, I do not know why you call it the most important part? kevalam raajayogaya hathavidyopadishyate...Hathayogapradipika.. Hatha Yoga is instructed ONLY for preparation for Rajayoga, the meditation. So, it is is very very very important to address meditation for one who is doing Hatha Yoga. And, meditation initially may mean focusing on the pose. But, that is NOT real meditation. |
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Veteran
Posts: 258
| Ah yes! Those affirmations are indeed very interesting, describing these feelings that I was trying to describe and focusing on them, thanks DownwardDog ! And thank you tourist for the recommended book, I will try to get it.
Neel, certainly it must be the “real” meditation which is The most important. It just seems to me that this “meditating” on the asanas and their “qualities”, eventually leads you to the real meditation, or to put it better, it leads you to realize the need for real meditation. At least that this is how it has been working on me. I had no idea about meditation when I had started Hatha Yoga. I mean, O.K. I had read a lot about it, but real experience is so different. And it was hatha yoga, and the focusing on the asanas, which lead me to the need to go further and explore meditation techniques. Unfortunately, here where I am living and in my country in general, I am afraid there is nobody trustable enough, so as to make him my teacher. And although some Iyengar books have helped me a lot in developing and deepening my hatha yoga practice all alone, I am afraid that no book on meditation can replace a real teacher. So I am just waiting for a teacher to maybe… fall from the skies (and I am sure it will happen sometime), and meanwhile I am just “meditating” on my asanas. But Neel thank you for reminding me this, that this type of "meditating" is really, Not The most important.
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
| kristi - you can look here: http://www.timeless.org/
And for anyone who has concerns about a post that advertises, this book is NOT for sale through yoga.com. |
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| kristi: There is no doubt that you are a very intelligent, sincere, and excellent Yoga Student. I making this statement without personally knowing you. I wish you all the best. |
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Veteran
Posts: 258
| Thank you both, tourist and Neel. For me it was a great thing to discover this forum and to be able to exchange ideas and to read articles about yoga and meditation. |
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| I regard meditation as a state of being which has the qualities of being completely present, unwavering, aware and equanimous. There are several techniques of meditation, using either one of the senses or the breath as a doorway to a meditative state. Meditation does not necessarily require the lotus or other seated postures, nor does it require stillness of the body. The practice of asanas while incorporating these qualities is not seperate from meditation. |
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| Quusai wrote: Meditation does not necessarily require the lotus or other seated postures, nor does it require stillness of the body. The practice of asanas while incorporating these qualities is not seperate from meditation.
===> Dear Qusai: I disagree with you that M does not need a still posture, and it can be done in any posture. Please give me a) either a single example of a known Meditative Yogi in a head stand or shoulder stand and such. What I mean is a person who is absorbed in meditation, NOT the one who is meditating on the Pose to improve the Pose. b) If you are performing asana, you would be spending some attention to doing asana, which you could use towards meditation if the asana was still, comfortable, and steady. Generally, such an asana is a seated one. And, therefore, the sage Patanjali says:
sthira sukham aasanam. steady and comfortable pose. |
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| It is indeed more difficult to attain "sthira sukham asanam" in shirsana than in a seated asana like padmasana (which is also not easy!). However there is no fundamental reason, other than the skill level of the practioner, why one asana affords meditation and another does not.
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Veteran
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| I cannot have an opinion myself on what you are discussing, since I don’t know. But please, from the point of view of a beginner, and with simple words, let me add the following (which may raise more discussions between you and it is so interesting to read these discussions) : One good effect that I experienced from this type of “inside-the-asana” meditation, is that it did somehow put me also in a kind of a “general”, an “each-and-every-moment-meditative-state-situation”. I mean that, through my regular “meditative” practice of asanas, I felt that gradually (and somehow automatically) I found myself being “meditative” (=“centered”, “mindful”, “self-observing”) almost all day through, while doing all the common, everyday things. When you realize this happening to yourself, it certainly makes you want to go deeper in meditation. Could be that, what I just wrote is nothing more and nothing less, than all hatha yoga practitioners feel. |
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| I agree with you about the quality of each asana however while I am holding a pose and going deeper into each asana I don't think I have quite the same experience as you do. I mean I don't focus or meditate on the same aspects of the asanas that you do. I don't think my experience is quite as concrete as yours yet. It may be because I haven't been practicing as long. I do love the way you descibed the experience you have with each asana and how you use them. I learned a lot from your post and I will think more about these things in my practice. I would love to hear more about what each pose brings to you and how and why you chose to practice each pose.
What I can say is that my Iyengar class is the most incredible and inspirational class I have. I feel as though my body, mind, and spirit really are becoming aquainted with the poses. The concentration that is put onto preforming the asanas correctly and going into and out of them correctly has taught me a lot. I also feel that more and more I am having my own very personal epiphanies (spelling?) while in certain poses. Iyengar has won my whole being over. I want so much to share my discovery with friends and family, especially the spiritual side of it but it is pretty difficult to explain to a skeptical crowd. |
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Veteran
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| Hello phoenix, I understand and agree to all that! When I went to my first ever class of Iyengar yoga, I felt this would change my life. Now I wrote the above thread about the quality of asanas, because I didn’t know whether those feelings that I described were similar to other practitioners. It seems to me now that they are.
Also another idea came to me recently while doing inverted poses: That it somehow widens your mind, when you see things how they look from upside down. You see things also from another “point of view”,which makes you more wise. And they say that the inverted poses are indeed strengthening the mind. One other thing that I find very interesting is how you deal with the opposite forces in your body. You suddenly realise that the more you press against something, the more you strengthen it. So this applies also to life, doesn’t it? This is why I think that hatha yoga makes you so much wiser. In each and every asana you discover more and more things !
And you are right, I also cannot easily share such ideas here. But I think we should try to "spread" the joy and the wisdom of yoga. It seems that the world needs it a lot... |
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| I think you are right about the inverted poses. I was really afraid of them at first. I could hardly bring myself to attempt handstand because I was so afraid my arms would buckle and I would hurt myself. Over coming that fear and then having time to contemplate it whild standing on my hands has been an intense experience. It is all about viewing life from a new perspective. I have been reading several of Mr. Iyengars books lately and I feel as though my perspective on life and every thing and everyone in it is shifting. What I am touched by the most is how he genuinely wants to bring yoga as a complete practice (physical, spiritual, mental) to everyone and how he believes that it is something everyone should and does have the right to learn about and live.
I had my Iyengar class last night and I do so enjoy it and learn from it each week. I try to work my travels around it because it is so important to my life. I will be paying closer attention to what each pose is teaching me now that you have starting this conversation. How long have you been practicing? Do you only take Iyengar classes? If not what do you think of the others? I feel like I am making no sense and that I am just babbling at you I hope you are getting a little bit of what I am trying to say. |
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Expert Yogi
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| kristi - I think your comments about being mindful and self observing are right on the mark. These things feel "meditative" or "contemplative" to us because we don't come from a background where meditation as a practice is common. But someone recently said something about sometimes words are used as description and other times words are used as definition. I think this applies to many of our conversations here. If I were to say that you could indeed reach a meditative state in asana, using "meditative" as a description, it might be fine, but for someone who reads this as definitive, the word "meditative" won't work at all. Perhaps your words - mindful and self-oberving - are better choices. |
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| Qusai - 2006-05-30 2:48 AM
It is indeed more difficult to attain "sthira sukham asanam" in shirsana than in a seated asana like padmasana (which is also not easy!). However there is no fundamental reason, other than the skill level of the practioner, why one asana affords meditation and another does not.
===> NO dear Qusai: sthirasukhamaasanam in general means steady and comfortable sitting posture with erect spine and head is on the top, not at the bottom. It is NOT due to skill level only, but it is supposed to be so. |
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Veteran
Posts: 258
| tourist thanks for pointing this out. Yes indeed, I am using the word "meditative" in a descriptive way and not as a definition. I can certainly not "define" meditation since I don't practice it, but I just try to describe the "feeling", the situation you get into while in a posture. This is why I am often using quotation marks.
phoenix, no I am not doing any other kind of yoga, except only of hatha yoga the Iyengar way, but I am indeed practicing very regularly, 2 to 3 hours almost every day, for the last 3 years. I want to go deeper in meditation, but have found no teacher for this around here yet. |
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| Dear Kristi: At your level of practice, you should consider 3 Audio CDs set on my website. Are you the girl whose Brother Bruce wants to be manager of? |
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Veteran
Posts: 258
| Neel, no I am not that girl, I have no brother named Bruce, I anyway live on the ooother side of the Atlantic. I am checking the CDs you suggested. |
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| Kristi: I just noticed that ONLY the first of the 3 CDs is mentioned on my website. I shall update the website tonight. Brother Bruce is NOT your brother but he is my big brother and the Moderator of the Yoga.com website. |
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Expert Yogi
Posts: 8442
| Neel- I have the same problme with the names. We have "kristi" and we have "twisti" and then there is "twisti kristi." They are all different people! I have a friend from eastern Europe who once had a class with 5 Alexanders and 4 Alexandras   I don't know how she kept them all straight!  |
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| By calling the entire class "Alex"?
Fee
tourist - 2006-06-01 4:00 PM
Neel- I have the same problme with the names. We have "kristi" and we have "twisti" and then there is "twisti kristi." They are all different people! I have a friend from eastern Europe who once had a class with 5 Alexanders and 4 Alexandras I don't know how she kept them all straight! |
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The "quality" of asanas
