Yoga Practice Buddhist Practice

Photo by Susan Crowder

Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, the ancient, foundational yoga practice manual, defines yoga as “the stilling of the changing states of the mind.”* Patanjali’s teachings are primarily focused on meditation, not the physical postures, which are largely a 20th-century innovation. Yet for me the movement – linked in the Ashtanga system to focused breathing and steady gaze (drishti) – has been an essential doorway into mental stillness, which I can achieve much more reliably on my yoga mat than on my meditation cushion. Yoga drew me into spirituality. Now that I am looking to go further in my spiritual life, however, I have found Buddhism more compelling than the Hinduism that underlies Patanjali’s writing.

Recently it hit me that, in my Buddhist practice, I am about where I was with yoga ten years ago. I have had some teaching and read some books. I have been meditating daily for a couple of years yet remain a novice in relation to those states of absorption that are the goal of meditation. In recent months I have been attending weekly meetings and done one weekend retreat with the local branch of the Triratna Buddhist Community. So, I am encountering people who are practicing Buddhists, but I have barely started on the work of understanding the teachings, much less made the commitment to try to live them. I’m in the water up to my knees but have yet to dive in, and it seems I am caught up in wondering where this stream might take me.

In the midst of this wondering, my thoughts often run to my experience with yoga practice. These are comforting thoughts, I think because of the incremental nature of practice. I know that on any one day the gains are likely to be small but so are the risks. No great declaration of faith is required, just a commitment to inquiry renewed on a regular basis. I know there will be challenges for me when I am ready for them, and on the days when the most I can do is show up there will be psychic rewards in that. Looking at it this way both draws me forward and gives me the courage to proceed.

* Edwin F. Bryant, The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali (2009), p. 10.  My comment on 20th-century contributions to the physical practice of yoga is based on Mark Singleton, Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice (2010).

Hip Openers 4

Hip Opener: Eka Pada Rajakapotanasana

My hip injury has long since healed. I have retired from the work that involved international travel. I have taken classes on Ayurveda, done spring and fall ayurvedic cleansing diets and even tried a sesame oil enema. (No more about that, I promise.) My husband and I will celebrate our 42nd wedding anniversary in a few months, the trauma of our separation largely subsided. For the first time in a long time, I am focused less on changing things and more on living fully what is, including staying open to what might emerge. For now, what I most want to do is stay settled in my practices: in marriage, practicing staying out of the victim mentality and showing up “authentically present;” in meditation, studying the Dharma and making it onto my cushion every day; in yoga, keeping the hip openers going.

More than the lunges these days, I rely on Eka Pada Rajakapotasana (pigeon pose) and the Yin Yoga version, sleeping swan. I also make it a point to step out of Ado Mukha Svanasana (downward dog) with my right leg, because the right hip is still much tighter than the left. The fact that I am also doing lotus regularly, which I could not do a couple of years ago, is a sign this hip opening is having an effect. On the other hand, I can’t sit in any position for more than 15 or 20 minutes without my hips being stiff and sore when I get up. I feel that, if I were to stop practicing, I would go straight to decrepitude.  Chip Walker’s fine poem on practice says it all:

Dig deep

Excavate

The gold vein beneath all gold veins
Way beyond the mother-lode

With only tap hammer     and chisel
                       the going   is slow

Every inch                        a universe

No such thing as faster
Not on this dig

Tapping harder
Only breaks the chisel

Besides
What’s the rush

Chipping patiently
Yields steadily
Ensures longevity

 Chip Walker, "Practice," in Half a Mala: Threading Towards Wholeness (2011).

Discovering Mysore-style Yoga

Photo courtesy of Yoga East

Margaret, my first yoga teacher only taught once a week at a gym with no other yoga classes. But she encouraged us to practice often.  So from the beginning I have done quite a bit of yoga by myself at home.  In Bringing Yoga to Life (one of my favorite books) Donna Farhi suggests this as a way to take greater ownership of your practice, and I think it has done that for me.  Another good thing about being alone is that I can do exactly as much of the practice as I have time and energy for on a particular day.  Margaret had a saying, “there’s no yoga police,” that effectively gave us permission for that.  One downside of practicing without a teacher is – not surprisingly – that it is hard to progress and easy to fall into bad habits.  It can also be a bit lonely. 

For the first couple of years after Margaret was diagnosed with cancer and stopped teaching, I didn’t want to think about finding another teacher.  Then we moved to Portsmouth and I started to look for a new studio.  After one false start at a place with an energetic vibe but, for me, way too much emphasis on the body-building aspects of yoga, I discovered the 6-AM

mysore-style class at Yoga East

.  This class is modeled on the primary teaching style of Pattabhi Jois in Mysore, India.  Each student does his or her practice individually, with the teacher there to provide guidance, coaching and physical adjustments to the postures.  I arrived at my first class one early summer morning with a load of grief over the loss of my teacher and a fairly half-baked, idiosyncratic, practice and found what still seems like, more than eight years later, the perfect home.