fingers together or not (trikonasana

[Guest guest]

> Why would you do what anyone says?

Really??<br>That's a good question. If you follow it to its logical

conclusion, then why follow an established form of yoga

practice at all? Why listen to what any teacher says?

Because, I suggest, most people are likely to learn more

with the benefit of other people's greater experience,

than by trying to reinvent and re-learn from scratch

for themselves what a lot of other people have

already painstakingly put together over thousands of

lifetimes of accumulated experience. <br><br>> Who's

practice is it? Who's experiment is it really? <br>In this

case it's Lu's practice and Lu's experiment,

obviously. But what experiment is it? It could be (1) "let's

see if I can adapt or invent a set of yoga techniques

that works for me". Or it could be (2) "let's see what

effect trying astanga vinyasa yoga - a set of techniques

developed, honed, refined and found to work well for a lot

of people over a long period of time - has on me".

<br><br>Either would be a perfectly legitimate experiment. But

if Lu is trying (2) - and the fact that he has asked

for advice here suggests that he is - then it makes

sense for him to take the best possible advice about

exactly what constitutes correct astanga vinyasa yoga

technique. In which case Sharath is definitely a better

source than Beryl. <br><br>(No, I'm not part of the

rabid anti-Beryl faction, whose obsessive rantings bore

me. I think her book is a useful text for beginners.

She's still far less qualified than

Sharath)<br><br>> Like the Buddha said - put everything to

test.<br>Yes. There is no contradiction between choosing to

benefit from other people's experience, and evaluating

the results for oneself with a clear and open mind.

<br><br>> Fundamentalist ashtangies should ...<br>No

comment, as I'm not one.