The Foundations of Yoga

[Guest guest]

I wanted to share something I wrote, inspired by my Yoga practise.

Namaste, everybody...

David

The foundations of Yoga:

Balance - Balance is fundamental to Yoga on many levels. Physical balance

is achieved when we have a quiet mind and can trust the body's

intelligence. The centers of balance are intuitively felt to be in the

pelvis, solar plexus, shoulders, and feet. When we can let go of

conscious control and let the body learn to balance in a tree pose, a

headstand, or other balancing poses, we have learned to key to inner

balance as well, to balancing our emotions and our vital energies for

daily life.

Breath - Breath is the great intermediary between the physical and

spiritual worlds. The rhythm of breath is what allows us to extend and

deepen into our poses and to let go more and more of the holdings that

bind us. By becoming aware of breath and how it circulates energy in our

bodies, we become aware on a deeper level of our energetic patterns and

movements.

Awareness - Awareness is the key to everything. Yoga teaches us to

maintain awareness without attachment to ego. Without worrying about how

well we are doing or if we are impressing someone, we let awareness

deepen with until we come aware of our body from the inside. Awareness

descends into the abdomen, the pelvis, the legs, the feet. Awareness

extends into our roots in the earth and into our crown of energy above

us. Awareness shifts from the conceptual into the deeply experiential

flow of the moment during a yoga workshop, until, in Shiva Asana, there

is no separate "me", but simply the awareness of the

greater Self that unites everyone in the room.

Alignment - The key to asanas is alignment. Alignment of the bones to

each other, of the skull to the shoulders, to the hips, to the legs and

feet. Alignment of muscles to bone, Alignment of mind to breath.

Alignment of intention to practise. Alignment of self to Self. Alignment

of student to teacher and students to each other. Alignment of learning

communities to civic communities and global community. Through the simple

acts of gently moving our necks back to align with our spines, and

tipping our pelvis to align the sacral muscles, we begin to align our

bodies, souls, and spirits with the great alignment patterns that govern

the spiritual worlds.

Folding the Blankets: Blankets are key parts of our yoga practice. In

other parts of life blankets are used for warmth and comfort, but in yoga

they are also used for support and extension and alignment. Therefore,

folding the blankets at the end of the session is a sign of the respect

we have for our yoga practice as a whole. And folding the blankets is a

metaphor as well for everything goes into supporting our yoga practice:

Every conscious effort to place our lives on a foundation of

healthy diet, wholesome self-care, and daily discipline of

practise is folding the blankets. Every effort to purify our bodies

and calm our minds is folding the blankets. Every attempt to live

with integrity, to conduct relationships with honesty and love, and to

work with dedication and cheerfulness, is folding the blankets. And when

we come to class and find the blankets neatly folded on the racks, and

find our lives consciously prepared for practise, we can go deeper into

alignment, awareness, breath, and balance, which, in turn, deepen and

enrich our daily lives.