That
was it. I kneeled on the floor, laced my fingers together and set my forearms
on the floor. I lifted my knees, and slowly moved my legs towards my chest,
raised my right leg followed by my left leg. I was upside down and I was still
alive. After two years of my yoga practice, I finally did my own headstand.
My
first encounter with Yoga was in 2001, during a study tour to India. It did not
impress me much. The business school in Gurgaon, outskirt of New Delhi where we
stayed, invited a yoga teacher who asked us to wake up at 4.30 am in the
morning, be ready at 5.00 am in the hall and lie on our back. He was a middle
age man, with a big belly and white hair. The scene was still very clear in my head when
he took a chair in front of us, sat, and started giving breathing instructions
which did not make sense. With a strong accent, he kept on repeating his
mantra: Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale, and that was it. I was still remember
that he instructed us afterwards to lie
on our belly, raise our heads up, and he repeated his sacred mantra again:
inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. Sitting on the chair but with crossed legs, I
could see his eyes were half closed and his big belly was moving up and down,
following his breathing rhythm. “Why on earth I do this?” I asked myself.
Under
the impression that yoga is a passive, boring activity, I turned more into gym,
swimming and jogging for my exercise routine. In 2005, more and more friends of
mine were actively doing yoga and they persuaded me to try few classes. I tried
to attend one and it was such a turn-off. The teacher was moving with very fast
pace while instructing poses which I have never done before. Without any
knowledge of what downward dog and cat poses were, I tried to keep up with the movement
and could not feel any enjoyment at all. Arrgh! It was too fast! The poses unbelievably
stretched every angle of my body very fast that I was afraid of getting
injured. I confirmed at that time, “Yoga
is not my cup of tea”.
In
the end of 2006, I felt that my life was off-balance and I started questioning
my own religion. I really felt the necessity to explore more spiritual angle in
life and I sensed that my understanding about my religion at that time was not “aligned”
with my inner voice. I did not find comfort anymore in doing my religious
practice. Something was missing. I investigated and made some surveys through
websites, books and publications about different types of meditations and
spiritual courses. Throughout these readings, I discovered that yoga was more than
just a breathing movement. It is way beyond imitating animal postures and
motions. It is not just an exercise.
It is a path for transformation.
I
was overwhelmed with this findings since I did not feel it during my previous
encounters with yoga. I decided to reset my opinion, unlearn what I experienced
and embarked into a new journey of yoga with no judgment. I looked for a place
where I could get more description of those animal poses and the benefits
provided. Then, I thought I should get a yoga teacher who could teach at slow
pace, and corrected my postures.
Good
intentions are always come with positive results since I finally found a yoga
studio which satisfied my query and curiosity.
It was interesting, it was calming, it was what I need. I found myself
falling in between sleep and conscious during Savasana (corpse pose) in few classes. I started learning more
difficult poses and in those days, despite ascending asana practice toward
spiritual journey, my practice transcended from spiritual quest to physical
needs. I became a yoga addict (or more precisely, one of those asana junkies).
I attended other classes and workshops with faster pace, and I started
practicing three times a week or more. In my spare time, I kept thinking how I could
deepen my upper back in Urdhva Dhanurasana (wheel pose), how I move my center
of gravity to lift my legs in Koundinyasana, and how I could stretch my hamstring
in Hanumanasana (front splits), until
one day I overstretched myself. I tore my hamstrings and it created painful
lowerback.
Did
I quit after that?
Yes,
but temporarily. I asked myself why did it happen and realized that, of
course, Ego played its role. I forced myself beyond my body capacity to
accommodate the stretch. That’s how I learned that yoga teaches us about life. If you want to progress, you can push harder, but your body needs time to
adjust. All short-term gain has always higher risk than long-term gain. When I
pushed my body, I exposed my body to higher risk of injury.
There is no such thing as a shortcut without
consequences.
It
has been more than five years now since I started practicing yoga, and I am
still hooked. The journey is like a
sinusoidal wave, keeps fluctuating between addiction to the endorphin release
after an intense physical practice, and a self-inward journey.
Discovering
Ashtanga Mysore practice this year, my self-practice has been improving
tremendously. This practice was popularized by K Patthabi Jois, and the method
is to learn, memorize and practice certain set of postures. Each pose is taught
by the teacher and one cannot learn the subsequent pose without mastering the
pose(s) that has been taught. The practitioner does his/her self-practice by
memorizing the sequence and the teacher corrects and adjusts his/her postures. Many people feel that it is a “boring” yoga
since we practice the same postures, over and over again.
But Ashtanga Mysore practice resonates with me. Although I keep repeating the same postures, the sense of it is
different in each practice. The mood influences the practice and the practice
influences the mood as if it is a cycle. I found that this method
increases my self-awareness, not only when we practice, but also when I am
off-the-mat. It forces me to be truthful and honest to myself, because body
does not lie. If we force our body beyond its capacity, we got problems, sooner
or later. If we are patient but consistent, doing our practice with intelligence and
awareness, the reward is certain. When we master the posture, move our body
with awareness, focus on what we feel rather than on what we think, we then
forget all those technicalities, rely to our intuition and our practice becomes
meditation in motion.
It is my wish to maintain my Ashtanga
mysore practice consistently, as the tapah, one of the key tools to work progressively
towards the ultimate goal of yoga: Self-Realization, to find God in me, the
Immanent God.
Patanjali Yoga Sutras II.1: tapah svadhyāya Īsvarapranidhānāni kriyāyoga
Burning zeal in practice, self-study of
holyscriptures, and surrender to God are the acts of yoga
