Meditation on art, teaching, science and yoga
This morning has dawned fresh and clear in Yonkers, NY, where we are staying with my old friend Susan Butterick, a physician assistant with Planned Parenthood here in New York and former law school colleague at UT. So many threads are weaving through my brain at the present moment, and being a big picture person, rather than a detail person, I have to pause to bring them into a fabric that will hold strong.
Last weekend with my colleagues Kristin Chirhart and James Murphy, we went through a process of assessing several candidates from the east coast at the junior intermediate two level. My thinking on the pedagogy in the Iyengar system has gone through much change in the past two decades since we started helping teachers prepare for Iyengar certification and in the past decade since I started working in Mexico. I think it will be helpful to write down some of the ideas that have been brewing inside me before chairing the introductory II assessment in Madison, New Jersey in two weeks time.
I used to think that we in the United States have the very best method of training teachers. We came to our system via a backwards route, since our national association began assessing teachers who wanted to become certified in the Iyengar method well before there was any agreement among our senior teachers about what the Iyengar method IS! The first chairperson of our certification committee, Ariane Hudson, was succeeded by Kristin, who has been followed by Joan White, Laurie Blakeney, Kathleen Pringle, Mary Reilly and now Leslie Bradley. A colleague has nominated me for the post, and though I would serve gladly, I have some reservations about taking on the position should I be elected and am not attached to the election results!
B.K.S. Iyengar himself ALWAYS emphasized the necessity of recognizing the modern practice of the third limb of yoga—asana— as part of the other seven limbs of classical ashtanga yoga. His method has grown into an empire of excellence-in-asana-seekers, varying in age from the twenties to the sixties. Geeta Iyengar has called for a meeting of people involved in training teachers worldwide for November of this year, I suspect because she recognizes that there are some significant differences among the international Iyengar communities in how people are “promoted” and trained. I’m also fairly certain that Geeta Iyengar is aware of the huge commercialization of yoga that has taken place in the last decades. This commercial aspect of yoga has, in my opinion, led to a strange but powerful cult of yoga as a path to eternal youth and beauty. Witness the ad campaigns for Lulelemon and Lole.
In conversation with James and Kristin, my original spark for following the Iyengar method became clear in my mind. Guruji always emphasized that working on the path of yoga, in yoga, would lead us to the sight of the soul. After reading all of Iyengar’s books and in particular most recently his ideas about vinyasa in particular (arguably the most popular “style” in the world today) in the essay on the subject in Ashtadala Yogamala, I am convinced that he never stopped highlighting yoga as a physical practice that includes the spiritual/devotional. The vinyasa essay is part of an assignment I am sharing with Gail Ackerman to present at Stephanie Quirk’s last workshop in Denver next month. Iyengar also speaks on the subject of vinyasa krama in the excellent film “Breath of the Gods”. From his writings and lectures in all the above sources, I am clear that he wanted us to come to the path of yoga with an understanding that our bodies are instruments on a journey to the soul.
To do justice to that insight, our pedagogy, I think, needs to recognize that the seekers/sadhakas who come to us for deepening their studies of Iyengar Yoga might also be interested in a level of yoga study “beyond” the physical. Since we are involved in a discipline that combines art and science, we have a complex task at hand—how to give good instruction in basic technique and at the same time to communicate how our work leads to a spiritual dimension, whether or not one “believes” in spirit or soul.
In a nutshell, this is what I would like to see our community of educators communicate more directly about, not just about acceptable methods of teaching parsvaikapada sirsasana. Though I see the value of the details necessary for the understanding inversion variations, I would like to insure somehow that people are kept safe throughout their yoga life, and valued for their contribution to the community of practitioners no matter what their age or physical capabilities might be. Beginning with our home communities, working with each other in an egalitarian, honest and open way, we can be part of the larger world of yoga and maintain a practice that promises peace and health to all.
Guruji worked for many years on crafting a democratic constitution to govern the Iyengar communities worldwide. He called it “The Pune Constitution.” It is a document that he obviously gave much thought to and wanted us to take very seriously. Each country is at a different stage of development in their community of Iyengar practitioners. A flexible document (and it IS written in language that allows it to be flexible) will be a good starting point for all of us. The key is good communication among those who have been on the path for many years and who are involved in guiding teachers in their home communities. I am hopeful that Geetaji will be able to shed some light on the way forward for all of us in November.
