Showing posts with label guruji book. Show all posts
Showing posts with label guruji book. Show all posts

Oct 22, 2012

Guy Donahaye ABQ - Bibliography

Source: Guy in ABQ, AAYS




Resources and references mentioned during Guy Donahaye's weekend workshop at the Albuquerque Ashtanga Yoga Shala October 19-21, 2012



 

 

GENERAL

Guy's Shala in NY:  Ashtanga Yoga Shala NYC
A good place to practice and a website full of valuable information.
http://aysnyc.org/

Guy's blog "Mind Medicine:  Ashtanga Yoga Darshana"
http://yogamindmedicine.blogspot.com/ 

Guy's book "GURUJI: A Portrait of Sri K. Pattabhi Jois Through the Eyes of His Students"
http://bit.ly/RhagPj

Book extracts:
http://bit.ly/QCpfmU

Interviews:
http://bit.ly/OXgeGN 




DAY 1:  Fundamentals of Practice

Reading list at Guy's website:
http://ow.ly/eGhEQ

What is Yoga?

What is Ashtanga Yoga?

Pranayama and mulabandha

Breathing


DAY 2:   Mind Medicine I

Ashtanga Yoga Mantram and translation
http://bit.ly/RlVIj3

Yoga Sutras & Hatha Yoga Pradipika

Why right leg first in padmasana

Diet and lifestyle

What is the Self?

Daily practice

Ego, vrttis, householders
http://bit.ly/RQIJTS

Ayurveda, doshas, recipes, and many more resources
http://www.ayurveda.com/online_resource/index.html  

Ashtanga yoga history and lineage
http://bit.ly/Rapfc0




DAY 3: Mind Medicine II

3 gunas, Yoga Sutras, and more
http://bit.ly/UtOlsh

When to and not to practice


First you do asanas

Mind control

Guruji teaching

Mad attention



Check back soon for more updates...

Sep 17, 2012

Interview with Guy Donahaye by Elise Espat Part 4

 

Reflections on "Guruji: A Portrait"
Interview of Guy Donahaye
by Elise Espat - Part IV
Originally published September 17, 2012 Mind Medicine Blog

Is there a point in the book that you feel is really crucial to understand Guruji, the system, or the practice?
I feel the book makes a few important points. Perhaps nothing new is said, although for many people there will be a lot of new material. The fact that we have 30 statements or interpretations, and that these statements are broadly in agreement, or together put pieces of the jigsaw in place, what we have as a result is a kind of "authoritative" text.

Interviewees were not always in agreement and at times completely contradict each other, however, I think you can trace at least 80% agreement on most of themes throughout the book.

In some respects you could say the interviews were research on my part. For instance, on the origin of the sequences: David Williams and Nancy Gilgoff believed that the sequences we practice (with some modifications) had been passed down directly from the Yoga Korunta, a text, 100s or 1000s of years old. This was the story I received when I first started practicing since my first teacher had learned from a student of David's. I asked Guruji about this several times and was never quite sure what he meant by his answers.

Apart from Nancy and David, everyone else who was interviewed believed that Guruji was involved in creating the system of asanas. Manju goes as far as to say that Krishnamacharya and Guruji sat down and went through various texts (Hatha Yoga Pradipika, Gheranda Samhita, Yoga Korunta, Yoga Rahasya) and made up the sequences based on Chikitsa and Shodhona. Norman Allen alludes to Norman Sjoman's book and its suggestion that this type of practice is a new creation modeled on gym training.
I think, through the interviews and my own conversations with Guruji,  a picture emerges that the Yoga Korunta contained  asanas and vinyasas grouped according to their therapeutic benefits but that the actual sequences we practice were created by Guruji under Krishnamacharya's supervision based on Chikitsa, Shodhona and so on.
It seems that Guruji did much of the work in organizing the sequences as well as in modifying the vinyasas. If you look at Yoga Makaranda - Krishnamacharya's book of 1934 - you can see how he sequences the asanas and structures the vinyasas quite differently. Shammie said he invented, or discovered the surya namaskar - I believe this is true - at least in the form that he taught.

One of the reasons I made the interviews was to establish a coherent picture and to correct some misconceptions about the nature of yoga, as taught by Guruji.
Guruji felt very strongly that yoga is a spiritual practice. It is perhaps ironic that someone who believed this so deeply, is sometimes seen as propagating a purely physical practice. Too many of my fellow practitioners in the early '90s tended to think this way, and maybe this is something which motivated me to initiate this project. For Guruji, the purpose of yoga was to make one fit for realization - that was his main interest - I think this is emphasized in the book.

For many people who never met Guruji, or whose contact with him was minimal, the anecdotes and stories about studying with him and about his character have brought him to life in vivid color. For those who did know him, the interviews reveal other facets of his teaching and has brought back many memories. I have received many emails from readers expressing gratitude for having been able to experience an intimate meeting with Guruji through these interviews.

Here is an email from John Scott:


Dear Guy,
Brilliant! Fanatastic! Congratulations!
Thank you Guy, I do think you and Eddie have put together a lovely and very valuable book.
It reminds me how much we learned from each other back in those days (the early 90s).
Guruji passed on so much wisdom to every individual student, and this was because he was always on-to-one with each student, and therefore the questions asked of him were all uniquely different. 
What is so nice,  is that Guruji's students love to share and pass on their personal experiences with everyone else.
The photo on the back cover looks great* and it's just as Guruji was for us back in those days.
Those were the days - the Lakshmipuram days

photo by John Scott
Photo By John Scott


I have already read a few of the pieces and have learn't so much more already
So again Thank You Thank You for sharing
Love John
Lucy India and Fynn

* This is John's photo



Guy Interview

Jul 13, 2012

Interview with Guy Donahaye by Elise Espat Part 2

Part two of my interview with Guy Donahaye on his book "Guruji: A Portrait".  And beyond.
Originally posted here:
http://yogamindmedicine.blogspot.com/2012/07/reflections-on-guruji-portrait.html

Reflections on "Guruji: A Portrait" 
- Interview with Elise Espat - Part II

Everyone you interviewed spent time with Guruji in Mysore.  Why is making the time to practice in India so crucial? Or is it?  

If you want to go deep into a subject, you have to go to the source. Spending time in mother India is an incomparable experience and having the opportunity to study closely with a master such as Pattabhi Jois is a priceless opportunity. I believe that it is almost impossible to understand yoga without spending extended time in India, so for a deeper understanding I think it is necessary.

Practicing with Guruji, especially in the intimate setting of the "old shala" in Lakshmi Puram was a very powerful and transformative experience. Receiving the asanas from Guruji and being adjusted in them by him on a daily basis also has a profound impact. Beyond the effectiveness and beauty of the sequences he created, the nature of his adjustments and the way in which he engaged with each individual were teachings on a daily basis. Much more is conveyed through teaching asana than is at first evident.


He would observe our personalities, mental and physical states and engage with us accordingly - teaching us yama and niyama and other yogic truths indirectly or in a practical way. For instance, in some students he was always trying to curb ambition and break down an over inflated ego, in others he was pushing, encouraging, demanding more effort. For each individual on each day it was different. This often caused a lot of confusion, intense emotions and outbursts of anger - either in private or in the shala - one day you though he loved you, the next he seemed to despise you. This caused a lot of self reflection and self analysis.

Prior to 2002 Guruji's yoga shala was very small. In the beginning there was space for eight yoga mats - two rows of four. As the numbers grew we squeezed an extra mat in each row and then eventually there were two in the middle - making twelve. In '91, when I first arrived, Sharath was just beginning to assist, so there were two teachers and eight students in the room. Prior to this and during the summer months there were only a handful of western students, sometimes only one or two - they would get private lessons from Guruji.

With the new shala there was space for sixty students to practice at the same time so the teacher student ratio changed radically. By this time there were many of Guruji's students teaching around the world and students coming to Mysore already knew the practice, so the teaching in the new shala for most students was more about quality control and less about one-on-one teaching. At times there were as many as 300 students present in later years. However, Guruji's commanding presence continued to have a powerful impact on everyone present even though he did not necessarily engage with you directly. It was a common experience that when Guruji spoke to one student - he would shout "straight(en) your leg!" or "touch your chin" - other students in the room felt spoken to also and even though his prompts were not directed at them, they were able to use them also.

Much is made (with good justification) of the ashtanga sequences, however, it makes a huge difference who you learn from and the environment in which you learn. Some say the practice is the teacher. I feel the practice is more like therapy. The guru is the teacher. Even though the teaching may not be explicit, by investing the teacher with a real or imagined superior knowledge, he causes us to reflect on our own limitations. When you are in close proximity to the Guru, these reflections take on a much greater intensity. We used to call mysore a karma accelerator - we felt that enormous transformation was taking place.

How does Mysore influence the practice?  Or does it?

Going to India can help by making practice the central theme of one's day for a period of time. It is also an opportunity to allow the transformations which want to take place in the mind/body to unfold in an environment which does not elicit one's habitual (conditioned) responses. Somehow India has the effect of opening people to greater acceptance and transformation.

I believe it is easier for those who spend time in India to become less materialistic and to start to guide their lives on the basis of a spiritual purpose. While churches in the West are closing, in India every tree or road side rock is a temple to a deity. While many indians crave the same material rewards as westerners, the celebration of and devotion to the divine is everywhere.

The traditional Hindu culture as primarily propagated via the Brahmin caste is based on the same principles as yoga. Guruji's old shala was in Lakshmi Puram, a neighborhood hardly touched by the twentieth century, where people lived much the same way they had been living for hundreds of years. We lived simply without furniture other than a mattress on the floor, intermittent electricity and water. We went to bed when the sun set and got up long before it rose. All around us the local people were all also involved in their early morning rituals, chanting, cleaning, bathing, etc. The target of life for the Hindu is liberation, yoga's target is the same.

Yoga is only one of 64 arts, each of which can bring a practitioner to samadhi and Self realization. Many students learn a musical instrument or study Sanskrit or philosophy - these pursuits take one deeper into an understanding of the science of Self realization.




Guy Interview
 

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