What Ashtanga is (to me anyway......currently)
An interesting aspect of blogging is seeing how your answers change, even if the questions are never exactly the same or the answers either, you have to read between the lines...
I've been thinking for some time now that my attitude towards my (Ashtanga) practice has changed somewhat, changed and yet remains the same, as if those aspects I find to be most important to me now were always important but perhaps I couldn't have put my finger on them way back when, too wrapped up as I was with more obvious aspects of practice.
And it's those more obvious aspects that we question and challenge of course and when we defend them chances are that those aspects aren't what we really wish to stand up for because really these are superficial aspects, it's what's deeper, more personal to us that we seek to defend, feel a need to defend.
The asana, it's never about the asana not really, practicing the asana perhaps but not the asana themselves, it's rarely about the bucket, The tool dissolves into the shadows, it's how we use the tool but even here we find a shadowy world, toolmakers shine a light here but it's rarely of our concern, nor should it be....tools are all about being and becoming, the being we bring and the becoming revealed
the being that's brought to the mat
the becoming that's taken away
We use tools everyday mostly without giving them a second thought, only when the tool is missing perhaps or broken. I'm a woodwind repairer, occasionally somebody starting up in repairs will call up and ask which tools they need to set up as a repairer (my company supplies tools for most of the repairers in the country). I have to think about this, what tools DO I use? If I want to remove a stubborn spring, broken off near to a post, I reach for a tool with barely a second thought, I use the tool which I modified myself back when necessity required me to shine light on to the toolworld to modify it's design. Once the spring is removed I hunt around for an appropriate replacement. I bring care and attention, patience, confidence, concern for the work, hopefully a professional attitude. I seek to do the best job I can, not for the customer so much as for the work itself, the horn. If I do the horn justice then it will follow that the customer is most likely satisfied.
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Likewise, I aspire at least to bring a degree of commitment to my mat, a resolve, a dedicated practice, dedication to the practice itself, the ritual of practice...there is devotion here. This is the being we bring to the mat. And maybe that dedication, that devotion is to something other than the practice, something greater, the divine resides perhaps in this, in rituals... in the sincere performance of rituals anyway, this is the becoming.
Rituals are clearings.
And so I seek out this aspect of practice now, ritual. I'm not concerned with the health giving properties of certain practices, particular asana, I couldn't care less in fact. The mostly fixed structure of my Ashtanga practice suits my needs, perhaps more variation has benefits, I'm sure it does but for the job I'm working on currently, for this work, repetition is what I'm looking for, attention now to detail. I bring the Vinyasa Krama breath, long and slow and reverential, this is also an Ashtanga breath an option available to us. And a ritual should not be too easy, too familiar, it should be challenging and on many levels, this is where the commitment derives, where the discipline is required, devotion acquired.
And that's my practice (on a good day), a mantra embodied, a ritual, structured and repeated, approached reverently, an attention to detail, to the ritual itself. The work for the sake of the work that's the being I seek to bring to the mat and perhaps there's becoming to be found there and in that, out of that.
An interesting aspect of blogging is seeing how your answers change, even if the questions are never exactly the same or the answers either, you have to read between the lines...
Addendum
This was an attempt to answer a question I set myself a couple of weeks back on 'How I balance Ashtanga and Vinyasa Krama' that never made it into post but relates perhaps to the post above.
I think the problem comes up because of the 'image' we have of Ashtanga and of Vinyasa Krama. there's the perception of Ashtanga as a dynamic practice, quite fast moving, the breathing sounding almost like panting, hot and sweaty, a fixed sequence.
You can practice like that of course and why not, there are arguments for it, building the discipline, improving health and fitness, the concentration that comes from a fixed sequence. And besides what's the rush, Ramaswami calls one of his books 'Yoga for the three stages of life', it's in the third stage of life it's suggested that you cut back on the asana and focus on the more meditative stages.
The image of Vinyasa Krama is the linking of long slow breathing and movements, the sequences perhaps in Ramaswami's book, no jump backs except at the beginning and end of the sequence, long stays in posture, repeating asana, flexibility.
And yet both systems are Vinyasa both link the breath to the movement. Krishnamacharya and Jois talked about long slow breathing, you can practice Ashtanga more slowly if you wish. There is a fixed sequence but Jois himself mentions that it depends on how much time you have available. You can modify the sequence if necessary. In Vinyasa krama the sequences Ramaswami presents are for learning the relationship between postures, you still have to construct a practice it may as well have the framework of an Ashtanga sequence.
I'm familiar with Ashtanga so I keep that framework but I practice with a particularly slow breath
In Ashtanga several asanas are repeated but with slight variations, finishing postures have long stays, the four variations of paschimottanasana in Ashtanga add up to a long stay as does janu sirsasana A and B
So you can practice Ashtanga more slowly, you can practice Vinyasa Krama more quickly, you can Modify your Ashtanga, you can come up with a general semi flexible framework for your Vinyasa Krama practice, not so far apart as they at first seem.
But it's that generally fixed sequence in Ashtanga that is perhaps the major difference, but I think there's something special in this, it's VINYASA + , something extra, the repetition lifts it somehow into the realm of ritual and the fact that it's always a challenging sequence in one way or another and this turns it into a discipline demanding of commitment, it demands dedication... and when does dedication tip over into devotion, not perhaps for the practice itself but something that comes into being around the practice
Ritual, discipline, commitment, dedication, devotion there is magic here, somewhere there between the lines and perhaps these are found in Vinyasa krama too but being generally a gentler practice, it feels a little easier to get on the mat, seems to take, for me anyway, more commitment, more dedication to practice Ashtanga six days a week. So I think I am practicing Vinyasa Krama but in the Ashtanga frameworks, Ashtanga Vinyasa Krama.
An interesting aspect of blogging is seeing how your answers change, even if the questions are never exactly the same or the answers either, you have to read between the lines...
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| Krishna Advising on the Horse Sacrifice |
I've been thinking for some time now that my attitude towards my (Ashtanga) practice has changed somewhat, changed and yet remains the same, as if those aspects I find to be most important to me now were always important but perhaps I couldn't have put my finger on them way back when, too wrapped up as I was with more obvious aspects of practice.
And it's those more obvious aspects that we question and challenge of course and when we defend them chances are that those aspects aren't what we really wish to stand up for because really these are superficial aspects, it's what's deeper, more personal to us that we seek to defend, feel a need to defend.
The asana, it's never about the asana not really, practicing the asana perhaps but not the asana themselves, it's rarely about the bucket, The tool dissolves into the shadows, it's how we use the tool but even here we find a shadowy world, toolmakers shine a light here but it's rarely of our concern, nor should it be....tools are all about being and becoming, the being we bring and the becoming revealed
the being that's brought to the mat
the becoming that's taken away
We use tools everyday mostly without giving them a second thought, only when the tool is missing perhaps or broken. I'm a woodwind repairer, occasionally somebody starting up in repairs will call up and ask which tools they need to set up as a repairer (my company supplies tools for most of the repairers in the country). I have to think about this, what tools DO I use? If I want to remove a stubborn spring, broken off near to a post, I reach for a tool with barely a second thought, I use the tool which I modified myself back when necessity required me to shine light on to the toolworld to modify it's design. Once the spring is removed I hunt around for an appropriate replacement. I bring care and attention, patience, confidence, concern for the work, hopefully a professional attitude. I seek to do the best job I can, not for the customer so much as for the work itself, the horn. If I do the horn justice then it will follow that the customer is most likely satisfied.
Likewise, I aspire at least to bring a degree of commitment to my mat, a resolve, a dedicated practice, dedication to the practice itself, the ritual of practice...there is devotion here. This is the being we bring to the mat. And maybe that dedication, that devotion is to something other than the practice, something greater, the divine resides perhaps in this, in rituals... in the sincere performance of rituals anyway, this is the becoming.
Rituals are clearings.
And so I seek out this aspect of practice now, ritual. I'm not concerned with the health giving properties of certain practices, particular asana, I couldn't care less in fact. The mostly fixed structure of my Ashtanga practice suits my needs, perhaps more variation has benefits, I'm sure it does but for the job I'm working on currently, for this work, repetition is what I'm looking for, attention now to detail. I bring the Vinyasa Krama breath, long and slow and reverential, this is also an Ashtanga breath an option available to us. And a ritual should not be too easy, too familiar, it should be challenging and on many levels, this is where the commitment derives, where the discipline is required, devotion acquired.
And that's my practice (on a good day), a mantra embodied, a ritual, structured and repeated, approached reverently, an attention to detail, to the ritual itself. The work for the sake of the work that's the being I seek to bring to the mat and perhaps there's becoming to be found there and in that, out of that.
An interesting aspect of blogging is seeing how your answers change, even if the questions are never exactly the same or the answers either, you have to read between the lines...
*************
This was an attempt to answer a question I set myself a couple of weeks back on 'How I balance Ashtanga and Vinyasa Krama' that never made it into post but relates perhaps to the post above.
......
You can practice like that of course and why not, there are arguments for it, building the discipline, improving health and fitness, the concentration that comes from a fixed sequence. And besides what's the rush, Ramaswami calls one of his books 'Yoga for the three stages of life', it's in the third stage of life it's suggested that you cut back on the asana and focus on the more meditative stages.
The image of Vinyasa Krama is the linking of long slow breathing and movements, the sequences perhaps in Ramaswami's book, no jump backs except at the beginning and end of the sequence, long stays in posture, repeating asana, flexibility.
And yet both systems are Vinyasa both link the breath to the movement. Krishnamacharya and Jois talked about long slow breathing, you can practice Ashtanga more slowly if you wish. There is a fixed sequence but Jois himself mentions that it depends on how much time you have available. You can modify the sequence if necessary. In Vinyasa krama the sequences Ramaswami presents are for learning the relationship between postures, you still have to construct a practice it may as well have the framework of an Ashtanga sequence.
I'm familiar with Ashtanga so I keep that framework but I practice with a particularly slow breath
In Ashtanga several asanas are repeated but with slight variations, finishing postures have long stays, the four variations of paschimottanasana in Ashtanga add up to a long stay as does janu sirsasana A and B
So you can practice Ashtanga more slowly, you can practice Vinyasa Krama more quickly, you can Modify your Ashtanga, you can come up with a general semi flexible framework for your Vinyasa Krama practice, not so far apart as they at first seem.
But it's that generally fixed sequence in Ashtanga that is perhaps the major difference, but I think there's something special in this, it's VINYASA + , something extra, the repetition lifts it somehow into the realm of ritual and the fact that it's always a challenging sequence in one way or another and this turns it into a discipline demanding of commitment, it demands dedication... and when does dedication tip over into devotion, not perhaps for the practice itself but something that comes into being around the practice
Ritual, discipline, commitment, dedication, devotion there is magic here, somewhere there between the lines and perhaps these are found in Vinyasa krama too but being generally a gentler practice, it feels a little easier to get on the mat, seems to take, for me anyway, more commitment, more dedication to practice Ashtanga six days a week. So I think I am practicing Vinyasa Krama but in the Ashtanga frameworks, Ashtanga Vinyasa Krama.
.......
Morning
Another interesting aspect of blogging is that in the morning you get to see if a post still makes any sense to you, if you understand even slightly what your were at least reaching for. The good posts (on a purely personal level), the good questions, are like this, sparring partners, Didi and Gogo.