http://www.yogacoventry.com
This isn't the Norman Sjoman workshop blog post I want to write, it's going to take a some time before I can write that one, enough to say that it was intense, physically, intellectually and whatever form of intense full-on pranayama practice elicits.
Surface, lets skim across the surface.
There was asana practice, it wasn't Ashtanga that's for sure, there was little to no breath focus as we moved in and out of the postures, first this one, get up, then that one but inside the asana certainly a focus on breath as tool.
Norman is interested in the movement within an asana, that will require a post all of it's own.
At times it reminded me of applied Vinyasa Krama, there were certainly some kramas, related postures placed artfully. I'm sure Norman used the word krama at one point.
It was closer to Iyengar and Norman Sjoman did study with Iyengar for a number of years in the great mans house back in the 60's, before the institute was built and things changed. It's not just Ashtanga it seems that lost it's innocence somewhat (some might call it naivety ) with it's blooming popularity.
So a strong Iyengar influence then, filtered through Norman's forty years of practice and teaching.
There was some serious cranking going on
Saturday night in an fb post I wrote
"I think I'm broken"
Norman adjusts like a chiropractor, there is.... extreme apprehension as you hear one yelp, groan (even scream) after the next and you know he is coming ever closer ( and this was a roomful of dancers too,there is a performing arts course at Coventry Uni, tough girls). Even when your alignment is not so bad, a "good" will be followed by CRANK. I think I get relatively deep into my backbends and twists, I've been practicing a number of years now but Norman will crank me in a third again.
Perhaps I was in the pose quite deeply but probably in all the wrong places.
I need to practice, to reawaken some of the things that came up over the weekend, I think I will understand them better as I enter the postures again, this morning. I took the day off yesterday, an unofficial moon day. I ache all over, my back feels sore, tender, but the muscles not in the sense of any damage done. Legs ache too from toe to groin and interestingly and something I'm most proud of, I can feel my obliques, I didn't know I had obliques. There were some the triangle postures where Norman was talking about an opening up of the abdomen, I think may have come from there, either that or from the pranayama.
At the end of the post I'll list the asana we practiced, it's a curious list. The second day he seemed to throw in the kitchen sink, some more advanced postures, perhaps as spice to the other asana that he focussed on more closely.
The talks were interesting of course, the first, Saturday, on his 40 years plus in studying Sanskrit and yoga. As I mentioned he was there with Iyengar when Iyengar was teaching out of his house but later he was also already living in Mysore when Norman Allan came to town. He has some stories.
Norman talked about his first book The Yoga tradition of the Mysore palace and it's (first) reception among Ashtangi's, the horror and vilification as they felt their ancient practice was being presented as a revivalist. All Norman felt he was doing supposedly was suggesting that the main influence on Krishnamacharya's yoga came from the Mysore palace and the old yoga texts in it's library. Several time he referred to Krishnamacharya practice as being strongly influenced by literature, by descriptions of practice in the ancient texts, there certainly is that thread in it, versed in sanskrit himself, Krishnamacharya seems to have combed the old books for all he could find on yoga practice.
Norman stressed that though he seems to have questioned the source of the Krishnamacharya asana tradition he also sought to 'save' asana rather than dismissing it's emphasis in yoga practice altogether but that this was somewhat overlooked in the furore that greeted his book.
There is something of the trickster to Norman I suspect, perhaps he got it from Iyengar, but it's not a bad trait.
It is perhaps this focus on asana as revelatory knowledge that justifies the inclusion of asana in Norman Sjoman workshop and it's place in our own practice. He wants to argue that Iyengar has a 'dynamic' focus on asana (or used to) initiated by introspection while Krishnamacharya and Jois followed a linear tradition orientated on accumulation. Personally I suspect that both possibilities and temptations are inherent in all asana based systems. I think of Krishnamacharya Yoga Makaranda and his long stays, the long slow breath and his focus on kumbhaka in asana, surely there was introspection here.
I've just renamed my blog, Overcoming asana, the overcoming of individual asana as well as the overcoming of our fixation on asana, the objectification of asana as well as the method, tradition or lineage in which we find ourselves. I'm thinking here of the dangers of asana as obstacle, but then that's not new, that danger is well documented from within each tradition, however the temptation is ever present.
The second talk, Sunday, was on the Yoga Sutra's, mostly Norman read sections from his new book Yogasutrcintamini in which he seeks to situate the Yoga Sutras in a wider tradition rather than as a single authoritative text. It's a wonderful book and I want to devote a post to it but here's a taste...
Norman's books are available from black lotus books http://www.blacklotusbooks.com/publications/gate.htm
After the talk on both Saturday and Sunday, Norman presented pranayama sessions. On my recent workshop I was asked by my hosts if I thought I had perhaps gone a little far in my inclusions of Kumbhakas in my own 20 minute sessions of teaching pranayama, I had built up to them lengthening the inhalation and exhalation then adding first one then the other short kumbhaka before lengthening them just a little bit. I wondered if they may have been right, did i go to far. Norman however jumped right in, long inhalations and exhalations, long kumbhaka's of around fifteen to twenty seconds for each stage at the end we were practicing nadi shodana at I think 30 second inhalations and thirty second exhalation, very intense. the pranayama sessions ran for longer than an hour, it was a quite full-on pranayama practice. I'm typing this very quickly now because I'm looking forward to going upstairs and practicing it just like that here at home. It was intense, challenging but also inspiring. The first day I opened my eyes to notice that many had given up half way through and were in the is savasana's already but on the second day almost everyone seemed to stick it out to the end, inspired rather than turned off by the challenging approach.
And that probably sums up Norma's workshop
It was intense, challenging but also inspiring.
He is also presenting another couple of workshops around the country
One at Urban City Yoga in Leicester and one at Free style Yoga Project with Mark Freeth in Tunbridge Wells, links to the websites below:
http://www.yogacoventry.com/yoga-workshops/yogaexpo1-nsjoman/
http://www.urbancityyoga.co.uk/pages/workshops
http://www.freestyleyogaproject.com/workshops/
Appendix
I was asked which asana Norman presented in the workshop, so here's a list. I'll write more about his approach to these later but for now I'm dying to go practice,
Workshop notes: NB this is just how I remember it the order might be slightly wrong and I may have forgotten a couple and I may well have got the ratio's wrong for the pranayama but it will give a rough idea of how I remember it ar least.
Norman was joined by Sheryl who demonstrated most of the asana
Saturday Day 1 of 2
Asana Session 2 hours
Sirsasana 10 min
Sarvangasana 20 minutes inc. leg lowering etc
Halasana's
Side bend, equal distribution, toes slightly pointing in
Utthita Trikonasana
Parivritta Trikonasana
Utthita Parshvakonasana
Parivritta Parshvakonasana
Prasarita Padottanasana A
Parshvottanasana
Digasana's
Ustrasana - lifting the thoracic,
Dropbacks
Janu Sirsasana 35 degrees, pelvis level
Paschimottanasana
Savasana
Lunch
Talk about Norman's Sanskrit and yoga studies
Pranayama 1 - 1/2 hours followed by a long savasana
Ujayii
Nadi shodana, adding kumbhakas one by one
Making each stage longer
20 sec inhalation and exhalation
Then 30 second inhalation 30 second exhalation
Bumble bee pranayama
Long savasana.
Sunday, Day 2 of 2
Asana session 2 hours
Sirsasana 10 min
Sarvangasana 20 minutes inc. leg lowering etc
Halasana's
Vasisthasana
viswamitrasana
ardhabaddha vasisthasana(?)
Utthita Trikonasana
Parivritta Trikonasana
Utthita Parshvakonasana
Parivritta Parshvakonasana
Prasarita Padottanasana A
Parshvottanasana
Ustrasana
Dhanurasana
urdhva dhaurasana
viparita shalabhasana
Janu sirsasana
paschimottanasana
ekapadasirsasana
dwipadasirsasana/yoganidrasana
mayurasana
savasana
lunch
Talk 2 hours - Yoga Sutras (and shastras)
Pranayama session 1 - 1/2 hours followed by a long savasana
Ujayii
Nadi shodana with kumbhakas 15 seconds each stage
20 sec inhalation and exhalation 20 second puraka kumbhaka
Then 30 second inhalation 30 second exhalation no kumbhaka
Bumble bee pranayama
Long savasana.