I honestly don't recognise the characterisation of Ashtanga by it's critics.
Wednesday I practiced my first full Ashtanga Primary series in, oh I don't know how long, almost a year perhaps. And this morning I practiced half Primary/half Second. I'll probably practice the same again tomorrow and then a straight Primary alongside M. on Saturday.
It's not really worth mentioning, I shouldn't write this until after a week, a month, another year of practice. This practice only takes on significance after a significant period of work, of grinding the practice out day in day out.
Leading up to practice I have this sense of mentally preparing myself to climb a mountain or rather of hiking a hill perhaps. I know it will take time and effort but remind myself that I will be so glad I did and that there will be joy along the way as well as effort and perhaps tedium (although if I'm honest, tedium has be rare).
I approach my resolute mat with resignation and determination or rather, will and intention.
Ekam, Dve, it begins. Half way through the count of the the first sun salutation I let the count go and breathe naturally, trusting my body to breathe appropriately, aiming to observe with detachment rather than to direct the breath.
I've done this practice for years, a decade, the asana mostly take care of themselves now, even after a year away, muscle memory. Heidegger says that we don't think about a tool so much as just pick it up and use it. As an experienced musical instrument repairer I can attest to this. Think too much and you'll over or under use the tool and end up damaging something. Asana are not unlike this, they take care of themselves.
Of course there tend to be an asana or two that we give more attention to, perhaps the most recent one we've taken on and are struggling with, or perhaps one of the stubborn resistant classics that never seem to get that much easier. Or perhaps a light bulb goes on in an asana that we've taken for granted for years and we suddenly rediscover it anew.
Occasionally we lose our way a little, try too hard, this is often where any injuries may arise, I've been lucky, a decade with no injuries to speak of.
But mostly we just do the work, grind the practice out on a bad day, flow/pass through it on a good, constantly seeking to bring our awareness back to the breath, letting the flotsam and jetsam of the mind float past, drift away on the gently lapping waves of disinterest....., on a good day
And perhaps we find ourselves in savasana and realise that the last thing we remember was going up into shoulderstand and we just lay there for a time before making the same commitment we made to stepping on the may but this time to settling into the tedium of pranayama and a Sit.
Home practice, no adjustments, no assists, nothing to prove and only occasionally overdoing it a little.
Practice should perhaps have a healthy dose of tedium, we shouldn't try to make it all too interesting too much of the time. Heidegger wrote a hundred pages on boredom, we shouldn't be afraid of it.
A sense of achievement, yes, a little perhaps because we remember that we didn't feel like getting on the mat that morning but we'll feel more achievement at the end of the week. One practice means little, the discipline is grinding it out again tomorrow and the next day and the next week, month, year.
The party tricks, the fancy asana we occasionally allow ourselves to be seduced by are little compared to the discipline itself of daily practice.
The critics of course focus on injuries, on mistakes, too strong adjustments on abuse (rightly so). Failing to understand ( read Mill on Socrates or a pig satisfied) they try to fit what they can't seem to comprehend into a box they can make some sense of, and more importantly manipulate and employ for their own ends. Tabloid like they focus on exceptions and collect enough of them to seemingly form a norm.
But the norm is actually quite unspectacular, nothing to see, merely the daily grinding out of ones practice, that setting up of our day, a discipline is remarkable in it's unremarkability.
And it's not just home practice of course. I have a page at the top of the blog, 'Mysore rooms around the world', ordinary practitioners grinding out their practice, extraordinarily ordinary.
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