Students, for the Kuteer:)

Today Sonia and Mini team's Kleansite boys (here, their link) came all armed with a lot of brush and stuff and liquids and were cleaning up the Kuteer. I feel ashamed to sound so unclean --  but it looked clean enough to me, as it was.  but Sonia rubbed her fingers on the tiles and showed some paint dust and white grime and said they will also be sanitising the hall.. I requested a clean-up of the lobby too, as a bonus.. and she agreed. Since I had left them at their task I do not know, but with so much equipment and labour attacking all that dust in the hall and lobby I assume that it will now be safe to do pranayama at the kuteer without having paint dust drawn into your lungs as you desperately inhale...

And then, this evening, as I was finally feeling a bit settled about maintaining my own firm style of teaching ...after having agonised over it for the last two weeks and getting really wild about a lot of things about teaching -- I was feeling a bit relaxed about something that had been gnawing me a lot..so, when  a bunch of newbies to yoga Meera, Muthu, Faisal, and Nisha gave me a lovely surprise, it really, in an oblique way, sorted a lot of that gnawing doubts I was having:) So, this gift, my dear students, is rather special to me!  Brass bells, agarbatti (very yummy smelling, and with Buddha eyes on the cover) with a wooden incense stand, a brass Buddha statuette, and a tribal brass holder   I was very moved by the thoughtfulness and choice of the gifts. Meera, apparently, was the gangleader!
I thank you all, really humbled.

And I am sure the Sadguru's grace will always be with you all:)
Om 

Lousie L Hay

On fatigue: What is its source?
She says, it is resistance to what one is doing!!


That explains it:) 

Real meditation, from the real guru : Ramana Maharishi

You may experience anything, but you should never rest content with that. Whether you feel pleasure or fear, ask yourself who feels the pleasure or the fear and so carry on the sadhana until pleasure and fear are both transcended, till all duality ceases and till the reality alone remains.

There is nothing wrong in such things happening or being experienced, but you must never stop at that. For instance, you must never rest content with the pleasure of laya (temporary abeyance of the mind) experienced when thought is quelled, you must preson until all duality ceases.

Meditation:

I am feeling super exhausted, for the last one month, because my meditation practice has suffered:( My only recovery is from meditation. I have also not sung with Jayashriji for a month. So, my voice is feeling thick and uncomfortable. Also, for the last one month, I have not experimented with new poses or sequences. Which makes me feel mentally sluggish and unchallenged. All the detailed work one needs to set up a center has been overwhelming. But that is no excuse. Because yoga is incomplete without meditation.

Yesterday, however, after winding up some more minute detailing at the Kuteer, I sat down for a meditation (yeeks, with the ac on:) and then sang Praja hati (from the Gita, set to raag shri)  with Jayashriji's taped voice giving me cues. Then, today I had a long  chat with one of my students, Sonia, who is `sanitising' the Kuteer... (she is into cleaning up office spaces , and runs an  housekeeping agency) and blabbed a lot about teaching -- she is my oldest student from the current batch. My mind is feeling a bit settled. And the sense of exhaustion, a little less.  From June 1, the Kuteer will start.

Today again, back to meditation:) It feels back to  normal, almost....


I am taking it easy the next month, having clubbed some classes, and keeping the Tue-Thurs-Sat for my own intensive practice. And get back to meditation with the same love I have always had for it. I have been meditating since I started learning yoga, and that has been for years. Even when my yoga sadhana has foundered earlier, I will always manage my meditation. But in the last one month, I have resisted it, for some reason, which must explain my exhaustion.

So, yesterday, when I sat down for meditation, I realised how much I missed it. It is the most wonderful thing, because when you meditate all the questions you never asked come up. And with it, often, the answers. The coin usually drops.

So, really, what I mean to say is, that meditation is the key...

Yogic thot for the day: wealth and health

If we do not accept the idea that we `deserve' to prosper, then when abundance falls in our laps, we will refuse it somehow: Louise L. Hay

She gives this example of how a student of hers, who wished to increase prosperity, had won a $ 500 lottery. But he could not believe it and kept saying that he never won anything in his life, and he could not actually believe it happened. Then, what happens, he falls,breaks his leg and then his doctor bill comes up for $ 500...

It is an interesting point and I myself believe in this theory implicitly. I have found that if you scrounge and save, you end up spending everything on some hospital bill or whatever eventually you create by such thinking. Hay advises that when you give money or pay a bill, do not wince inside. Do it comfortably, to create prosperity...

Daily health gyan

For some reason, a lot of requests for inputs on asthma cure this week: here is some more, on diet, for asthma patients: fresh fruit/vegetables: mackeral and sardines; salmon and tuna; wheatgerm ; nuts and seeds; garlic and onions.

Tomorrow on foods you must avoid if having asthma... (From the book Vitamins and Minerals/Sara Rose -- a simple book which does not seek to confuse the way most nutrition books do) 

Daily health gyan

Louise L Hay says asthma victims are suffering from suffocating love, suppressed love and need to affirm that it is safe to take control over their lives now. 

Yogic tip for today : bow pose

Sai gave this tip to me, having picked it up at Parmarth festival, from a very simple but fantastic teacher from Kerala, he told me. He said to do a perfect bow, you need to hold the ankles, then rock the chest up high. That gives you the lovely high lift that defines the bow. Then, move the legs away from the body! Normally, we draw it towards the back.. but this looks like fun. Somewhat like the crow, with your legs pressing into the shoulder .. seems difficult initially, but powers the pose by and by still you experience pure strength. 

Mock drill, at Yoga Kuteer ,,, some images

The images should say it all: Just a first peek of the Kuteer with some of my students. Minesh is doing the wheel, with leg raise; Vivek doing the crow; Sonia, the unsupported headstand, with hands stretched, and back hand hold; I am in the scorpion with the group, and different versions of a simplified bherundasana; Sai is doing the peacock.

Join us?!!

Quizztime!

Answer: The base/mooladhara chakra. It is involved with anxiety about survival, and makes one hoard, seeking to control one's condition of survival!

Query: Which chakra, when it overflows, makes you talk as if you have attained enlightenment? Meaning, makes you delusional, spiritually arrogant, spaced out and silly (but you do not know that, because you lose your awareness of that, and acquire what is called sukshma ahamkara/subtle ego, the most difficult ego to dislodge).

Yoga Kuteer, first look

More than my work... as somebody pointed out... I have not taken a holiday in about three years..it is the net which has been giving me trouble...

So just posting these firt shots of the Yoga Kuteer... U can find out more, on visiting...

ANSWER AND QUERY

ANSWER: Air element is for the heart chakra... like air, whimsical, love .. flitting,sometimes there,often not there...It can be a good thing,when it flows well -- good self-esteem, love for others. When blocked, loveless and sere.. and irritation for others..

QUERY: Which chakra -- when flowing out of control --makes one keep on acquiring property and money beyond the need of what one has, and makes one act miserly??!!

Yoga Kuteer: cleaning up the lobby

(The images, also in facebook at this link)

Yes, I am a shrill yoga teacher who likes to say it when she feels  goody goody:) (Still stuck and locked by the Vishnu Granthi at the throat, which prevents you from moving onwards spiritually because of the strong sense of identification with the  right and wrong and feeling good about good things,  ha ha!!)

This is  the lobby to the Kuteer... when we bought it, as I explained on my fb page, this stretch where the plants were meant to be, were dunked with garbage, concrete from some interior work (most are super-rich owners/tenants here, but yet, but yet, they will do that, dump stuff about -- because this is  Mumbai where if you did not spot garbage for a day you will have a heart attack or a stroke:), lots of spit to which clearly more red stains were being added by the hour!! So, we decided to clean it up, removed the concrete and the garbage, placed fertile soil on it, and then planted the hardy money plants. None of the other plants which I did want to plant -- the lively bougainvillea, the majestic bamboo or the soothing palms -- could fit in here because this part of the building does not get much sun.  

So, yes, the money plants are picking up pace and seem to grow daily. I have a developed a proprietorial (stuck now in the Brahma granthi -- base chakra which is involved with feelings of ownership:) affection for the crisp tendrils of the plants, so they inch upwards, strongly...

Yes, the plants seem to lift the lobby..

Daily health gyan: ankle problems

Ankle problems, according to Louise L. Hay, is due to inflexibility of the mind and guilt about receiving pleasure.

Yogic tip for today

To get a good padamasana, strengthen and flex your ankles with the classic tadasana (on the toes, version),

Brain map, your reproductive system, addictions and tadasana

(The image of the brain ma  giving a representation of how much space each of our body parts have in our brain. This is called the homunculus man in biology)

I first discovered the homunculus man in the Bihar school of yoga books. It was a very exciting discovery, because it explained so much about the prominence of mudras -- hand gestures -- in yoga.  Yogic mudras exploit this prominence of hand in the brain to heal areas which may otherwise be unreachable.
And the homunculus man also explained a lot to me about  why some poses are regarded as cure-all poses. (The stuff about mudras, I keep talking of in this space. About the ankle/foot and toes also, I write a lot. )

GENITAL SYSTEM AND SELF-CONTROL
If u see closely, u will find that the genitals are closely placed to the foot and toes. This may explain why many of the  disease-curing poses service the legs a lot. Not just because of the connection between reproductive system, as many people immediately think, to sex but also because more importantly because this system manages all our moods -- neurochemicals here decide your personality oxytocin (love hormone), dopamine (adventure hormone), serotonin (feel good hormone), amongst others. Not just orgasm, but also other feelings like keenness to learn new things, a sense of adventure, memory, love for the community, anger, helplessness, contentment are played out by the flow of these hormones. What you call feelings are actually the flow of these chemicals and yoga constantly seeks to harmonise and regulate their flow.

ANKLE-STRENGTHENING POSES AND HEALING 
. Perhaps the yogis guessed, very intuitively, that if you regulated the system, you could get organised mentally also. And that will put an end to many psychosomatic diseases. That is why ankle-locking poses -- lotus, vajrasana -- are regarded as healing. So also the other poses which you may call ankle poses -- the classic tadasana -- for example is a powerful cure-all pose, with practically no contraindication, and used powerfully for weight loss even.

MOUTH IN YOUR BRAIN AND ADDICTIONS 

See the representation for mouth? It is huge in the homunculus man -- which may explain why when depressed, we reach instinctively for food (or other addictions involving the mouth -- recreational drugs, cigarette, drinking, etc!!).

Practising yoga seems to contain addictions too, for this reason. Below is another version of the homunculus man -- which shows how big a representation the mouth has!!

SENSE EXTROVERSION AND CROW POSE 
As also the sense organs, though not as much, but big enough -- explaining why when I see someone acting with an OCD behavior, or externalise/extrovert their mind (adjusting the mat constantly, reacting to others in the yoga class, being aware of them though they may actually not even talk to them!!)  I feel convinced that they may trouble with some balancing poses -- like the crow, headstand, or the scorpion ...

Cool summer and crow's shit

Here is my article in rediff.com on keeping cool. None of it is original of course -- can any such info be original? It is just that these health ideas make me think and I am into checking out a lot stuff about inflammation -- it is the inner burn that causes all sorts of diseases, aging  and everything else bad -- and which not even water can quench  --

btw  a pesky blog visitor has beem calling me names between hugging me ( over the net, unasked!!)  and giving me gyan -- but who simply has no clue about biology --(or about spirituality) -- when I said that water is not enough to hydrate, this person keeps on posting queries tho I suggested that he/or she (always these anonymous types:) should do a bit of reading and thinking for himself/herself. 
. If you do not read about science you won't understand that  drinking a lot of water does not mean that the water is being absorbed by your body!  In water intoxication, your insides can be so flooded by water that you may suffer a stroke! In fact, when dehydrating, having the right salt comibination in the water (ions/sodium-potassium) will be more meaningful than more water!!

Water  must be held by the body.. drinking is just one step towards that. What you eat, how u feel, is what holds the water in your body... Some foods hold the moisture of the body in, lock it in!

I was watching a  back-from-death real life story on TV  in which I learnt that if you are muscled, the chances are you will last longer in a desert than a fatter person, simply because muscles release water in extreme circumstances like that .. which means they are also holding it in more!

... so water, water, water everywhere means nothing.. as much as a hug does not mean love (this one is for this blog visitor who kept saying nasty things and winding it up with a `hug' -- heavens, how one carries on with this idea of being good, so much so that it can be rather violently imposed on someone sitting in her corner -- me -- minding her own business!) So, yes,. I did not see any hug, but just a lot of angry foam, froth and fume!! . Taking the effort to share, as I do in this blog, is also love.. a hug is just a gesture, and is meaningless when it is offered in anger (though this person even kept winding up with peace!!) . Sharing my time, as I do here, to some people who are ingrates is more meaningful than a  hug... which is as useless as drinking too much water and being flooded by it!

One of the Siddhar yogi called himself Crow's shit (Kaga pucundar). That was his way of showing he cared two hoots for form and pretentious tradition.
 I believe I belong to that school of thinking ) I rather be crow's shit than  jaw  crap as do these holier-than-thou types:)!!

Yoga nidra: brain massage!!

The one thing I miss is nidra, being done to me by a teacher. Otherwise I am comfortable practising on my own, but nidra, I miss. It is a brain massage. Very soothing and healing. And I believe very important for yoga teachers to recover from, from teaching! And it is the best healing agent in therapy yoga. Below, my thoughts on this wonderful practice that, I believe, is not done in some stupid yoga classes in Mumbai.. Don't join a yoga class which has no final relaxation -- it is not yoga, at all!!


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Some schools like the Bihar School of Yoga, add the sankalp or resolve-making to yoga nidra. Other purists shun this. Thus, the debate amongst specialists continue. But basically, if we wish to demystify yoga nidra you can say it is a meditative, healing practice which induces a state of deep mental relaxation by giving the brain a staccato, repetitive chore. This involves making the brain focus on different body parts, in a particular order. The brain, stunned into a state of deep relaxation, changes its brain wave patterns, entering a mental state not always reached consciously. This can have a powerful healing effect on the body. The nascent branch of neuroimmunology says the whole body depends on cues from the mind. Perceptions create a cascade of bio-chemical reactions in our body. In yoga, when this bio-chemical gush is negative, it can harm us by becoming ailments. Practices like yoga nidra switch on the positive, bio-chemical cascade throughout the body.

MATURITY IN PRACTICE:

It is true that only intermediate and advanced level practitioners are able to resist the urge to fall asleep during an induced yoga nidra. The brain is lulled completely, yet it retains its awareness and control. But this sort of controlled awareness can only be attained after regular yoga nidra practice. Ordinarily, the brain waves are in the beta wave mode. This mode involves very fast waves. This sort of chaos is necessary for the brain to function. But it also is a very tiring state to be experienced for long. This static also has a biological source. It springs from the reticulating activating system – the chatter box in our brains. But the brain needs to rest from it, and so induces sleep or rest, to help get this chaos in order. But even in normal, biological sleep the reticulating activating system does not shut up fully. However, in yoga nidra, even at the beginner's level, this static is stunned into silence. As explained above, this can have a profound, healing effect.


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GOAL SETTING:

Advanced practitioners exploit this subtle, but powerful impact of yoga nidra to reach other mental goals. It is said the Bihar School of Yoga's current head, Swami Niranjanananda, learnt all the ancients scriptures as a child while being induced into yoga nidra, as the scriptures were recited in the background. Similarly, I recall reading of another swami who had learn English, which he had not formally learnt, by employing yoga nidra.

MOST HEALING PRACTICE:

As an instructor I have also found that those who are very ill, or are working towards some sort of serious ailment, display immense restlessness even in the simple corpse position. There seems to be some correlation between the restlessness of the body and their illness. Doing yoga nidra regularly would release them from the traps of their mind that is ruining their body.

Yogic tip: for intense pranayama

Luckily these days at least I have not had a pretentious beginner student suggesting to me that he or she wants to do more pranayama! Earlier, when I was a callow teacher, and vulnerable (that makes these audacious types more audacious:) I have had such requests: a student coming to say that he or she is bored with a particular pranayama and wants to do something different or more. Now I know better. Unless you show evidence that you are, on your own, practising what I have thought you, you are not qualified to more growth in pranayama. That is somewhat like meditation, and needs a lot of maturity to invite daily practice and deep dedication. Where that is lacking, u are just flirting with something that deserves something more than that vapid attention!

Also, for intense pranayama, your diet has to be modified: no salt or spice. No stimulants. No media or onslaught of information that can distract or agitate the mind. You need to have less work such as you may be doing now -- commuting etc (this is also true for intense meditation, btw). That is why it has to be done in a protected space like a retreat, ashram, and under expert supervision. Otherwise, you will break out as the toxins release -- skin eruptions, ulcers, fever, blood pressure fluctuations. And the less said of the mind, and the effect on it, if intense pranayama is done unguided, the better!!

Happy sadhana!

Daily health gyan: abs

People do not understand abs exercise. I see this when people say they are into gym training, and do abs to tone up. First of, of course, if your stomach is toned, u do not flag in any yoga pose... they are related, your core strength and overall stamina, obviously.
When I ask people to show me what abs they do, they show me a move which is universal -- the legs folded at the knees and hands under the head and lifting the torso up and down. But they take the brunt of the pose at the back, depending on their weaknesses, they will shift the weight to the strongest part of the back, so neither does the back tone up, nor definitely, the stomach.

For proper abs, you need to lift up from the belly, with the pressure shifting to the thighs. The hands under the head should have the elbows pointed out, ideally both for the up and down movement. But if that is difficult initially, at least for lowering movement of the back. If pressure is being felt at the neck or lower back, your stomach is def not toning! Plus, the stomach should be deeply drawn in while lifting up, with an exhalation. This synchronisation of breath with muscular effort is the most important factor in real abs. You do not need to hundred, as some stupid gym sessions suggest you to: but 20 without any rest break, with the above suggestions, will explain the difference between men and boys:)

Answer and query: all about fire in our bodies

Sorry guys, the maid has been off since the beginning of the month, so have to mop and wash dishes (tho there is an occasional help from the home quarters, including husband and child in this dept), still .. I am doing all those little `art work' for the kuteer, plus forms and stuff. Then, of course, the comp is banned for me most days since it is in the daughter's room. So, all in all, bad support for blogging, which is a luxury, na?

Here is your answer:

Answer: Yes, manipura chakra...


Query: What is the element for the heart chakra?

Answer and query: all about fire in our bodies

The last question, which remained unanswered, including by me, for long was which element does the thumb represent?

Answer: The most important of all fingers, the thumb, is represented by the fire element. In mudra science, the thumb is used to curb or spike an element.

Query: Which center/chakra is represented by the fire element?


Answer tomorrow, for sure (Why, because the net is almost back:)

Something about pain

On the Ripley's show on TV saw a couple, the woman blows fire and the man swallows a curved sword. Both are, appropriately, married:) And claim to be boringly normal, leading very boring, ordinary lives, except when each fire-eats or sword swallows.
The show said this is done by using eastern meditation techniques that make you move back from the experience of pain. Below, some thoughts I had written in a column a few years ago .. Pain is something u can indeed step back.. these days, while getting a tattoo I actually fall asleep if the session goes on for hours and the only issue I have is about snoring in a crowded studio!!!

On the art of Mushin... a state of awareness, not shutting down... 

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Zen martial arts was crafted from the South Indian yogic martial arts form called Kalaripayattu, from Kerala.  In any martial arts, emotions must be laid aside so you enter a mushin state (Japanese for no-mind state). In yoga, this state is  citta or pure consciousness. American Joe Hyams while learning this technique asks his teacher how one acquires `mushin'. Only through practice and more practice, responds his teacher. In other words,   through sadhana. Hyams writes in his book, `The Zen in Martial Arts', that this state of awareness, gained through constant practice or sadhana, also helped him deal with any acute pain. Once he refused a pain-killer the dentist offered, practicing the art of shifting his thoughts to somewhere pleasant, shutting out what the dentist was doing. His mind was so taken up with this task that he did not even realize the dentist had finished his work. Of course, he could not have done this without practice. The mind is the most difficult to train. Only daily and steady sadhana can help gain such control.

Yogic tip: practice, practice, practice

I teach so I can practice. I know lot of people want to teach, for various reasons -- for lucre, for halo, for pedestal, just to have something to do. But practice is all .. here is what a powerful quote explains, about yoga teachers (and practitioners) who crib they cannot practice...

" The knowers say that like a dog delighting in offal, the learned man who who does not practice also delights in external pleasures. Though always busy with Vedanta, reading and teaching it, he is no better than a mean dog."  

From the treatise Advaita Bodha Deepika

 

Yogic thought for the day

"Long before medical science even knew about the existence of thyroid glands, the yogis had devised practices which not only maintained healthy glands and metabolism, but also formed part of a system of enlightenment. The good health of the neuroendocrine system was understood to be vital to higher awareness. " Dr Swami Karmananda, Yogic Management of Common Diseases.