As a high school student, I became an activist. I started a peace club at my school. In our small republican-dominated town, we held rallies, school walk-outs, painted peace-signs on the American flag, wore buttons. We chartered a bus and went to NYC to protest (unsuccessfully) with millions against W. Bush’s plans to invade Iraq. The back of my silver Honda Civic, which was older than I was at the time, was covered in bumper stickers. Way too many to just fit on the bumper. No war for oil. God is coming and she’s pissed. An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. Live simply so that others may simply live. A Canadian flag. The back of my car was ready to change the world.

Then, in grade eleven, I went to a tiny, poor, resource-depleted, former French colony called Burkina Faso. Generally, people didn’t have a clue that its in West Africa and its capital is Ouagadougou. Mostly I went so I could live in a place with four syllables and three ou’s. Also to go to an International school on exchange, learn French, and volunteer. I lived there for six months, enough time to get really angry and sad about social inequalities, post-colonialism, conservative missionaries, and culturally insensitive development work. Then I came home, with a few parasites in tow, and tried to raise money and awareness for Burkinabe organizations. I graduated, and applied for University with plans to go into International Development, Economics, or Anthropology. Degrees I thought would equip me further to save the world.

But somewhere in between Africa and University I started getting sick a lot. Chronic headaches, thyroid issues, adrenal issues. I cut a number of things out of my diet, worked with a naturopath, made my yoga practice more regular. I got a bit better.

I started doing more activist work again. I volunteered at the University Womyn’s Centre, co-Produced the Vagina Monologues, coordinated the Peace Society. I moved to Montreal for a year, taught English to immigrants, was secretary for a start-up environmental NGO. I got sick again, I got depressed. I was burnt out, and felt like my body just wouldn’t keep up with everything I need to do to save the world.

I started doing more yoga, and less activism. Slowly yoga started to transform me. The practice has deepened for me, to the point where it has been a part of my daily life for over two years. The yoga I have experienced is not a practice that transformed me to be “different” or “better” but a practice that has taken me on an inward journey into a more spacious way of being with what is and recognizing that that is enough. Somewhere I realized that maybe the world doesn’t need saving. The hardliner activist shell softened.  There are millions of things that I’d like to be different in the world. But right now I’m going to start with making peace with my body, and smiling as I say hello to the bus driver. I want to eat a conscious, mostly vegetarian diet, but not be anal or extreme about it.  I don’t want to wear buttons. I want to take a deep breath and notice what’s going on in my body before I make a decision. I want to walk and take public transportation, and buy local. I want to support my students, and try and make their lives a bit brighter. I’m not saving the world, but I do feel like I’m touching people in my community. And if my students feel a little more grounded, a bit less stressed, anxious or depressed, a little more open, a bit more inspired, then they’re probably making a difference in their communities too. And it so ripples out.

This transformation feels whole to me. It feels sustainable. It feels authentic and alive. That’s yoga.

The centering is intended to help students soften and become aware of themselves. My instruction is very intentional during this time, and the instruction to “welcome each other” in particular is intended to help students feel that they are practicing in community, even though most of the time they are alone on their individual mats, and not speaking to others.

Some classes I will have students work with a partner on certain poses. I’ll teach them how to work together and assist one another. For example a simple partner stretch we might do in the warm up would be facing a partner, holding each other’s wrists and then steeping away to get a stretch through the spine and legs.  I instructing partners to be sensitive and supportive each other. I find that students seem to enjoy these exercises and they may learn or feel things that are more difficult to experience on their own. Also it will often help to loosen up a uptight group and bring more lightness to the class.

At the end of class, we finish by singing Om again together. After class students sometimes chat in the lobby area or change room. Often students come to classes with friends, and they’ll come and go together. I notice that students that come to classes with friends attend pretty regularly, they have more incentive to show up if a friend is going to wonder why they’re not there.

Advanced Anusaraâ Yoga Teacher Training Intensive with Todd Norian and Ann Greene

Location:____ Toronto ____________ Date:__Nov 24________________________

Thank you for sharing your feedback on this training program. Our intention is to serve you in the best way possible. Your honest feedback helps us assess the effectiveness of this program and grow as teachers and staff.

1. What is your overall evaluation of this program?  (please check one)

x Excellent     Very Good     Good     Fair     Poor

If your experience of this program was less than excellent, please tell us what was missing for you or what would have made it an excellent                                       program.

2. What specific experiences were the most meaningful/powerful for you?

I felt so uplifted both as a student and teacher of this powerful training. As I student I felt that I was honored and respected, and I am so appreciative of your particular attention to helping me work with my SI and psoas. Your sharp vision and your kind way of communicating how I can better align to help me get out of pain are very important to me, and I’m learning to be steady in moving into that more optimal alignment, while honoring that it’s a process that will continue for years and years to come. Being seen in such a kind and loving way was a huge first step in my healing and a huge inspiration how to hold presence as a teacher and convey the highest to my students.

As a teacher the power, attention and intention to words was really meaningful to me- It really came through in your teaching. I will never forget when you were working with me, Todd, to help me not bind in my psoas in a standing pose and you said, “open to grace then hug in sweetly.” That last word, and the care and intention behind it, made all the difference- all the sudden muscle energy took on a whole new meaning and shifted from gripping to nurturing stability. This was just one of the many examples of how your conveyed the power of matrika through the training. I found the sections of matrika, heart language, making themes accessible and streamlined with action to be particularly powerful for me. I really appreciate the way you broke things down and gave us a formula to help what starts out as a broad, rambling theme idea for themes become clear and powerful. A big revelation for me was linking the theme to the universal through chit or ananda or both in a pulsation theme. No one had ever made this clear for me before, and I know some certified teachers don’t make this clear in their classes, so I think the model needs to be incorporated into the whole system of Anusara more- contextualizing and the universalizing really make a difference in how much a student can connect to the heart! Maybe you could suggest to John that he make this a little more explicit in the next Anusara Teaching Manual.

I also appreciated the times for journaling and reflecting in small groups, or as an entire group- especially the light-hearted and fun times. These moments help the teachings to solidify for me- settle down from my brain and into my heart. Overall, the training was really well balanced.

3.  Do you have any suggestions for improving the content or presentation of this program?

Everything taught was incredibly valuable, yet at some points, it felt like so much was being covered that things got a bit diluted, or went too quickly. It would be good to narrow the focus of the training a bit and really go deep into the subject matter you’re going to cover.  I know it must be hard, because you have SO much to offer! Also it would be really nice to have at least one longer, uninterrupted asana class. All the asana pretty stop/start- which was great and really useful most of the time, but at least one more flowing practice would have been really nice to replenish our bodies and hearts and get out of all the headiness for a bit. It would be of course useful to break it down afterwards and investigate how you were teaching.

4. Please give us feedback on the staff and guest teachers. (Please list by name if possible.)

None

5. What have you gained from this experience?

The training brought a new level of clarity and meaning to my understanding of the art and science of teaching, the more I learn the more I discover I have SOOO much more to learn and practice- it is certainly humbling and is also exhilarating! I just finished typing up 20 pages of notes and transcriptions from the training- I will be reviewing them and be fed by them for months and years to come. It’s big delicious meal to digest! Ann, I particularly appreciated your class/theme on steadiness. That has really inspired me post-training to remember and stay focused (and take the time to type up all the notes!). It’s easy to come out of a training and go back into old patterns, but I keep thinking of that class and how I have to be steady to stay connected and follow what I want in life and who I want to become as a teacher.

The training was also a wonderful opportunity to be inspired and feel connected to the kula, I really noticed your emphasis on that through little gestures such as saying namaste to each other not just the teacher, and through the way you had us work in groups and share together. Thank you for such wonderful group facilitation.

So I had an amazing conversation with John Friend yesterday about the 3 A’s and about the lovely and dynamic relationship between Attitude, Alignment and Action and what it really means to be a three-pronged approach to asana practice. Obviously, Anusara is heart-centered method. As such, Attitude is considered the most important A. But really, if we think of a three-legged stool, it is at it most functional when all the legs are equally balanced.

Why I say the conversation was amazing is the clarity that John brought to my understanding about Action. Action is really Balanced Action. (Like maybe instead of 3 A’s, we really have 2 A’s and a B, but I digress…) Action, in our method, is about bringing balanced action to the form of any asana so that the light of the heart (attitude) shines through what otherwise would be a stale pose or a foreign outside imposition of an arbitrary shape to the body. The A’s are in relationship to one another; each A, gives the other A its relevance to the whole.

For instance, if we take away Attitude, we have dry technique-based asana. If we take away Alignment and a sense of clarity as to what the form for each asana is, we have creative movement with little boundary. Also we lose sight of the vision of why the actions are even necessary. If we take away balanced Action, we run the risk of injury in the postures because the forms themselves can be like land mines of potential danger if we do not know how to align ourselves within them. And so on. Each A is important.

So we talked a lot about classic form vs. variations. One of the hallmarks of our method, I believe is our great delight in practicing creative variations on classic form and on our willingness to occasionally, as I say, “put the protractor away for a while” when we practice. But John was insistent that these variations be taught relative to the classic form because in most cases the classic form is the standard for experiencing and expressing balanced action.

Take trikonasana for example. Many time we take that pose and back bend it. But in its classic form trikonasana is straight through the spine. (Check out Light on Yoga or D’s syllabus poster.) The straight spine should be “mastered” first because it is easier to find and express balanced action in that form. (Mind you, I did not say easier to do, just easier to do in a balanced way. If you are a bend-y type, guaranteed you will not enjoy classic form as much!) So if you can find balanced action straight, then you can work on not just back bending the pose, but back bending it in a balanced way- with strong kidney loop and pelvic loop, for instance.) Same goes with all the forms that we back bend- seated twists, Vira 1, anjaneyasana, etc.

Now, I myself have heard John say, Action over Form but I think we have to be mature in our understanding of this. I am pretty sure he does not mean that form does not matter! This might mean that in a back bend like urdhva danurasana the shape is bent but the action is like tadasana; there is still that kidney loop action within the form. The kidney loop in this case is there to bring Balanced Action. And so on. Same with poses like padmasana where the form is extremely externally rotated we still need the action of Inner Spiral to keep the femur set in a balanced way so that we do not aggravate the psoas or the S.I. joint.

So enough on this today. Obviously more could be said. Oh, but the thing I must say is how cool it is to keep plumbing the depths of the basic of this method because as John told me once, “The depth of the basics is infinite.” How crazy after 10 or more years at this with John to go, “Oh, right…. Balanced Action, not just Action.” (I swear this stuff is never dull.) And John’s patient dedication to my love for precise articulation always astounds me.

Tomorrow I hope to follow this up with a discussion on how all of this relates to Tantra because the way we take this off that mat is actually where the fun begins! It is a lovely discussion about discipline, indulgence, rules, guidelines, deference, and the exciting path of discovering and expressing one’s own wisdom and authority. (How is that for a tantalizing preview?)

back body= universal> opening and learning to stay conencted to that. Front body= individual, embracing and opening to our individuality and diverisity

Bring meaning to the practice to stay engaged.

Stability preceeds freedom.

Soften first, then ask “what does this pose have to offer/reveal to me?

Place four corners of foot on one foot- press ball down, and then lift heel and pull back to inner edge

DFD demo- often lose connection- arm bones collapse to floor. stablity preceeds freedom. create boundary you can expand out into. donw ant to fall off edge and lose sense of who we are. if upper back is stiff, look forward

Ardha Salambasana- with friend, whole hand under/top of shoulders and then lengthen and lift

Urdva Danurasana with friend- toes in line with their ears, grip ankles. Assistant bend knees. Pull elbows up (NO) push elbows/HAB down (YES!). Armpits towards floor. arm bones back, heart to partner.

Sat PM

balanced action= energy moving in and out. not static- pulsation. learn to play the edge skillfully.

optimal blue print- not  cookie cutter, indiviudal, where balance is optimal for you.

contemplation= be still and be with whatever is. conenct with how it can unfold. reflecting with an receptive mind. leading things arise> creating space for things to arrive. having faith/trust that you know, not thinking something to death.

How:

1. prepare yoursef to ask question.

2. learn to ask clearly.

3. write what immediately arises- what is in your awareness

4. allow that to settle, and extract its essence

5. refine

the process of contemplation helps us to gain clarity. brings sense of freedom and power of transofmration into the moment. helps us to become more fre from incessant thinking. process of self inquiry. listening skills.

Meditiaton- you use all the practices, and then eventually you let them go and all of life becomes meditation, the practice. no separation.

Here are some questions for contemplation that she sprinkled throughout the weekend:

• What does opening to grace mean to me and how can I experience it in my practice?
• What is god, the universal energy, spirit for me?
• What does it mean to connect to something bigger?
• How to I move into greater alignment with spirit to lead and live an empowered life?

Reflections from throughout the weekend:

Sat AM- I’m thinking so much, trying to figure our the alignment for my back, and to let my psoas release. I need to take a step back and remember what opening to grace feels like in my body- a softening and expansion. OTG is softening into the universal, trsting that I’m at the right place in my journey- the process, my practice and my body will open and unfold over time. In opening I need to remember that I am safe, that I won’t be perminantly hurt or harmed- I can stay with the discomfort and breath life into it. OTG is a first step, next comes action, but they are applied onto this inner body of softeness and expansiveness. That way the actions are not a gripping, controlling effort, but an embrace around what is already perfect.  This is a process, my body, mind and heart won’t get in instantly. I’m happy that in Shraddha’s classes we’re stickying with a lot of basic poses, so I can work on finding that softness and expansion in a place where I’m not right at my edge. Once I find that softness, I learn to balance it with strength, then I can begin to push the edge again. “effortless strength”

Sat PM-What does it mean to connect to something bigger? Seeing the good, looking for the beauty and remembering its a reflection of what’s already inside. The beauty is always there, dancing right under our foot, shimmering like yellow leaves under a blue sky. Connecting means remembering and celebrating our part in the beauty, recognizing that we’re it, there’s no separation. Then we get to play and participate, co-create with it!  We can start in little steps what we want to do in big steps- start by connecting to other people, to nature.

Homework- to look for the good- in the world, in my own body, even in pain. Simple, but not easy.

When you feel helpless, send your blessings. Who am I really blessing? Who am I really forgiving?

Some days we’re cloaked and clouded. But when we get on the mat, we make a committment to be with it all, and open to let spirit come in and be with us there. Often when we leave the mat, we feel a little more clear.

Sunday AM Practice- The theme today was celebrating the diversity. I tried to remember my diversity, and just embrace the actions that I had to do- turn my feet out, more outer spiral. My back started to feel a lot better- I could feel it trusting that it was safe. It also was incredibly powerful to have Shraddha’s support. I walked in Sunday morning and she exclaimed, “I was thinking about your psoas and SI all night!” Feeling her support helped me soften to trust in the process. I started to feel more secure, like I had a container and I didn’t have to hold everything all alone. The power of care is huge. This is the perfect place for me right now, its amazing how life brings you the right teahers and the right points on your path. I’m glad I took the first step in and decided to commit to her.

Align and trust in the process.

Sunday PM Practice- I’m feeling more and more security in my SI. I trust that I can figure this out, and have the tools and support I need. I trust in time. Open to grace is still hugely important- not just inner body bright, but first a downward softening in the pelvic floor so that the inner body has the freedom to rise up and get full. This lengthens and relaxes the psoas. I’m really impressed the Shraddha’s refined understanding of the principles- its these nuances that are taking my practice way deeper. How wonderful! I’ve focused so much mentally and physically this weekend- I’m pretty pooped. But I trust that this work is important, and working with the pain has brought me to a really hightened place of awareness and prescence with my body and mind. I can start to see it as a gift.

Each day, at every moment we can create meaning and value. We are always “Poised for Grace”, poised to receive Grace, poised to offer Grace.

12:42 PM Sep 16th from Ping.fm
from Jamie Allison on twitter http://twitter.com/jamieomzone

In the Anusara yoga I teach and practice, the principle is to say “yes” to life, to our goals and aspirations and dreams. But coupled with that “yes” is an immediate “no,” expressed by creating boundaries, for the safety of our physical bodies and our psyches. We literally contract our muscles to protect and stabilize the joints and the core. Then out of that “no,” that stability, can come another “yes,” a physical (and perhaps spiritual) expansion, one that is more grounded, more realistic and has been tested by life’s challenges. It is too late for the people who suffered and died in that sweat lodge. But it’s time for all of us to insist that anyone who presumes to take on the mantle of “spiritual teacher” must honor the importance of “no” – as much as the aspiration of “yes.”

Katchie Ananda is a Bay Area yoga teacher. Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/10/26/EDF41A9U14.DTL#ixzz0WQ7HllKq

In “The Image of the Performing Body” Mullis considers how the body is transformed into an aesthetically expressive medium. Though his work specifically considers dancers and actors, he provides useful explanations of experiences of embodiment that can be applied to the practice of yoga. Mullis explains the process through which the body acquires physical skill using the notions of “body schema” and “body image.” Mullis cites the work of Shaun Gallagher who defines body image as “a complex set of intentional states and dispositions—perceptions, beliefs, and attitudes—in which the intentional object is one’s own body” (2008:62). Mullis breaks body image into three components: body percept, body concept, and body affect. “Perception gives me a sense of the condition of my body at any point in time, while conceptions build upon perceptual content and allow one to understand the nature of one’s embodiment” (63).  Mullis also highlights how body image, particularly body percept and concept are highly influenced by cultural and societal standards of beauty, fitness, health. The ways in which our bodies are “invested with emotion” is also culturally influenced, claims Mullis (63).

Body schema as first defined by Head and Holmes in 1911, is the subconscious postural model of the body. “Body scheme functions by continually comparing the body’s present posture to those held in the immediate past. That is, at the preconscious level, schema provides a standard against which changes in posture can be judged” (63).  Mullis gives the example of moving to answer the phone. The body automatically knows how to get up and move to the phone, if you had to think about how to make every little movement you’d never get to the phone on time. Body schema provides the following three functions. First, input is the way that information about posture and movement are processed through balance, joints, skin, and muscular and kinetic sources. Second, output is the motor programs both innate (reflexes) and learned (such as riding a bike) that are elicited by the environment—just like riding a bike; they come back to you when you need them. Third is the translation of visual information to proprioceptive information. For example, if a teacher demonstrates a movement, and says do it like this, the body can imitate. This function of body schema is essential for communication.

Mullis explains that though body schema is normally preconscious, it can enter consciousness. This happens when the body is learning a new motor skill. Mullis quotes Gallagher to illustrate, “the dancer or athlete who practices long and hard to make deliberate movements proficient so that movement is finally accomplished by the body without conscious reflection uses a consciousness of bodily movement to train the body-schematic performance. Proprioceptive information (especially visual and kinesthetic) is used to develop schemata that, in time, will be automatically elicited by the environment.” (CITE!!)

Body schema feeds into body image, providing information for its formation (64).

In yoga, as in dance or performance, students are taught to be more skillful in their movements by becoming conscious of subconscious postural schemas and training the body to do something different. A change in body schema can affect the body image, one’s conscious experience of the body. Mullis (67) cites several studies that demonstrate that individuals who engage a high degree of physical activity tend to be more positive about their bodies. In both performance art and yoga, the body is transformed into an expressive instrument and a higher quality of perceptual and affective experience of the body may be developed.

Effortless performance (69): Talking about how performers communicate physically- communicative gesture is contingent upon interaction between performers and audience. The movement itself is meaningless, but because a communicate space (72) is developed meaning is assigned. Same in a yoga class- a teacher creates a communicative space where movements and expressions are assigned meaning. (“like your inner body be bright like the sun in shining in your heart”). Yoga teachers ask students to convey a certain attitude through their movement, which the instructor assigns- having fingers open wide conveys an attitude of radiance.

Mullis concludes that performance arts (and I think yoga too) “entail transforming the body by consciously developing the functions of the body schema…. Ultimately, this transformation entails using intention to consciously develop functions that normally take place below the level of consciousness” (74). > this makes body become an aesthetically valuable (for performance arts). For yoga, I might argue that this is how the practice becomes a vehicle of personal and spiritual transformation.

“Body schema acts as the intermediary between conscious intent and realization of specific goals” (74)