“the artist is none other than he who unlearns what he has learned in order to know himself.” —e. e. cummings

Variation of Dhanurāsana (bow pose)

  - - “In the wholeheartedness of concentration, world and self begin to cohere. With that state comes an enlarging: of what may be known, what may be felt, what may be done.” -Jane Hirschfield - -

“Only ceaseless practice and endless striving for perfection engenders skill, understanding and wisdom and forms the subtle body of the ineffable which is art.” -Yogācārya B.K.S. Iyengar, Art of Yoga, 1985.

In Iyengar Yoga we explore our aspects of individuality  to train ourselves to prepare to experience the universal within (seeing beyond the confines of individuality), ultimately to serve as the instrument of that understanding.

Reaching out

 “Art like prayer is a hand outstretched in the darkness, seeking for some touch of grace which will transform it into a hand that bestows gifts,” Franz Kafka

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Utthita Pārśvakonāsana. Extended Side Angle Pose

-It’s maybe not possible to put into words my gratitude for the teachings of Yogācārya B.K.S. Iyengar. How to  explain the life that was before and the living that is now? Poets craft with words; his teaching was art— instructions, sequences, postures, lessons aligning with the bliss of the soul...                  —Jennifer Beaumont 

(Excerpts From) TO BEGIN WITH, THE SWEET GRASS —

... Behold, I say—behold

the reliability and the finery and the teachings

of this gritty earth gift. ....

Look, and look again.

This world is not just a little thrill for the eyes.

It’s more than bones.

It’s more than the delicate wrist with its personal pulse.

It’s more than the beating of the single heart.

It’s praising.

It’s giving until the giving feels like receiving.

You have a life—just imagine that!

You have this day, and maybe another, and maybe still another. .... -

What I loved in the beginning, I think, was mostly myself.

Never mind that I had to, since somebody had to.

That was many years ago.

Since then I have gone out from my confinements, though with difficulty.

I mean the ones that thought to rule my heart.

I cast them out, I put them on the mush pile.

They will be nourishment somehow (everything is nourishment somehow or another). And I have become the child of the clouds, and of hope.

I have become the friend of the enemy, whoever that is.

I have become older and, cherishing what I have learned, I have become younger.

And what do I risk to tell you this, which is all I know?

Love yourself. Then forget it. Then, love the world. —Mary Oliver

Willpower

 “Willpower is nothing but willingness to do.” Yogācārya BKS Iyengar

Waking and rising in the dark

Traveling through the cold rain

To practice, to study yoga

grows will-power.

Instead of seeing the difficulties

as what’s stopping progress

can we envision how they strengthen and teach us and shape our path? -

“The art of seeing has to be learned,” -Marguerite Duras -

“There is an art to learning as well as teaching” -Yogācārya BKS Iyengar

Looking where we are

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 “One doesn’t arrive — in words or in art — by necessarily knowing where one is going. In every work of art something appears that does not previously exist, and so, by default, you work from what you know to what you don’t know. You may set out for New York but you may find yourself as I did in Ohio. You may set out to make a sculpture and find that time is your material. You may pick up a paint brush and find that your making is not on canvas or wood but in relations between people. You may set out to walk across the room but getting to what is on the other side might take ten years. You have to be open to all possibilities and to all routes — circuitous or otherwise.

But not knowing, waiting and finding — though they may happen accidentally, aren’t accidents. They involve work and research. Not knowing isn’t ignorance. (Fear springs from ignorance.) Not knowing is a permissive and rigorous willingness to trust, leaving knowing in suspension, trusting in possibility without result, regarding as possible all manner of response. The responsibility of the artist … is the practice of recognizing”. —Ann Hamilton

The study of Iyengar Yoga teaches  how to solve imbalances in practice. Starting practice is the act of looking at what needs care and attention. After driving an hour to bring children to school, the two legs do not behave equally in standing poses. Pushing a pedal for a period of time changes the way the two hips behave in the pelvis. Muscular skeletal imbalances can be addressed in standing poses. Yesterday the difference between the behavior of the two legs was very clear at the start of a practice in Virabhadrasana II. Aligning the hips in the pelvis meant perfecting the āsana on both sides, until they were brought into rhythm and harmony with the posture. Eventually the imbalances resolve to be nearly negligible. The practice of standing poses prepares the yoga practitioner for anything—balances and prepares the muscular-skeletal body; the consciousness is attuned, attentive, sensitive, watchful to every nuance of the now. From a state of balance the potential for exploration into new space expands.

Stillness in the storm

Yogah Citta Vrtti Nirodhah. “Yoga is the stilling of the movements of consciousness.” Patañjali Yoga Sūtra I.2 🕉.

Marichyasana II — Sage Marichi’s Pose variation 2 

“Art has something to do with the achievement of stillness in the midst of chaos. A stillness which characterizes prayer, too, in the eye of the storm… Art has something to do with an arrest of attention in the midst of distraction. …. Art attempts to find in the universe, in matter as well as in the facts of life, what is fundamental, enduring, essential.” —Saul Bellow. “It is very important for the artist to gauge his position aright, to realize that he has a duty to his art and to himself, that he is not king of the castle but rather a servant of a nobler purpose. He must search deeply into his own soul, develop and tend it, so that his art has something to clothe, and does not remain a glove without a hand. The artist must have something to say, for mastery over form is not his goal but rather the adapting of form to its inner meaning.” Kandinsky

In Iyengar Yoga, the practice and art of posture (āsana) is the work of drawing the senses and consciousness away from outward (and inner) distractions, to become absorbed completely in the actions of aligning all the aspects of being in the posture, realizing a state of stillness and oneness.

Yoga is Union

 “Out beyond ideas of wrongdoing and rightdoing there is a field. I’ll meet you there.” Rumi

Philosopher Jacob Needleman’s abiding assertion: “There is always something more than two opposing truths. The whole truth always includes a third part, which is the reconciliation.”

“Āum as a whole stands for the realization that liberates the human spirit from the confines of body, mind, intellect and ego. By meditating upon Āum, the sādhaka remains steady, pure, and faithful.” Yogācārya B.K.S. Iyengar, Light on Yoga Sūtras of Patañjali, commentary on sūtra 1.27

Awakening the Spine

For children, backbends come with ease and bliss. For adults, so much work is required to gain back that freedom. The effort needed may feel unnatural and frightening.When we see the child move and inhabit their body naturally, easily, joyfully with every expression of being doesn’t that inspire us to seek and rediscover that which has been forgotten and neglected?

Toni Morrison wrote, “Anything dead coming back to life hurts.”  On the other side of that pain, is freedom. Keep going. ❤️

Dynamic Contemplation in Iyengar Yoga

Standing poses are the foundation of this innovative method of classical yoga, named for B.K.S. Iyengar. In some form, variation and degree, I practice them daily. When practiced with utmost attention they awaken and tune one’s instrument. Standing poses develop strength, stability, balance, agility, alignment and the ability to see all the parts of one’s self at once.

“Actions mirror a man’s personality better than his words... The yogi conquers the body by the practice of āsanas and makes it a fit vehicle for the spirit... A soul without a body is like bird deprived of its power to fly.” —Yogācārya B.K.S. Iyengar, Light on Yoga, 1966. 

“.The spirit, like the body, can be strengthened and developed by frequent exercise. Just as the body, if neglected, grows weaker and finally impotent, so the spirit perishes if untended. And for this reason it is necessary for the artist to know the starting point for the exercise of his spirit.” —Kandinsky

 “All great art contains at its center contemplation, a dynamic contemplation.” —Susan Sontag

Prasārita Pādottānāsana I — “intense stretch of the spread wide legs” pose, straight arm stage)