Tag: yoga

Ma India, take me home

by L. Valdez Karl

As I’ve mentioned time and again on this blog, ever since I returned from my first trip to India in 2005 there has never been a day that I do not think of India. it can be a child’s face that flashes through my mind, or something I learned in my yoga classes there, or a smell that makes me remember where I was when I first smelled that smell. a soap or a spice will bring me back. even the clothes that I bought in India still smell “like India.” I brought back a supply of my favorite shampoo and sometimes I sit on my bathroom floor, open up a bottle and sniff…sometimes I cry on my bathroom floor.

I came across the blog of a professional photographer — the photographs of India and Indians are beautiful, so I’ve posted this video he took in Chennai in 2006. I’ve been to Chennai three times and I’ve never visited Marina Beach. I’ve been on the beach in Pondicherry and Rameswaram but never Chennai….next time.

I want to, need to, return to India so badly. now that I am going through some rough emotional times I think even more about being in India, maybe for 6 months out of the year. India is the only place that heals my soul. an Indian friend told me that my heart is calling me to India because I am missing something here that I need very badly.

a regular reader of this blog and his wife will study yoga at the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram for one month later this year and then travel to my favorite temple towns. email discussions of their itinerary make my heart ache — I was in Tamil Nadu in January and I can still feel the temple ground beneath my bare feet, the sun on my bare arms, the smell of jasmine in my hair, and the touch of shakti all around me as I sat in temples. even though I returned from India this year sicker than a mangy Indian street dog, I was home less than a week when I started dreaming those Tamil Nadu dreams.

I want to go home. jai Kali ma, take me home.



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bhakti required

by L. Valdez Karl

I find that the longer I practice, the longer I teach, and the more I meditate, the more I am drawn to bhakti yoga. maybe I should say that because of all of the above, my own bhakti has grown exponentially. I call myself Kali’s girl and when I was at a Krishna Das kirtan, he chanted the word “Kali” in a Durga mantra and at that moment it literally felt like I was hit right between my eyebrows and the tears started to flow. that’s bhakti. mantra chanting and kirtan are forms of bhakti yoga. I know a devout American Murugan bhakta who has never done one asana in his life, but he is a bhakti yogi.

I believe that bhakti, for the most part, is missing in Americanized yoga, at least in most of the classes I attend. I know that even chanting the single sound of OM can scare some people away from yoga — I’ve seen students leave classes if the teacher chants. I always open and close my classes with meditation and at the end recite the Four Immeasurables and chant OM MANI PEDME HUM. I would not be true to my heart if I did not teach this way.

So I give you the website Bhakti Collective. The Bhakti Collective is “composed of persons of various backgrounds with a common interest in bhakti, India’s tradition of devotional yoga. It is a non-profit organization based in New York, which serves as a medium for the exploration and sharing of the culture, philosophy and practice of bhakti.”

The Bhakti Collective has many interesting articles including this one, a critique on a Yoga Journal article about bhakti. in it, Kaustubha Das quotes Dr. Robert Svoboda’s feelings about bhakti in western yoga:

“Some Western yogis dabble in bhakti yoga through an occasional prayer or kirtan. But if you’re a serious practitioner looking to find union with the Divine, a more rigorous practice is in order.” Svoboda says the path of devotion involves total dedication and surrender.

Svoboda agrees that it’s good to sing bhajana (Sanskirt hymns) to get into a new space. But he cautions against thinking you can really engage in bhakti yoga by occasionally joining in a kirtan. “That in itself won’t be sufficient to have a transformative effect that will penetrate into the deepest and darkest parts of your being”, he says.

“I don’t think most people in the yoga community have a concept of the degree of emotional depth and intensity and texture that is necessary for bhakti yoga really to flower”.

Get out of your yoga body and get into some bhakti.

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yoga economics: a student’s perspective

by L. Valdez Karl


This post is an email I received from a devoted reader. his thoughts, his opinion, your food for thought…

“I was interested in, and moved by, your posts on teaching. I hesitated to respond on the site ’cause as you know I’m a student, not a yoga teacher. But even though I am an off-the-charts creative artist type I have labored in the upper echelons of the corporate world long enough to have picked up plenty of business smarts by osmosis, and so I often wonder how it is that yoga in America has become such a lose/lose proposition – economically.

Teachers, unless they own the studio they teach in, make a meager income. And as you say, elite teachers usually do stop teaching led classes at some point if they can (Tias LIttle is a recent high profile example; the great Richard Freeman still does, but he does own the studio and certainly makes most of his income from TT’s and DVD/CD sales). On the student end, to take Boulder, where we lived until just recently, as an example, it is very expensive to be a serious student: $150 a month for an “unlimited” membership, on average, at a good studio, or you might get your per class cost down to $11-12 if you buy the costliest punch card. So for us as a couple taking 3 classes a week $66 a week or $264 a month for steady instruction – plus workshops or trainings several times a year.

The most expensive of the many, many health clubs in Boulder costs $60-80 a month for a couple’s membership and while there are lots of issues with “health club yoga” the fact of the matter is that nearly all of the top teachers in Boulder do teach in those clubs – it is a necessity to make ends meet and offers the kind of predictable income that teaching at the yoga studios does not.

It is just heartbreaking as sincere students to show up at a class in, say, summer when studios in Boulder are slowest and be 2 of 3-4 people at a class to be taught by a teacher with 30 years of experience and many trips to India under her belt, knowing she will net $18-24 for nearly two hours of her time. We offer dana on top (invariably refused), profuse thanks…..and meanwhile Bikrams and Core Power across town are jammed. And this is in one of the meccas of meccas. Yoga Workshop (Richard’s place) would probably be more popular, but with him lecturing on impermanence and death, on how the body is only a vehicle, on confronting our kleshas through the knots in our body-minds – in short, ’cause he and the others there are guilty of teaching and praticing actual yoga, many come once and then go where there’s music and a “real” workout.

I don’t know the solution. For us as people who chose to live cheaply in order to have more time for yoga and meditation practice it has come down to spending our limited funds on periodic private classes with a teacher well-schooled in the later teachings of Krishnamacharya plus periodic weekend and longer immersions. Led classes are now an occasional but much-appreciated luxury for us; we have had to develop a personal practice. That maturing is good, but I’d be lying if we said we didn’t miss the group energy and sangha that comes with more times together. But as you (and Desikachar and others) point out yoga was traditionally taught with a single student, or small handful, sitting at the feet of one teacher, with students and teacher both giving totally of themselves. Maybe that’s the only model that’s meant to endure.”

Thanks, K, for being such a loyal reader of this blog and for sharing your thoughts. much metta to you….peace, love, and hugs.

I know through my site meter that many of you have read my latest posts on yoga teacher pay and gratitude. a few of you have commented and I would be interested to read more of your thoughts on those topics and on this post, from both students’ and teachers’ perspectives.

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dana, gratitude, and love offerings accepted

by L. Valdez Karl


As a practicing Buddhist, I’m all about dana (pronounced “donna”) — “unattached and unconditional generosity, giving and letting go.” that is how I make payment at Spirit Rock Meditation Center for my Mindfulness Yoga and Meditation training.

in my last post, bindifry made some very pithy comments about students showing gratitude to their teachers, and I agree 150% with her:

“part of the yoga path is gratitude. it is very important to express that to your teacher.

something most yoga students do not understand. often we are left quite empty. many students never even say “thank you” after a class. it’s sad, really.

I study with an amazing Aussie teacher. part of her teaching is a gratitude circle at the end of the cycle. everyone sits in a circle and must show gratitude to the teacher.

and when you receive shakti from your guru, the respectable thing to do is kneel before him and touch his feet. it’s dharma.”

“I just find it quite alarming how many students, rather than saying “thank you” instead say things like “why didn’t i get more adjustments? i paid my money just like everyone else”

sorry, but yoga teachers are also human beings…people need to be educated about etiquette. other cultures do not have this issue at all, as teachers are considered the highest form of professions.”

“yoga teachers are people like the students and that for students to say “thanks” goes a long way, even though i have learned to live without the gratitude. students don’t tell their teachers thanks or even acknowledge them as their teachers far too often. they do not know that gratitude, like santosha, is part of yoga.“

“everyone sits in a circle and must show gratitude to the teacher” — how many of you can honestly say you would feel comfortable doing that? I know that many Americans have a hard time wrapping their mind around the idea of their yoga teacher being their “guru”, but that’s Ego, pure and simple. and fear. “guru” is Sanskrit for teacher, someone who has “great knowledge, wisdom and authority in a certain area, and uses it to guide others.” nothing more, nothing less.

I believe that lack of gratitude or lack of acknowledgment is definitely an American/Western thing. it’s not that way in India. this American yoga teacher has no problem whatsoever touching the feet of my teacher, an Indian from Chennai who was an original trustee of the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram, when he comes to teach in Chicago. I wrote about my own feelings about being a good student here.

so it gets my thong in a knot when I write about pay for yoga teachers and I’m told to “be content” or have “santosha”, just accept what is given or not given to you. I DO have santosha, in fact, I feel I am blessed to be able to teach yoga. but like bindifry says, yoga teachers are also human. think about that.

I am blessed to be teaching now at a studio where if two students show up, they thank me for being there, for driving 45 minutes and spending my time with them. this is in stark contrast to the studio where I used to teach where the upper middle-class women had a huge sense of entitlement.

support your local yoga teacher and show her or him some love. that’s all I’m saying.

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why do you want to teach yoga?

by L. Valdez Karl


I’m just throwing the question out there.  I know why I teach, but why do YOU want to teach yoga?

I suppose this goes back to the “how much is a yoga teacher worth?” question, and for those of us who don’t want to return to the corporate life, yoga teaching is my vocation, my avocation, and my personal dharma.  I know more than a few teachers who also do massage or another holistic practice or their yoga teaching is a “sideline” and they rely on another’s income (and health insurance.)

I know very few yoga teachers who totally support themselves by only teaching yoga. because of a life-changing decision I have made, I may have to get a part-time job.  but I know I will never stop teaching yoga and Buddha/Kali/Shiva willing, I will do this the rest of my life, either in the US or in India.  I still need to finish my Mindfulness Yoga and Meditation training at Spirit Rock, and in October I start Phoenix Rising Yoga Therapy training. in late 2009 I plan on living two months in an ashram in South India studying yoga therapy with a swami.  this will require me to give up two steady yoga gigs, or at least get subs for them. as I mentioned in another post, for those of us who do these lengthy trainings, there is no guarantee we will have yoga jobs when we get back. this is the reality of the yoga biz. but this is my commitment to myself, to immerse myself as much as I can — at my age I have a lot less time on this earth than if I would have started this path 30 or even 20 years ago.

everything I earn gets plowed right back into my yoga biz (I’m incorporated.) I am over 50 and this is my life plan and nothing will keep me from it. I know this is my path and I have given it up to the Universe to follow this path for the rest of my life.

what will you give up to be a yoga teacher?

I live in the Chicago area where there is a plethora of yoga teacher training programs all costing beaucoup bucks. this is where the yoga money is made, in teacher trainings and offering workshops.  a well-known American yoga teacher who was on the same retreat that I was told me that she rarely teaches group classes anymore, that she makes her money on her branded teacher trainings and traveling the world doing workshops.

when I was certified in 2002 there were only four training programs in Chicago that I knew of.  now almost every major studio both in the city and suburbs, and some not-so-major, have teacher training programs that train you in “their” brand of yoga.  and of course there are the weekend programs (become a yoga teacher in 16 hours!) and the online yoga teacher training courses where voila!…anyone with a computer can become a yoga teacher.  of course, not everyone who does a training wants to be a teacher, some do it to deepen their yoga knowledge.

for a while I thought of starting my own teacher training program, which would actually be unique in my area because I would incorporate yoga therapy and Buddhism, no other local training offers that. but I decided I don’t want to be tied down with that right now…my next two years are going to be for my own yoga sadhana culminating in the Kumbh Mela in Haridwar, India in 2010.

so where are y’all going to teach?  after spending thousands of dollars on your training will you be happy making $4 or $5 or $6 when one student shows up to the studio?  I made $12 again last night. I used to teach at a studio where students paid $5 for their first class and the owner did not pay the teachers for those students because she would “lose money.”  some months I had so many first-timers in my classes I lost over $100 in monthly income. I’m not crying about this, this is the reality of the yoga biz.

people want yoga for the same fees that they are paying with their gym memberships. and everybody — every spa, chiropractic center, gym, and physical therapy office — wants in on what they view as big bucks to be made in yoga. the yoga biz in America — a gazillion dollar business according to Yoga Journal.

but who’s making the dough and where’s the dharma?

I have a friend who’s convinced that everyone doing teacher trainings nowadays are delusional, that they’ve all drunk the Yoga Journal kool-aid about becoming a yoga teacher.

have you?

the price we pay, part 2: how much is a yoga teacher worth?

by L. Valdez Karl


This is another topic that Yoga Journal won’t touch: how much is a yoga teacher worth in this American consumerist society? forget for a minute what our emotional or spiritual value is to our students (actually priceless), but what is our monetary value? in a culture where fitness instructors never have to step foot inside a yoga studio and can get “certified” online as yoga teachers, are yoga teachers now a dime a dozen?

My post “the price we pay” gave rise to some interesting comments:

“have had several conversations with other yoga teachers recently about how they want to earn x amount per class or they won’t teach. Got me to thinking: if I can pay my bills on less than that, and I am maybe helping some people, sharing my knowledge of yoga a bit, isn’t that enough? We aren’t supermodels, we are social workers…”

*******

“i thought going to india for 11 months, teaching in japan and thailand, australia, bali…i thought all of that would make a difference. it actually hurt me. i make less money than ever. no one is impressed with my resume. it means nothing to anyone.

except for me and the handful of students that i am actually reaching. that’s all we can hope for. that’s just how the world is. anyone can teach yoga. we’re indespensable. you are fooling yourself if you actually think you are anything more.

still, i would do it all the same. for me at least.”

*******

“I think yoga teachers are a “dime a dozen” now.

Point – Teacher Training programs. This has become a cyclical conundrum perhaps? An organization decided yoga teachers should be ‘certified’. Studio’s/gyms/fitness centers decided this was a good idea. So, in order to teach you have to be certified and there are a whole slew of students needing those inital hours to become certified because the studios require it…see where it goes?…”

*******

bindifry said this about yoga teaching in her blog: “…and i reached another person. i turned them on to yoga. they turned me on to them. and for that moment i had a purpose.” to which I responded: “yup….that’s what it all comes down to, isn’t it? it’s not about the money, it’s not about some sick inversion to impress or intimidate people, it’s not about lululemon pants….it’s just about the yoga.” and bindi said: “well said….yoga is for everyone to enjoy. yoga teachers should spread it around to who wants and needs it regardless of their economic situation. it’s our duty. if we all did that, we could alleviate much suffering in the world. teaching yoga is the ultimate “green” action. how many yoga teachers teach without the thought of dollar signs? i do not know many.”

Nadine believes that yoga teachers are social workers. bindifry said that teaching yoga is the ultimate green action. I say that teaching yoga is a pure expression of the bodhisattva path. and with my private students, I’m also a psychologist. like bindifry, I’m still going to India to study even though it does not make me one dime extra as a yoga teacher.

I truly believe all of the above. however, I still need to pay the bills and buy food and gas. and I pay the same for food and gas as the person does who makes $200,000 a year. last year I made about $10,000 teaching yoga. I’m not crying about it, it’s merely a statement of fact. it was my choice 10 years ago to stop working for lawyers after 20 years (and making damn good money) and become a yoga teacher. our lives are determined by our choices, not by our circumstances.

I’ve been struggling a lot with this money question as I am in the midst of a life-changing decision that will literally affect how and where I can afford to live. as Nadine said, I know more than a few teachers who won’t teach if they make below X dollar amount — and I am one of them. over the years I’ve invested over $10,000 (probably closer to $15,000) in my training — this does not include travel to India to study. I also know some yoga teachers who’ve been teaching 20+ years who won’t teach a workshop for under $500 even if only three students sign up — they have their minimum show-up price. I believe that to teach a class under a certain dollar amount devalues yoga and puts it on the same level as an aerobics class.

one of the places I teach is a yoga studio where I get paid by the person…so one day I make $12, another day I make $60 per class. I also teach privately, one-on-one, and my prices in my area may range from $75 to $100 per session. what a teacher charges for private yoga in the United States is dependent upon the geographic area, what the market will bear. I feel that prices for private yoga are comparable to getting a massage or a physical therapy or chiropractic or acupuncture session — it’s all about holistic health modalities. unfortunately, most people don’t understand this. I’ve found that people (at least in my area) don’t “get” what private yoga/yoga therapy is all about, not when they only know health club yoga (and I’m not dissing teachers who teach at gyms or health clubs, so don’t get your yoga shorts in a knot.) there IS a difference between yoga one-on-one and yoga in a group class. yoga one-on-one is the the traditional way — Krishnamacharya did not teach Iyengar or Jois or his son Desikachar in a group class.

however, my favorite class to teach is one where I don’t get paid at all — I teach yoga and meditation at a domestic violence shelter. I’ve been teaching there for five years and it’s my hope to start a yoga therapy program there funded by grant money. some day.

I know of yoga studios where the owners have yet to pay themselves, the studios literally don’t make money, they just break even. from a sound business standpoint — and let’s get real, yoga is definitely big business in America– that situation can’t continue forever. my yogini friend in Oakland, California tells me I should move to northern California, that I’d be turning people away, that people can’t get enough yoga out there. in the suburbs of Chicago, yoga studios struggle to survive.

The Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram where I study in India has no qualms whatsoever about charging westerners much more money than it does its Indian students. teachers such as Gary Kraftsow and David Life and Sharon Gannon charge at least $8,000 for their teacher trainings here. so why, as not-famous-no-Yoga Journal-cover everyday yoga teachers, are we not supposed to make a livable wage?

what’s a yoga teacher to do? this is not India where I can go live in a cave and spend my days meditating, living off the kindness of my devotees. while I’m Kali’s girl, I’m still waiting for that Goddess-in-Residence yoga gig somewhere that my gal pal in Nepal told me I need to find. this is America where it currently costs $35-$40 to fill my gas tank to get to the studio to make $12 for a 90 minute class.

so it is a fine balance between the bhakti and the bucks, between the dharma and the dough. I don’t want to make what a supermodel makes — I just want to be able to afford to live and do what I love to do.

support your local yoga teacher.

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the price we pay

by L. Valdez Karl

(KYM, 2005)

Yoga teachers need to continuously fill their cups with yoga knowledge in order to teach, at least I believe so. in this way we feed our students, and you can not feed others unless you feed yourself. you can not nourish others unless you nourish yourself.

So yoga teachers go to workshops, other teachers’ classes, more teacher trainings, or to India. there is so much out there to support our practice and our teaching is fed by our personal practice. how can we teach effectively if we are not continually learning and going deeper into the ancient teachings? again, just my opinion. I’m not saying we all have to go to India, some yoga teachers never do, but at least do one training or workshop a year to feed yourself. I can not imagine teaching without taking classes or workshops to rejuvenate me, my teaching would get as stale as day old bread. my teacher Srivatsa Ramaswami studied with Krishnamacharya for over 30 years, so there ya go.

As for me, I need to go to India, that’s my nourishment, that’s what informs my practice. I’ve studied three times at the Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram and I am currently investigating an ashram in south India where I can get personalized training in yoga therapy. I would be gone at least two months, which means my private students won’t have me and I’ll have to find subs for my classes or cancel them entirely. the next time I go to India for two or three months, I have no idea whether I will have any teaching job anywhere when I return — I teach at a studio and at two community colleges. teaching yoga is all I do to pay my bills.

My private students always feel sad when I am gone so long (I stay in India at least for one month), but I tell them that I am also doing this for them because I will become a better teacher (at least I hope so!) however, studio owners and operators of other venues sometimes don’t see it this way.

a case in point is Cara Jepsen, a yoga teacher who I know slightly from the Chicago Yoga Center. she is an astangi and is in India right now studying in Mysore. I’ve read her blog a lot and used it to prep for my first trip to India in 2005.

Cara writes: “This time, one of the venues where I teach cannot guarantee I will have classes when I return from India. I don’t blame them, but this could affect up to 1/2 of my income. Ouch!”

That’s a sad thing. a yoga studio is a business just like any other business but there’s a way to conduct business that is more mindful and holistic, shall we say. and frankly, some yoga studio owners shouldn’t be in the yoga business.

If I had a teacher who studies as much as Cara or I do, or is so committed and passionate about yoga, it would never cross my mind to not welcome them back home to teach. why would I not want such a knowledgeable teacher to return to my studio to teach? why would I not want her students to benefit from that knowledge?

Are yoga teachers just a dime a dozen? does a studio owner think one teacher is as good as another so if one leaves, another can’t be too far behind? that one teacher of a certain skill set is easily replaceable by another?

If a yoga teacher is on “sabbatical” to further their path which makes them a better teacher, get a substitute teacher just like in a school system. there are so many yoga teacher training programs in the Chicagoland area I have no idea where all these newbie teachers are going to teach — that’s your sub market right there. I have a friend who is a substitute school teacher and she works every day — public school teachers take LOTS of time off and no one tells them they won’t have a job if they take too much time off. yoga teachers should be given the same respect.

So for a studio owner or the operator of any other venue to tell a yoga teacher that they might not have a job when the get back…that attitude boggles my mind. talk about putting some bad energy out into the universe.

On the other hand, if a studio owner tells me that they don’t want me to come back after I’ve studied not only to improve myself but also for THEIR business, that tells me that I need to move on, that this is not the place for me and my talents, and that I am destined for bigger and better things. all things happen for a reason.

“If your teacher does not have the correct foundation, how is he able to teach students?…You pratice yoga as a spiritual practice, not in order to become a teacher. Yoga should be like eating very day; it should be like, without yoga you cannot survive.”

A “correct foundation.” that’s the training that we do to continue doing what we do. and without my training I could not survive as a yoga teacher. but that’s me.

If any of you reading this are thinking of becoming a yoga teacher for the money, think again — that shouldn’t even be your motivation in the first place — “many yoga teachers say they don’t make enough money teaching yoga. ‘Then do something else.’ It is your karma to do. Don’t expect anything from it.”

We don’t do this for the money, but I pay the same amount for gas and food as y’all do. and it would be nice to know that I will have a job to come back to.

We all pay a price for our dharma, isn’t it?

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the retreat, part 2: Yoga Dawg goes legit!

by L. Valdez Karl

I have finally found some time to write a a bit about my second 10 day retreat for my Mindfulness Yoga and Meditation training at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Woodacre, California. You can read about the first retreat in October, 2007 here.

We had the same teachers from last year except for Stephen Cope from Kripalu. I missed him because I love his style. In his place was Chip Hartranft who wrote The Yoga-Sutra of Patanjali: A New Translation with Commentary which is the version of the Sutras we are using for this training. In his book Chip skillfully shows how the buddha-dharma can not be separated from Patanjali’s yoga philosophy.

My interview with a yoga teacher was with Chip and I loved his style as much as I loved Stephen Cope’s. Chip is sweet and down-to-earth and the real deal in my opinion. We were both sorry that our 15 minute talk seemed to end so quickly. I look forward to seeing him next year as he will be one of the teachers leading asana practice, along with Jill Satterfield.

The guest yoga teachers for this retreat were my teacher, Sarah Powers, and Judith Lasater. It was good to see Sarah as she is my teacher for yin yoga together with Paul Grilley when they come to Chicago. We did a yin and yang practice with Sarah and restorative yoga with Judith Lasater. I will say that after spending two days with Judith and her style of yoga, I wanted to leave the retreat — more on Judith’s classes in my next post.

Anne Cushman, who wrote Enlightenment for Idiots (see my sidebar), is one of the coordinators of this training and she led us in classes and also gave a talk on yoga. Although it was a mostly silent retreat, I thanked her for sending me her book and she told me she was going to quote YogaDawg in her talk — so that’s how YogaDawg became legit, his book quoted at a yoga and meditation training. I was amused when I saw students furiously writing down his words about yoga students, and I wondered whether they realized it’s yoga satire….after all, Lindia is YogaDawg’s evil yogini sister, bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha (that was supposed to be an evil laugh.)

Anne opened her discussion by posing the question: how does asana practice help mindfulness practice? she said because everything — meditation, pranayama, Patanjali’s and the Buddha’s words — are used in the service of waking up. she said that yoga was never supposed to be for anything other than awakening and seeing the world clearly as it is. that is enlightenment.

in the retreat asana practice cultivates a deeper exploration of our emotions, mind states, and body and breath. we use our asana practice to explore our relief from suffering, to bring us ease, and to explore the Four Noble Truths in relationship to our practice and therefore our life. yoga is life — Krishnamacharya knew this when he said “breath is central to yoga because it is central to life and yoga is about life.” practice is life and our life is the practice. yoga has the toolbox to bring us blissful states but the problem comes when we think that’s the only thing yoga can do, i.e., when we use yoga as a quick fix. what do we do when there is no quick fix? what are the larger principles we can bring to our asana practice?

Anne named four things:

1. bring the quality of metta (loving-kindness) or self-compassion to your practice. she said that sometimes metta was more important than mindfulness because we are judgmental about our practice. we forget that we are already complete and as yogins we have too much internal criticism about our practice. when we practice self-compassion our mindfulness will flourish naturally.

2. remember to use asana practice AS IT IS; know the difference between goal and intention. be present and develop a new relationship with WHAT IS. be willing to be present in your practice and transformation will occur. use your asana practice as a counterpose to the culture at large where we are pressured to constantly and continually become “better” because it is never good enough to be just as we are.

3. don’t use your asana practice as a way to support your conditioning — use it to counterbalance and transform your conditioning. Anne gave the example of Type A personalities always doing the same type of practice which supports their conditioning instead of transforming them into a less agitated Type B. if you live your life in constant agitation, don’t do a practice that will agitate you even more. be flexible with your practice, not dogmatic. As Jack Kornfield writes in A Path With Heart, mental flexibility is one of the marks of spiritual maturity. embrace the yin along with the yang.

4. most importantly, use your asana practice as a means to get in touch with impermanence. our bodies are changing every day even though we act like they aren’t. all of us will die yet we live as if we won’t. use your asana practice to recognize the changes in your body while at the same time celebrating it and appreciating it.

Anne reminded us that our asana practice is a constant dance between form and formlessness. as yogins we devote ourselves to the study of form and to being healthy, but at the same time we must realize that the forms we turn our bodies into are impermanent, one asana flows into another, as do the seasons of our lives. embrace the two truths of form and formlessness at the same time and always remember that it’s just a pose.

This second retreat was a mixed bag for me, good, bad, and indifferent, yet I experienced some epiphanies. I used to tell my students that a wise-ass Buddhist once said, life sucks, but suffering is optional. I now realize that life is suffering, pain is optional — big difference, think about it.

During a meditation practice on forgiveness, I finally forgave the alcoholic yoga studio owner, I no longer feel the rage. actually, the forgiveness was ultimately for me, not her. I forgave her for myself, to relieve MY pain over being betrayed. self-compassion is a wonderful thing.

the entire trip was a lesson on impermanence. before the retreat I spent five days with a friend exploring the Big Sur area. as it turned out, we cheated death by a few days because when we left, Big Sur went up in flames. the restaurant and the store that we went to and the Tassjara area, all were engulfed in wildfires that are still being fought.

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I WILL be back

by L. Valdez Karl

As I said on my sister blog, I’m taking a summer hiatus, just like your favorite TV show. and as I said here, I wanted to make myself healthier, and I’m getting there.

insofar as physically healthier, I’ve cut out (mostly! sometimes I still cheat a little) wheat and dairy. and I’m taking thyroid meds twice a day now so my energy has returned. I’ve concentrated more on my own yoga practice instead of thinking about my classes, thinking about what I’m going to teach. frankly, when I teach, I channel asanas, hard to describe I know, but that’s me. of course a teacher still has to think about how they will run a class, but if you don’t feed yourself first with your yoga, how can you feed your students?

my back issue that I’ve been dealing with since last October is being resolved through the work of an awesome chiropractor I found who is not your typical bone-cracker. I’ve never been down with the whole chiropractic idea of someone cracking your neck and everything will be fine. my chiropractor deals with the soft tissue first, so my back right now is about 60-70% better after 5 visits.

and in two weeks I leave for Spirit Rock Meditation Center for the second retreat of my Mindfulness Yoga and Meditation Training. I can’t wait because it is such a fabulous program and I feel blessed for being a part of it. talk about being fed. we got an email that Judith Lasater will do two days of teaching on restorative yoga. she is only one of the great teachers that I will experience. so you know I will have to blog about that.

however, before I get to Spirit Rock, I’m spending about 4 days with my California gal pal. she’s picking me up at the airport and we’re immediately hitting an Indian restaurant for breakfast and to pick up food for our sojourn in the Carmel valley. she got us a room with a kitchenette in a funky little motel that is Sideways style. she has scheduled us for massages at Esalen and we’re hitting the hot springs at Tassajara and we’re going here for some cool shopping. all along the way, we’ll do a little wine tasting, a little art viewing, and talk a lot about Ma India since my friend will be making her 8th trip in the fall.

last but not least, I’m planning my 4th trip to India and I’m putting my intentions out into the universe that it will be a 6 month trip. it’s part of my unending, soulful need to migrate home to Ma India (thanks for those words, sistah sita!) I returned from my last trip sicker than an Indian street dog, but as soon as I started to regain my strength I was dreaming those India dreams again.

the first month will be spent studying yoga therapy at an ashram outside of Mumbai, then after that….I blow with the wind. whatever happens, happens. I’m a woman of a certain age and I try to live my life by asking myself, “if not now, when?” the trip will culminate in the Kumbh Mela at Haridwar in 2010. me, and 40 million of my closest friends all caught up in the power of shakti.

life is good. in the meantime, enjoy the buddha cat.

peace out.

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turn out the lights….

by L. Valdez Karl

…the yoga party is over.

well, at least for a while.

I have decided to stop blogging for the time being, at least for the summer. I will not say when I will pick up the pen again. I took almost all of 2006 off from blogging, and I think it’s time for a break. I will keep the comments enabled only for a week, then shutting them down.

I want to concentrate of getting healthy again….not that anything is seriously wrong with me, but I’m sick and tired of feeling sick and tired. I also want to concentrate on my own personal yoga practice (a yoga therapy practice) and for me that means cutting out extracurricular stuff that keeps my mind off my own practice.

it’s gotten to the point where I’ll be taking a shower and a blog post will pop into my head or I’ll think about how to tweak a sentence or two, and before I know it, I’ve been sitting in front of the computer for three or four hours writing and tweaking. can’t do that anymore. besides, the weather is getting too nice to be sitting inside for any length of time.

so I am doing what the Buddha taught: giving up an attachment — blogging. I have made many cyberfriends in the blogosphere — you know who you are and I will still read your blogs when I check my emails. but I won’t be attached to them.

who knows? if the mood strikes me I may sit down and write another yoga rant, but for right now, it’s all about me and my yoga and getting healthy again — physically, emotionally, and spiritually.

thank you all for reading this blog and for all your beautiful comments…remember to breathe peace, be peace.

may all beings have happiness and the causes of happiness
may all beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering
may all beings never be parted from freedom’s true joy
may all beings dwell in equanimity, free from attachment and aversion

OM MANI PEDME HUM

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