:: YogiSutras: Yoga Blog - Journeys into Yoga ::

Hello this is Isa, I am a little sad that our yoga journey together is
ending, it seemed to fly by. Of all the things I didn’t say because of
supposed tommorows. I am grateful for the opportunity. IT will be cherished
along with all you as my inspiration. Each pose we endured together, always
building on our foundation, took us through to know ourselves better. I have
no doubt that all of you will be great teachers.

Namaste

Yesterday, we spent the afternoon in the Cadaver Lab. This was a much antipated, yet much feared part of our CorePower teacher training. I can honestly say that I went back and forth in my mind dozens of times on whether or not to attend.

But, after everyone said that this was “an experience NOT to miss”, I decided to go.

The first 45 minutes or so, we sat in a nice yoga circle (with little desks), while the Cadaver Lab owner, Todd, made us feel at ease. The cadavers were all part of a Donation program, and he wanted us to understand that they are all there because they willingly donated their bodies to science. Meanwhile, four bodies were lying on the right-hand side of the lab, awaiting our viewings.

All the cadavers had names. I can’t remember the first cadaver’s name, but he was roughly 6 feet tall, and Todd had him “pre-disected” for us. The unveiling of the cadaver was slow, and section by section. After unzipping the bag, and carefully unrolling the towels to show the body, I was caught between complete, utter fascination, curiosity, and amazement, and becoming physically ill. I found myself getting closer to gain the knowledge, and then carefully stepping back when body parts continued to unfold.

We went through the entire front of our first cadaver, exploring the diaphram, muscular system, layers of facia, kidneys, liver, lower intenstine, and more (actually, more than I want to really share). Then, we explored all the muscles of the thigh. It was interesting how thoughtful Todd was of the bodies, and how carefully he could reconstruct the chest cavity after he pulled everything out for our combined educational purposes.

The second cadaver we got to view was “Lady Margaret”. She was a much smaller cadaver, and was placed face-down, so that we could explore the muscular structure of her back. But, that didn’t stick in my mind as much as the female reproductive system that Todd so carefully held up for us to examine. It’s fabulous how the body actually lives, creates life, gives life, and then dies.

And finally, Todd got to show us a “new” cadaver, only five days old. He had just started disecting this cadaver, and showed us his brain, scull, and jaw. Illness was really taking over at that time, so I slowly backed off from learning more.

After our visit, I just could not stop thinking about it. One overwhelming thought is that even though I am not chosing to eat meat regularly, the afternoon sealed my intentions of no longer eating meat.

But more importantly, seeing a body that no longer has a spirit made me respect life, and the short time we have on this earth. These vessels that we are blessed with are absolutely one of the greatest inventions known. How we move with intention, how we take care of our bodies, and what we do with our vessels in our lifetime are completely our choice. Choose to make a difference. Choose love over hate, and choose to take care of ourselves, our fellow living creatures, and the earth that we live in. We can all make a difference.

Namaste

And it’s the beginning or middle of week five of the training, and it is amazing. It is absolutely fantastic. And words cannot even describe how amazing this process really is.

All right, so in all seriousness, this is Brandon Cox and I am the director of teacher training for the CorePower Yoga Studio, Boulder, Colorado. I’m co-directing it with Sierra White. This is my seventh teacher training that we’ve done through Core Power Yoga, and it’s an amazing experience being able to teach teachers, to be able to actually feed people who are hungry for knowledge, and it’s so inspiring to actually be able to share knowledge. What a great experience, and I feel honored and blessed.

S I E R R A

I’m not exactly sure what to talk about on this, besides to introduce myself to the blog, and so many things to talk about in these trainings, which we’re getting close to wrapping up. But let’s talk about love, and it’s an interesting thing to bring into the yoga room. But ultimately, if we don’t love ourselves, then we don’t do programs like teacher training, right? Because we’re not worth becoming a teacher, we’re not good enough.

So, to understand and love, we must first love ourselves, undetstand that we’re good enough to be loved, and that we’re good enough to take care of ourselves. I read something that was inspiring to me, and I’ll read it to you briefly.

It says: “Choosing to follow yourself is a very personal process that takes time. There is no magic wand you can wave to make this just happen, but there is the magic of your intention and the power of your actions. Whether you are taking the time to do activities that you like, speaking to and treating yourself with respect, taking inventory of all your wonderful qualities and accomplishments, or nurturing yourself plenty of rest and self-care.

“When you fall in love with yourself, you begin to see yourself more positively, appreciate your unique outlook in life, and treat yourself in a more more nurturing way. In loving yourself, you are acknowledging that you are special and deserving of love. Best of all, you’re giving yourself one of the greatest gift you can, one of the greatest gifts you have to give another. You’re giving yourself the gift of your love.”

Which is great, it’s a great way to understand that. It doesn’t have to be vain, it doesn’t have to be all about you, but ultimately it starts with you. So it’s a great thing to understand as we approach yoga. So that’s it for now — I may give another blog in a few, but thanks for listening.

I know I said my next blog would be on Satya, the second Yama, “truthfulness”, but the truth is I’m still working on Ahimsa. This is not surprising, as Gandhi spent his entire life practicing Ahimsa, and made great political advances in the process.

Last night, Alanna came to our teacher training last night to share her knowledge and journey into yoga. Alanna is the JivaDiva. I wanted to personally thank her. Not only did she inspire me to continue my journey towards Ahimsa, but she has also inspired me to further investigate my interest in Jivamuki Yoga.

As in my last blog, Ahimsa means “non-violence”. A good place to start is to simply, be kind. With the simple practice of always being kind, you yourself are practicing Ahimsa. This may not be as simple as it sounds. As soon as you hop into your car in the morning, start thinking “be kind”, as your neighbor cuts you off, or a bus decides to put on his blinkers in front of you.

Start by being kind to yourself. One of my students related to this last week in class. I started the class with the simple notion of being kind to herself. She was stressed from a long week of working in the high-tech world. We started with grounding in child-pose, and recognizing that it’s OK to take care, spend the next hour focusing on yoga, and being kind to herself. In order to share kindless and peace, it must come from within, and being kind to yourself is the perfect foundation.

Be kind to yourself, your co-workers, your fellow parents at your child’s school, your neighbors, your x-spouse, your family and everyone around you. Be kind to your enemies, and they will learn from your kindness. Kindless comes from the heart. As your kindness spreads, good karma will return to you.

Namaste

PS: If you haven’t already, please visit Alanna’s JivaDiva website. It’s a wonderful educational resource on yoga, complete with Podcasts (yes, Yogi’s Podcast!), chants and meditation, and other great treats for yogis.

The day I started my journey down the Core Power Yoga Teacher Training, I bought a book called Jivamukti Yoga. Written by Sharon Gannon and David Life, this book provides a very readable, detailed journey down the “yoga as a philosophy” path.

I took to this book immediately, (maybe because of the forward from Sting), as it jumps into the history of yoga, dating back to 600 B.C. Fascinating! It was from this book that this website, The Yogi Sutras was inspired. Sutras are compact, documented words of wisdom written by the ancient yogis that students can learn from. The goal of this site is to share little tidbits of knowledge that we learn along the way.

The Indian philosopher Patanjali did not invent yoga, but he did document his Sutras, which have become known as The Yoga Sutras. We all have access to these sutras, and whether or not we chose to follow or observe them, is clearly our decision.

Patanjali recommends an eight-limbed (you can visualize this…right?) system of yoga called Ashtanga, or Raja Yoga. Over the next few weeks, I’d like to share my attempt to apply the first two limbs: the Yamas, and the Niyamas, to my life. These limbs are slowly becoming my own inner psychotherapeutic tools that I can use in my every day life in a personal attempt to achieve mind/body purification, peace, or a glimpse at the devine (samadhi).

Let’s start with the first limb, the Yamas. The Yamas are simply guidelines for how we interact with the outer world. They can also be regarded as social disciplines or respects to our relationships with others. There are five Yamas: Ahimsa, Satya, Asteya, Brahmacharya, and Aparigraha. (note to Ifer…remind myself to digitally blog some Sanskrit, as it is the most beautiful ancient language to actually speak.)

The first Yama is Ahimsa. Ahimsa is defined as non-violence. Non-violence in the physical sense, as well as gentleness in our speech, thought, and actions. I had the opportunity to practice Ahimsa last week. I recently went through the experience of adding a room to my house. The word “recent” is relevant, as the project started in February of 2004. (note today’s date). All through last summer, I went through the joys and challenges of managing this project with an outside contractor. Together, we managed to complete all of the project, except, the roof always leaked when it rained. As you can imagine, this caused heartship for both myself and my contractor, as he considered himself “done”, when I still had a leaky roof. And, the city would not approve the structure. This “discussion” went on for month after month, with neither party leaving the conversation in peace (a nice way of saying, well, we were not agreeing). I even got to the point of not being able to converse with my contractor, as the conversations always became verbally ugly.

After our yoga teacher lesson on Ahimsa, I decided to face my fears, embrace Ahimsa, and call my contractor in an effort to “get done, and come to peace with the project.” With kindness through my voice, the non-violence through my mental and physical actions, my roof was willingly replaced by my contractor within the week.

Ahimsa energy spreads good will. By alluding Ahimsa, those around you will share Ahimsa as well.

Next: Satya - Truthfulness