Today was spent at the largest Ashram in Rishikesh...Swami Dayananda ashram.I have seen adds for this ashram in the Yoga Journal. We started with a 2 hour class with what we in ormond beach would not consider yoga. There were a few poses and some variation of sun salutations, but much of
the class was how to use the breath to get into a pose and other dialogue from Gopal, the teacher,with a guided meditation after. Not for Warriors,but if you had never taken a teachers training course it was quite useful and informative . It seems yoga here is more about the spiritual side of this practice with meditation and imagery as the main focus. Of course that was only one class at an ashram,so I am still learning the differences in Yoga here and what I practice at home.However, I think one would really need to study here to try to attain the level of spirituality I see in their forms of yoga and everyday life.
I spoke to Arvind and he says yoga asana (the poses) are only a very small part of yoga, these postures keep the body in shape so the other 7 limbs of yoga can be an effective way to liberation of mind, body and soul. He went on the analogize it to a coke bottle. if total freedom of spirit is the sweet soda inside the bottle, one must have a strong container(bottle and body) to ultimately take the remaining steps to finally tasting the sweet coke..
I got that .Did you? Western yoga is an exercise with sometimes a smigen of personal spirituality thrown in. we use it as a form of exercise to calm us down from our whirlwind pace. India does not have that pace...in fact I don't believe they even understand the concept of being on time. There is time and there is Indian time...It's actually pretty funny...nothing is on schedule from trains to meals to meeting times ...It 's nice
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Kelly and Gopal at our ashram yoga class
These lotus flowers adorn the ceilings of the ashram
More on my day later....Karin
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