Summer's Horizons

A s you may have noticed, I've taken a bit of a vacation from this blog. Nothing formal...just a decision to write more slowly, take time out in the sun to recharge, or wander out and see the epic final chapter of the Harry Potter series. But I'll admit, as much as I'd like to siesta and keep it all quiet and sleepy, there are plenty of fascinating things percolating on the yoga horizon and for this blog. So this break of mine will be short.

For one, I'll be making a trip to Los Angeles in a week and a half, and I plan to bring back tidbits on yoga in LA and perhaps a few interview prospects. In fact, if any readers out there have suggestions of yoga studios to check out and yogis to speak with, fire away. All suggestions are welcome.

Two, Yoga Festival Toronto is coming up quickly - it runs August 19-21st at the National Ballet School; and this year's festival is shaping up to be quite exciting. In fact, a few nights ago festival directors Matthew and Scott (Remski and Petrie respectively - whom you may know as the authors of Yoga 2.0) threw a wonderful vegetarian feast for the faculty dinner in anticipation of the event. If the dinner was any indication, Matthew, Scott and the entire YOCOTO team have filled the programming with yogic inquiry, warmth and the lost art of hospitality....so it's well-worth travelling to Toronto from wherever you are to catch this festival. This year's guests are as diverse and interesting as ever - you can register and see the lineup here. Step up as scholars such as Dr. Frawley and Yogini Shambhavi deliver talks and instructors offer workshops on everything from the Yoga Birth Method to acroyoga. This year is also the first year the festival has offered yoga programming for children.

To boot, Shivers Up the Spine will be participating in one of Yoga Festival Toronto's keynote presentations in an interview with Mark Singleton, author of Yoga Body, The Origins of Modern Posture Practice.  The interview is built around the title, Beautiful Bodies, Broken Bodies: Yoga's Tricky Lineage and Physical History, and I hope the interview will address our very physical, modern practice as a hybrid of assumptions about the human body and the body of yogic tradition. In my mind's eye, I picture a 30-minute session of Singleton improvising around my interview questions, followed by audience members throwing their own unruly questions/thoughts into the mix...resulting in a public interview of sorts that will be transcribed to Shivers Up the Spine following the event. The interview happens on Saturday August 20th, 5:30-6:30 and I urge anyone in the hood to drop in on the festival at the National Ballet School and join the discussion! I will add a more detailed look at the interview content for the sidebar of this blog soon enough..

(Marla Meenakshi Joy & Ron Reid)

Also upcoming on this blog is a piece on Ron Reid and Marla Meenakshi Joy of Downward Dog Toronto, which I hardly want to say anything about save that the record shows that it was a delightful, funny and thought-provoking conversation...which means that the bulk of my work is already done. Don't you love yogis and their vivid journeys? I swear half the time i can't tell if i'm talking to a yogi or a flesh and blood magician...all the more so when you're talking with Ron Reid and Marla Joy. So stay on the look out for that one.


 T his way now the horizon is gathering some interesting weather patterns just round the bend of a reddish sky. No better time for a siesta...See you in a bit.

Welcome to the Prism: Infinite Refractions, The Variety of Vedanta and Yoga in America with Philip Goldberg

(American Veda by Philip Goldberg)

R eading is a solitary thing. For the most part, nobody joins you in the process, save for the occasional elderly cat -i have one such- that takes delight in napping on top of the best paragraphs.  But reading is also part of a breathtaking human process of experimentation; of taking things in and radiating back out; and not unlike inhaling and exhaling, there's a circulation of energy. So I'm grateful when readers step off the page to tell you about what books they've loved, letting ivory towers crumble...sharing ideas. So when a Shivers up the Spine reader suggested I get out and read American Veda by meditation teacher and ordained interfaith minister, Philip Goldberg, I was on it.

(Bob Dylan)

American Veda is a celebration of the history, legacy and profound impact left by core teachings of Vedanta and yoga on the religious and ethical sensibilities of Americans. Specifically, it looks at the dark and forgotten closets and cupboards of the nation to find the staple stash of Hindu thought that has been re-created and served up as a side dish with dinner each night for more than a hundred years. And from Emerson to Bob Dylan to George Lucas, artists and storytellers have certainly been dipping into that back pantry for inspiration and serving it up with great and colourful variety to sometimes completely unsuspecting audiences.

("Avatar", by James Cameron)

Would American rock band The Doors have tested the limits of perception without the cultural backdrop and impact of meditation practices and its accompanying interest in altered states? Just how common have Sanskrit words become in America that the word karma is ubiquitous enough to be used in the titles of pop songs that span the last three decades? (Consider for a moment: "Instant Karma" by John Lennon to represent the 1970's, "Karma Chameleon" by Culture Club for classic 80's and more recently "Karma Police" by Radiohead...) Or what about the word avatar, and that once trendy, and highly contagious virtual reality site called Second Life with its population of avatar protagonists? Do I even need to mention director James Cameron and his epic blockbuster which pays repeat homage to the word avatar (or incarnation) and its Indo-European legacy?

(Philip Goldberg)

Philip Goldberg is a spiritual counselor, meditation teacher and ordained Interfaith Minister. The author or coauthor of 19 books, he lectures and leads workshops throughout the country. A novelist and screenwriter as well, he lives in Los Angeles, where he founded Spiritual Wellness and Healing Associates (SWAHA). He is Director of Outreach for SpiritualCitizens.net. and blogs regularly on the Huffington Post and Intent.com. And while there have been other books that look at the history of yoga in America, American Veda has a unique bent; and it's one that is shaped by its author's own life-changing experience with the persuasive power Vedanta and yoga, its varied expressions in popular culture, and his explicit interfaith mandate in writing the book. 

In our interview, Goldberg, a veteran interviewer himself (he completed several hundred interviews in the course of research for his book) offers his thoughts on why an interfaith perspective is crucial to understanding the variety of practices that have emerged out of the Vedanta and yoga contexts. Goldberg hones in on one of Vedanta's key messages "truth is one, its names are many",  and explores how its message has reshaped not only American popular culture, but also the sheer range of religious expression and practices available to the average American. Seemingly immune to doctrinal differences, the collision of practices such as postural yoga, meditation, and self-help circles has resulted in one hell of a mash up; from Christian yogis to Kirtan chanting rabbis, Americans have inhaled a happy puff of yogic smoke and exhaled an electric cocktail of hybrid spirituality. Truth may be one, but its forms are many, many, many....

(http://vagabondsister.blogspot.com/2010_09_01_archive.html)

Geoffrey Wiebe on Mirror Neurons and Beloved Yoga Teachers: Free, Life-Affirming and Dangerous

(Geoffrey Wiebe)

T he word vrtti is an interesting one. It rolls off the tongues of yogis fluently, and I always imagine that word has the power to invoke itself...to bring on a ringing in the ears, a deafening hum of unwanted frequencies oscillating like a funnel cloud.

 "O h the vrttis... It used to be that I couldn't sleep till five in the morning". 

Amused and shaking his head, Geoffrey Wiebe was rolling his pale eyes upwards as if he couldn't possibly describe the nature of the outgrown predicament. The winter light was brighter than usual, like a flash flood through the wide perimeter of the cafe window, and Geoff was all smiles as he unfurled his lithe arms along the rough hewn wood counter. O those vrttis: the rapid-fire neural activity, that vortex of gapless thought that leaves us exhausted and wide-eyed in the dead of night. He was answering my question: "So how has yoga changed you?"

Sitting with Geoff it's not hard to imagine that the scope of his intelligence and energy could invoke a burden. Ask Geoff a question and you'll get a hundred intricate and vastly different answers; each thought digressing gently, the path dotted with Vedic tales, Zen koans, dialogue from screenplays and quotable one-liners from indie bands. Creativity and agility are no issue. And if you've ever been in one of Geoff's yoga classes the same is true. Exacting and detailed as a teacher, his one-on-one approach with students is as gentle and reassuring as he is in a face-to-face conversation.

The only child of a professor (of the philosophy of science and religion) and a registered nurse, growing up on campus in England was rich with opportunity, and Geoffrey Wiebe was introduced to yoga at 5 by an upstairs neighbor- though interest soon faded in favour of sport. The next invitation came over 20 years later with the ashtanga practice, taught by Diane Bruni and Ron Reid, with whom he completed teacher training in 2001. Other teachers include Mathew Sweeney, Richard Freeman, Chuck Miller & Maty Ezraty, and Geoffrey continues his study at the Downward Dog, Toronto. A graduate of U of T, Geoffrey has studied and worked in theatre (Canada, the UK, Germany, and Italy), made a film, and competed as a cyclist and rock climber.

(Geoffrey Wiebe, Teaching at One Love Toronto 2011)

As if all of this isn't enough, Geoffrey also presented an intriguing paper at last year's Yoga Festival Toronto entitled, Our Rishis Have fMRIs. The paper generated a wave of interest at the festival sparking ongoing debate about establishing teacher training standards. Drawing heavily from ongoing research in the area of neuroscience, it examines the critical role of "mirror neurons" in the yogic learning environment.

 In our chat Geoff is outspoken about his experience studying with beloved teachers, the yoga of surfing, his views on "grace" in a practice and how a yoga practice can make you free, life-affirming and "dangerous". And you'll notice he asks as many questions as he answers. It really is amazing that he can sleep at night.

(Geoffrey Wiebe)

  

"Modern neuroscience has shown that learning alters physical brain anatomy (neural plasticity) and can do so throughout a lifespan.  We become our patterns and our patterns shape us; and we exist more as a wave than a thing.  The theraputics of yoga sits in the ability to hone and shape this patterning (samskara, literally stain in Sanskrit)  through directed effort...  From a bad back to bad choices, and the two are inextricably linked as is our mind & body".  (Geoffrey Wiebe, excerpt from "Our Rishis Have fMRIs")

This is No Time for Dull Instruments. Yogis and Philosophy with Shyam Ranganathan, PhD.

 

"The sign of a true yogi is thus not how flexible their bodies are, but rather how willing they are to be philosophical about personhood, and critical of their own prejudices, while being serious about living in the Natural world." (Shyam Ranganathan, author of Patanjali's Yoga Sutra)

D oes a Yogi need to be a philosopher? Is being able to debate philosophically important to your personal practice? According to York University professor and author of Patañjali’s Yoga Sūtra (Penguin Classics 2009), Dr. Shyam Ranganathan, yogis must, at the very least, be able to engage in a philosophical argument. Maybe you're thinking, "Wait a second, that sounds a bit intense. Can we not practice yoga a-la-carte, grabbing what we like as we shop"?
Well, not according to Shyam Ranganathan. And, he'll be the first to tell you that according to his reading of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, a yoga practice without philosophical agility is not yoga. It's something Ranganathan calls "pseudo-yoga".

(photo: http://puregoldphilosophy.xanga.com)

As contemporary yogis who practice an assorted grab-bag of practices, we likely have little daily interaction with philosophical debate vis a vis yoga. We know this makes the practice easier to integrate into a mainstream lifestyle; making it a practice that anyone, anywhere, can dip into without getting ponderous. But what if it's the philosophical questions that do the heavy lifting when it comes to finding out what you're made of??

So how are we to develop skills at argument? Well, I took a stab at it by asking Shyam a few questions; and his answers illustrate just how much careful consideration the process of philosophical inquiry requires. Time and attention knot together in these answers; and untangling each question takes the same delicate patience and eye for detail that you would reserve for untying a knot.

Shyam Ranganathan has an MA in philosophy, an MA in South Asian Studies from the University of Toronto, and a PhD in philosophy from York University. He is author of Ethics and the History of Indian Philosophy (Motilal Banarsidass 2008) as well as translator and commentator of Patañjali’s Yoga Sūtra (Penguin Classics 2009). He is the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s area editor for Indian Philosophy. He has written articles on Yoga, and taught yoga philosophy both in an academic environment and to students of yoga in the community. In addition to Indian Philosophy, his research focuses on ethics and the philosophy of language, with a special focus on the role of translation across cultures and languages. He teaches philosophy at York University.

Leslie Kaminoff Part 2 of 2: North American Yoga, Who Owns This Practice?

(Leslie Kaminoff)

"This is a major problem with religious fundamentalists of all stripes. They simply don't know how to leave non-believers alone." (Leslie Kaminoff on the Take Back Yoga Campaign, e-sutra 11/30/2010)

I chose to start Part 2 of this Leslie Kaminoff interview by bringing attention to a few of the hot button issues in North American yoga that have been making good copy.
The New York Times recently ran an article entitled, "Hindu Group Stirs a Debate Over Yoga's Soul", that incited its fair share of debate as arguments circulated freely at the Huffington Post, and elsewhere in the blogosphere. The influential group backing the "Take Back Yoga" campaign is called the Hindu American Foundation, or HAF, which is a Hindu Advocacy Organization based in the U.S whose goal it is to reclaim the spiritual roots of Yoga and recouple them with Hinduism. To summarize, the piece outlines the arguments set forth by a group of people The NY Times designates "Indian-Americans" who have started a campaign to "take back yoga".

What the hyphenated term Indian-American designates is not clear. And, as Indian-Americans and South Asians in general are comprised of at least 4 of the world's major religions: Buddhism, Hinduism, Christianity and Islam... not to even mention Jainism and Zoroastrianism, the designation Indian-American is sloppy and vague. To boot, yoga is also a lovely hybrid of many different strands of religious thought still largely co-mingled and indistinct. Nonetheless, both the New York Times as well as the HAF appear to flatten the pluralist nature of religious identity in the subcontinent and elsewhere, which is to say the least, only one part of a much more tangled problem.
Opponents include the ever popular voice of American Hindu thought, Deepak Chopra, whose take on the matter is made clear on his home page...while those in support of the campaign claim that Chopra's Hinduism is an amiable pushover.

The HAF make it clear that they have no interest in proprietorship regarding yoga; however, they do make it clear that contemporary yoga evades its relationship with Hindu tradition and culture. Unfortunately, the HAF's credo of reclaiming yoga to accord with perceived notions of authenticity flirts most unfortunately with fundamentalist approaches to Hinduism. And, the HAF does not clarify exactly how Hinduism has been overlooked.

And this is exactly the gap into which Leslie Kaminoff has thrown his thoughts; and he addresses the issue directly on his blog, e-sutra, as well as through our interview:

Priya Thomas interview with Leslie Kaminoff October 2010, Part 2:

(Leslie Kaminoff, left; Amy Matthews, right)

Leslie: I believe of course, that yoga was discovered in India; but that doesn't mean that Indians own it. 

Priya: Right.

Leslie: Well, you say right and I say right. But the people who created the database of traditional knowledge would disagree. You're aware of this right?

Priya: Yes.

Leslie: There are a lot of people in India who are pissed off at yoga being appropriated or misappropriated by Westerners; and even more pissed off at it being missappropriated by Indians living in the West...you can fill in whatever name you want there, but it's really about Bikram and his insistance that he should enjoy copyright protection for his sequence, which I agree with. I supported him for that. I still think he's an asshole. But I supported him in that. So you know there's this idea that you can gain patent protection for traditional knowledge, and prevent other people from using it. And that's why they created this database of traditional knowledge, and have filed this database with the patent offices around the world in an attempt to keep people from producing yoga products. It's as if the word yoga itself is something that could be protected. 
And that's pretty much Gary's Kraftsow's perspective. He has no problem with anyone doing anything they want based on yoga teachings or an amalgam of yoga in this or yoga in that as long as they don't call it yoga, he thinks it's misleading. He thinks it's a form of fraud to call these things yoga if they're not grounded in the traditional knowledge. And I would disagree with that because my perspective is that yoga was discovered in India, not invented there.   

Priya: Do you have a basis for saying that? 

Leslie: Well, it's like a force of nature. Like electricity...you can't invent electricity. My take on yoga is that it is the natural tendency of organic systems to want to function in harmony. And that's something that's built into nature. And we can discover that principle and take advantage of it and align ourselves with it. So that's the perspective in which I view this term "yoga". So it's much bigger, and older and more ancient than India, or even this planet. You know, it's a force of nature. And as such, I have no problem putting the word yoga on it. Yes the word is a Sanskrit word, and it has an etymology and it has a history and all of that. But you know you have to use some word for it. 

Priya: I liked your iteration of anatomical structures to illustrate yogic principles. For instance, I read your use of the word "joint" in your articulation of embodied metaphors for joining. It's as if the metaphors for yoga can be found in existing anatomical structures, and in the structure of language itself.  

 Leslie: Well that's one of the great things from the Indian tradition, is that when you want to understand a term, look at its roots. I mean, that's a whole way of understanding Sanskrit terms. And Krishnamacarya had some unique perspectives on some of these roots. You can do the same thing with an English word, like "joint".  

Priya: Yes! And that's what I found really creative about it. Because it is something that often happens as a way of understanding Sanskrit words; but less so when it comes to understanding words in English. I thought that perspective of looking at the "joint" was a remarkable reiteration of the spiritual underpinnings of yogic ideas through anatomy.  

Leslie: Well if it gives you a new take on something and a new perspective that's useful, I'm all for it. You know, English is not a consistent language like Sanskrit. Its grammar and spelling and pronounciation are all over the place. And yet, there's a lot of Indo-European roots in English, where you can find it in the language, Im always looking for it.

A Two-Part Interview with Leslie Kaminoff: Making Space for the Universe in the Depth of our Breath

T wo nights ago, I watched a dissected human body, "breathing" - the lungs like a tender anemone, delicately billowing, assuming strange, unpredictable shapes...and I cried. Then I wrote to the front desk at the Breathing Project to ask about it. Is Leslie Kaminoff's online anatomy course supposed to be moving? Because I'm on lesson four, and I feel like I've been struck at the core.

"Breath is about freedom; not about getting it right. The first thing we need to be free of is that idea that we need to get it right". (Leslie Kaminoff)

Leslie Kaminoff, Feb. 2010. Photo: Lydia Mann

I t was a fall day in NYC, the pale wind was picking up as I struggled up west 26th to Leslie Kaminoff's studio. I waited inside on a bench thumbing through my jumble of papers, looking through the door to Leslie's office, opened footwide enough to see the a figure seated in an office chair, facing away from the door, forearms square at a computer. I was early; and Leslie Kaminoff was obviously punctual. He worked right up to the scheduled minute; and then when I politely knocked and entered, he slid the chair away and got up to shake hands. I turned around to fumble through my things and hit record on the iphone. He asked a few questions about the blog and its readership; and my plans for monetizing it. I told him I didn't know; but that this blog was forcing me to read more....He kicked his legs up on the table, ankles crossed one over the other, and leaned back in his chair with his hands behind his head.

Leslie Kaminoff is a yoga educator inspired by the tradition of T.K.V. Desikachar. He is an internationally recognized specialist with over thirty-one years’ experience in the fields of yoga and breath anatomy. He has led workshops for many of the leading yoga associations, schools and training programs in America. Leslie has also helped to organize international yoga conferences while serving as Vice-President of Unity in Yoga, and has actively participated in the ongoing national debate regarding certification standards for yoga teachers. He currently practices in New York City and Great Barrington, Massachusetts. Leslie is the founder of The Breathing Project, a New York City yoga institute dedicated to the teaching of individualized, breath-centered yoga. Leslie is also the founder of the highly respected International Yoga list, e-Sutra, and is the co-author of the bestselling book, "Yoga Anatomy."

(Leslie Kaminoff, photo: Lydia Mann)

Far from being ponderous in this interview, Leslie Kaminoff speaks to us in brief and precise language about his colorful three decade history as a pioneering practitioner/educator who has studied in India, was ordained as a swami in the Sivananda tradition, and later renounced his robes for the world of bodywork and sports medicine. After a period of study with T.K.V Desikachar, he went on to test his understanding of the principles of yoga through a systematic study of anatomy via cadaver dissection and textual exploration.  The circuitous trajectory that has formed Leslie Kaminoff's substantial knowledge is testament to the power of svadhyaya (self-study). And as you will see, if there's a wrangle or a squabble to settle, Leslie Kaminoff certainly has the cowboy bravado and sense of adventure to join the fray. Outspoken, individualistic, and a rationalist, the yoga he loves is one that breathes with a specifically American tenor.

YOGA: The Architecture of A Trojan Horse, An Interview with Ravi Ravindra, Phd

“Yoga is like a Trojan Horse. You can do yoga simply as a physical practice. Some people do yoga because they believe it will increase their sexual potential...or make them more beautiful. All this is ok. But eventually the practice will generate its own effects.” (Ravi Ravindra, Phd)

 “Do not rush through the book”,  read the email.

Fair enough. There are times when it’s worth following instructions. I read Ravi Ravindra’s cogent and lucid translation of the text that is the spiritual cornerstone of yoga practice entitled, The Wisdom of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras, with 50/50 contemplation and leisure. And, because I was suffering from minor wrist strain at the time, I had the fortuity to immerse myself in the book’s inquiring momentum for a few hours at a stretch, and then follow it intermittently with lazy august naptime; only to get up and digest some more. It was lovely summer afternoon reading, rich and elastic in its depth of insight culled from sources as diverse as Sufi mystics, Christian theology, Puranic lore, threads from Rainer Maria Rilke and British artist William Blake. For someone supine, slightly injured, and looking for yogic transformation through a good read, this book was a no-brainer. 

(The Wisdom of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, Ravi Ravindra)

Ravi Ravindra, PhD is a spiritual visionary, scholar, and leading international speaker on religion, science, and spirituality who has written fourteen books; several of them on the practice of yoga. He is Professor Emeritus at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Canada, where he was Professor and Chair of Comparative Religion and Adjunct Professor of Physics. Known for his ability to communicate with and inspire students, he is recipient of several awards and research grants and author of more than 100 papers in physics, philosophy, and religion. The latest of his many books is The Wisdom of Patañjali's Yoga Sutras. Ravi’s spiritual search has led him to the teachings of J. Krishnamurti, G.Gurdjieff, Zen, and a deep immersion in the mystical teachings of the Indian and Christian traditions. He shared a personal friendship with J. Krishnamurti about whom he has written several books. He has also received blessings and instruction from Sri Krishnamacarya, and studied with Sri TKV Desikachar at the Krishnamacarya Yoga Mandiram in Chennai. 

(Jiddu Krishnamurti)

In this first post for the Examiner, Ravindra has been kind enough to chat at length about the roots of his own personal practice, and how he came to study with, and later befriend Sri TKV Desikachar. In addition, he talks about his personal choice to renounce the practice of teaching yoga in the 1960’s, his upcoming work in October at the Yoga Crib in Ojai. And, he describes the enormous transformative potential of yoga through the metaphor of the Trojan horse; a weapon of stealth, as it pervades a person's interior battleground, despite anyone's best efforts to resist. 

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