Freedom at Atmananda

We are entering the third week of Atmananda’s 300 Hour Teacher Training Program. It's been an amazing journey so far. 

The other day Jhon T said something that struck me deeply: 

“Right now your minds and bodies are being challenged by the pose. As you continue to work, you will one day come to challenge the pose.”

If asked to describe what Atmananda Yoga is all about, I would without hesitation say freedom. Now let me be clear, the freedom offered Atmananda is not the freedom sold by the shapers of our mainstream culture. When we think of freedom most of us think of doing “anything I want.” When I study yoga with Jhon T however, and I try to do Downward Facing Dog “anyway I want,” he’ll quickly tell me with an strange combination of brutal frankness and loving amusement that I’m doing something more akin to Downward Facing Idiot. 

The trademark at Atmananda is proper alignment. At first glance this is not very sexy. When I learned about Jhon T’s approach, the first thought that popped into my head was of my mother telling me to sit up straight. I didn’t like being told to sit up back then! Why would I like it now? For me, the freedom of yoga was all about the flow. I tried Iyengar a few years back although I could appreciate its benefits to old people, I was young and athletic. Give me the fire of Ashtanga over “Nursing Home Yoga” any day!

Well, in the three weeks since I’ve been practicing yoga at Atmananda, everything is different. Jhon T’s sequence combines what is best in Iyengar and Ashtanga. There’s no Either/Or here! Yoga is about alignment AND flowing with breath. It is about the body AND mind. For Jhon T yoga is about integration. It is a path towards bridging the gap between the mind and the body. 

The greatest human disease is the dis-ease we continually feel as we go about our lives. This dis-ease is the result of our dualistic worldview. We mistakenly think that our true self resides in the mind. We experience ourselves as a subject stuck in this body, looking out into a cold and indifferent objective world out there through these little peepholes called the eyes. The body is mysterious to us in that it seems to be party “mine,” in that I can control certain things like the movement of my arms and legs and yet, partly “the world,” in that it involves all sorts of involuntary processes like digestion and blood circulation. 

For most of us therefore, the body a frustratingly confusing thing and we’re not quite sure how to deal with it. Our thoughts however, seem clearly to belong to “me.” The sensations and feelings that we experience in our bodies therefore, must either fall in line with our minds (i.e. our mission control center) or we’ll force the stupid lump of matter into compliance through the use of substances which either excites the body in action or numbs it into oblivion. 

Most of us live in a no-man’s land between our body and our mind. It follows that we split between thought and feeling. A day to day existence is thus manic and dis-integrated. In short, we are creatures in need of a cure! The yogic path is one such cure. 

Jhon T has told us on many occasions that the goal of practice is to arrive at “the perfect pose.” The “perfect pose” is the moment when a yogi experiences stillness and silence in an asana, fully realizing, without judgement, the simultaneous forces of groundedness and lightness within his/her self. While experiencing “the perfect pose,” the yogi’s mind and body become one. The idea of separation between the body that take the pose and the mind that judges vanish and in its place is simply the pose.

In learning about “the perfect pose” I realized that in my previous approach to yoga, I was continually seeking an ideal; i.e. the external semblance of a pose, or a feeling; i.e. the endorphin rush from a strenuous workout. In other words, my yoga practice was driven by my mind. The body became subservient to my ego’s desire for the self-congratulations I would give myself after achieving a new pose or the euphoric rush I would feel after a hard sweat. In this abusively lopsided relationship, my “task master” mind would often push my body beyond its limits resulting in injury and frustration. 

In Jhon T’s approach, the mind must respect the body. The mind likes to live in the past and the future. The body is always in the present. When I focus my attention entirely on the body (or rather, the sensations I experience in consciousness) and allow the body to find its proper alignment within a pose, my mind becomes humble to the here and now. I no longer force myself into a injury provoking posture. I refuse to take shortcuts. I give myself fully to the posture while at the same time, surrendering my ego’s desire to be “perfect.” It’s important to note that the perfection of the “perfect pose” is not found in “me” doing the pose “perfectly,” but rather in dissolving the difference between “me” and “the pose.” It undoubtedly takes time to master and experience the perfect pose fully. And yet, there is perfection to be found in surrendering here and now to my lack of perfection. 

From this vantage point we can return again to Jhon T’s mysterious statement: 

“Right now your minds and bodies are being challenged by the pose. As you continue to work, you will one day come to challenge the pose.” 

In these few weeks I have come to understanding that yoga is a vehicle for transformation. The two great strands of Buddhism are called Mahāyānam and Hīnayānam. These words mean “greater vehicle” and “lesser vehicle.” Another translation for the word vehicle is “raft.” A common Buddhist image for the spiritual path is the crossing of the river. In the Katha Upanishad, the sage says: ”The path is difficult to cross like the sharpened edge of the razor, so say the wise." The purpose of following a spiritual path therefore, is to get to the other side of the great chasm that exists between reality and our idea of reality.  

In Buddhism, once once reaches the other side, one must discard the raft. In bridging the gap between the mind and body, one has come into direct contact with his or her inner authority. It is for this reason that the Buddhists will say: “When you see the Buddha walking down the path, kill the Buddha.” For the integrated person, one is no longer bound by any external authority because he or she has become one with Universal Authority. 

From this perspective, Jhon T’s statement makes a great deal of sense. As one begins on the yogic path, the pose challenges the mind and body. It exists as something seemingly external to the self. Each pose is a path to tread. However, once one achieves (or non-achieves) the perfect pose, the separation between the practitioner and the pose dissolves. I become one with the Creative Energy, the expression of which is this pose. In other words, the mind and body become what they truly are: two sides of the same coin. And here is the place of true freedom.