Journeys & Experiences

अथ   योगानुशासनम्॥१॥ I.1 Atha Yogānuśāsanam It was in the summer of 2018 (March 2018) when my Ashtanga Yoga guide, Nitesh Batra, got us started on reading and reciting Chapter 1 of Patanjali's Yoga Sutra ( a collection of 196 Sutras--aphorisms-- divided into 4 chapters on the theory and practice of yoga, compiled by sage Patanjali) . My reaction then was a mix of wonder, excitement & apprehension. For one, it meant going back to school, sitting in a place with concentration and memorizing. This meant mental discipline. Over the previous 7 months or so, I had become reasonably disciplined physically, and was showing up at the  shala , getting on the mat every morning at 5.30 am--about which I wrote in fair detail in my first blog post. But this was a different ball game altogether. The last time I memorized a topic in Sanskrit was in school, 30 years ago. Thus, there was a sense of excitement with quite a bit of self doubt as well. 20 years of corporate life and out

I will remember today as the day when I broke my mental barrier. I woke up in the wee hours of the morning, to practice meditation during " Brahma Muhurta ". My  Ashtanga Yoga  guide had scheduled a 2 hour meditation session for us that was to begin at 4.00 am.  This meant I had to wake up at least an hour and a quarter earlier, get done with my morning ablutions and arrive on time.   Surprise # 1 : I woke up at 2.31 am, 09 minutes before my alarm clock was set to ring.  Surprise # 2 : I did not grumble. Nor did I negotiate with my mind to sleep in for those extra precious minutes. Surprise # 3 : I showed up at the shala  on time, at 3.55 am. We started at 4.00 am with a short, 20 min asana practice, to prepare ourselves for the 2 hour long meditation. I now understand that stretching the body before a long meditation practice helps prepare the body for a longer meditation.  I had read about the purity of the Brahma Muhurta (that 1.5 hours before dawn

योगश्चित्तवृत्तिनिरोधः I got introduced to  Ashtanga Yoga  about a year ago and quite by chance. At that point of time, I was 2 years into being a reasonably regular yoga practitioner at a popular, local yoga studio and I enjoyed turning up at the studio every single time. All of a sudden, my Yoga studio shut down and I couldn’t imagine a life without Yoga as by then, I had integrated it into my life. That’s when one of my then Yoga instructors suggested that I look at pursuing  Ashtanga Yoga  (I keep thanking her for that). Till then, I had no clue what  Ashtanga Yoga  was all about—I assumed it was another style of Yoga with some variations of  asanas  I was familiar with.  So, in I walked into my 1 st  class on July 31, 2017 and a year later, here is who I am- a very different me, a better me. I wasn’t prepared for or aware of what the world of Ashtanga held and the wondrous wealth contained in  Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra . I know what I have discovered is perhaps not even