Now Begins My Practice of Yoga (Atha Yogānuśāsanam)
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