Tag Archive for: Niyama

In terms of Tapas, I got the immense gift from this experiment of experiencing firsthand how creating an inner heat can cleanse the body and how that can radiate out to so many aspects of our lives and beings.  It makes sense that creating heat in the body would cause it to sweat and breathe out toxins, and ignite the digestive fires to eliminate toxins as efficiently as possible, as well.  Now I know kinesthetically the lightness of being that comes with having fewer toxins in my body and how the connectedness with my body that comes with that, translates to a natural decreased desire to put more toxins in my body.  I am also beginning to see how working on this one Niyama, has translated in to a natural reinforcement of all of the Niyamas and Yamas in my life, as well. I am grateful to have had this opportunity, and I believe it has brought me back (at least semi-permanently) to my old habits of regular activity and daily yoga practice, which benefit me so greatly.

One of the lessons learned by Axis YTT students is that people find Yoga through a variety of paths. This student found Yoga through meditation. And when experimenting with the niyama, atmanivedana (or Ishvarapranidhana) the existence of both positive and negative aspects of any chosen path were evident in the experiment.

My first experiment is focused on Atmanivedana. Atmanivedana is the concept of offering one’s life to god. I decided on this concept because I feel this is the reason why I began yoga and all of my life’s choices and crazy turns have led me to realize that this is the path for me. I have begun to realize over the past 10 years or so that this is an extremely difficult decision to make and to stick with. I have had multiple periods of great insight and constant practice overlapped with months of self loathing and pity. However, even in my darkest moments there is something or someone inside telling me that the right choice is to surrender to god and everything will be ok even when it appears that all of life’s normal structures that you have built up around you begin to crumble after a decade of construction. It is also quite relieving to find that they are not very missed.

I entered into yoga through meditation and a strong need to relinquish pain I was feeling as a teenager. I had a very sick girlfriend and lost multiple friends to drunk driving and drugs and my mind was at a very fragile state. I was lucky enough to realize this and found some great people to lead me to Zen meditation. The structure and intensity was a lot for a sixteen year old with no religious background of any kind and the need for long sittings was nearly impossible for me even though I was a very athletic hockey player at the time. The sittings were so intense that I could not even focus on meditation. Up to then I had never been able to even sit cross legged. I endured the pain for a few years not even knowing that there was a way for relief and there where systems designed for this very problem. Much of my practice was on my own, through books and lectures, because the sittings at the Zen center were just too much. Luckily one day I met Candess and she introduced me to asana practice.

I have had an off and on mediation practice for many years now. When I begin meditating I dive fully into it and try to meld it into every aspect of my everyday life, or fully surrender to god. When I am off, I am completely off with little attention paid to this crucial aspect to existence. In order to help me stay more focused and remain on the path I believe having multiple different practices  will ensure I can remain in the proper state of mind for longer, and the addition of a daily asana practice in conjunction with mediations would be a great asset and is the focus of my experiment. Another beneficial aspect to adding a daily asana practice is the fact that it will greatly help with the quality of my mediations because I will not be in as much pain.

To complete this experiment I will add a one hour asana practice every morning before my meditation or pranyama. My asana practice will begin with a joint opening series, and then followed by multiple sun salutations that increase in intensity. I will finish with some twists and inversions – mainly headstand and shoulder stand. I will then take a short savasana before my normal mediation practices.  I will keep a journal and make notes every few hours on the level of attentiveness I feel I give to a particular task. I do not have time to break down everything I do but will try to record my attentiveness for physical labor like tasks as well as some detail about relationships and general well-being. I will also make note of the pain level or length of time that I can meditate pain free seated in the cross legged position.

I guess you cannot have the good without the bad, however. I feel it important to point out some of these details because I have noticed it multiple times over the past ten years anytime I get very serious about my practice and a shift is occurring in my life.  There is almost a force that brings on some amazing challenges once you begin this path and it has forced me to stop multiple times. I do not want to dive too deeply into this but it is beginning to get to me a bit because it seems to be part of an endless cycle these past ten years. My life was peachy three weeks ago before I began this experiment and began meditating a lot more and trying to surrender to god in every aspect of my life. In the past three weeks my wife was hospitalized and near death, my dog was poisoned by the neighbor whom is now in jail, both my car and my wife’s car have broken down, I passed a bladder stone and had three days of urinary issues, I had the flu, multiple little annoying items lost or breaking down including my computer crashing shortly before finishing this paper, this is the second draft and I will most likely not get certified as an instructor due to some of these issues. I can go on.

I do believe there is much more going on here and this is not a direct result of the experiment and would never want to discourage people from beginning this path based on these results. These three weeks have almost allowed me to create some space between me and these issues and see that it is almost comical, albeit heart wrenching. I have realized that it is beyond me and is not there to punish me but to perhaps teach me. This is just something that I need to get through this time and I feel that I chose this yoga intensive mainly for that reason and this will stay with me forever whether I get certified or not. I am going to continue my daily asana practice and have to say that this experiment was exceptionally enlightening.

Each year Axis YTT students find new awareness through their experiments with the yamas and niyamas. This student found the ability to “come into my spirit” through both passive and active surrender to God. This is the account of practicing the niyama, Ishvara Pranidhana.

I began journaling. This very cathartic experience allowed me to re-direct my thoughts in moments where my mind was spiraling out of control. Being a planner, I began to make daily lists of things that I wanted to focus on and that were tangible. The lists really helped me stay focused on the present task instead of letting my mind steam roll into the over-planning mode. When I found myself fixating on a situation that I had no control over I would literally tell myself “STOP” and offer the thought up to God. I found serenity in this practice because it felt like letting go and being free. I also began to develop a more consistent sahdna practice to help this process of letting go. These actions were all very helpful; however, Richard Freeman writes in The Mirror of Yoga that the surrender carries two connotations, one that is passive and one that is active. Most of what I was doing was passively surrendering to God by simply accepting things as they are and having trust in God. In order to fully immerse myself in the experiment I wanted to go a little deeper and work on an active surrender.

I decided to do this by offering service to Isvara through helping others. I began to research volunteer programs and places I could offer my service and dedicate my actions to the good of others.  I soon found this active surrender transcending throughout my daily life and my interactions with friends, family, the environment, and numerous other situations. Suddenly the situations I was toiling over were not that important, I could focus my energy, and efforts in helping others instead of letting my false ego flare up.

By embracing Ishvarapranidhana (surrender to God), this Axis Teacher Training student found peace that had been missing in daily life. Identifying a need for constant control and then practicing ways to relinquish that control was an excellent introduction to the application of the niyama Ishvarapranidhana.