22) Multiple disciplined Yoga Teachers
I am updating this blog after a very long time . The past few months I was absorbed in reading and reflecting and spending time in silence and I continue to do so . I have taken an informal break from many external activities and just confine myself to my own sadhana and my private yoga teaching .I am using the current spiritual break to recharge myself physically ,emotionally and spiritually and re-clarify my goals and priorities with regard to my yoga teaching , my future program of travel etc .In this regard I wish to point out that I was highly impressed by reading the book "Journal to the Self" by Kathleen Adams that points out the benefits of maintaining a personal journal and how it can help heal us and help develop more clarity .I am using this book as a guide book in maintaining my own personal journal and hope that it will help me unlock my own potential as a better yoga teacher .Also I was equally impressed by reading the speeches of Charlie Munger friend of the greatest Investor Warren Buffett . Charlie Munger's wisdom is complied in a book called "Poor Charlie Almanac" and they are termed as Mungerisms .Though I do not have that book I have access to many of Munger's wisdom through the net and one thing that attracted me to Munger was the fact that he laid enormous amount of stress on self education through voracious reading across multiple disciplines .Munger believes that the world is not linear but a complex entity with various interrelationships and one cannot find solution to anything being just a unidirectional person .He illustrates this by his famous saying "To the guy with a hammer every problem appears to be a nail fit to be just hammered upon " ,what he means is that if a carpenter carries just a hammer he will be ineffective in doing a proper work but if he carries multiple tools like screw driver , spanner , wrench , hammer etc then he will use the appropriate tool for the appropriate job and stop finding solution to everything using just a hammer .Now what does that have to do with yoga ?
I find Mungerism is very valid for a Yoga Teacher as most of Yoga Teachers are just uni-directional and use one tool just asanas or their own favorite posture sequence to address the problem of a student .While this may prove useful in a group setting for a set of healthy and fit yoga practitioners it many not help solve problems for many students who need a personalised solution .A yoga teacher is effective when he has maxamium number of tools at his disposals like posture sequence , pranayama , warm up exercise , meditation , self enquiry ,nutrition ,psycology ,chanting etc . I am sorry I am expecting lot from a yoga teacher but I feel a real effective yoga teacher is one who has a mastery over multiple disciplines and uses a wonderful combination of these disciplines to help strengthen a student who comes to him .
It is not that this is a new concept ,Swami Sivananda already started this concept way back in the early 1930s when he started the Yoga of Synthesis : a combination of Hatha , Bhakthi , Jnana , Raja Yoga and Karma Yoga and first give a student a training in all these multiple disciplines nd identify in which area he is more intersted and develop him accordingly in that area .Swami Vihsnu devananda redefined these things in his 5 points of Yoga saying Yoga is not just postures but a combinationof asanas , pranayama, relaxation , diet and meditation .Unfortunately what we find is many Yoga teachers are very uni-directional and while it is good to develop an expertise in one discipline it is equally necessary to develop necesaary competance in auxilarly disciplines as not all students are alike and not all should be treated the same .So the need of the day is to have Yoga teachers who are having competance in multiple disciplines .It takes a long time for a person to be such a multi disciplined Yoga teacher but in this complex world we need such teachers to help solve students problems otherwise like a man with the hammer many of the yoga teachers will be touturing students rather than helping them . It is this quest to be a multiple disciplined yoga teacher I am on right now and I hope in due course I will develop my expertise in many areas appropriately .
I am updating this blog after a very long time . The past few months I was absorbed in reading and reflecting and spending time in silence and I continue to do so . I have taken an informal break from many external activities and just confine myself to my own sadhana and my private yoga teaching .I am using the current spiritual break to recharge myself physically ,emotionally and spiritually and re-clarify my goals and priorities with regard to my yoga teaching , my future program of travel etc .In this regard I wish to point out that I was highly impressed by reading the book "Journal to the Self" by Kathleen Adams that points out the benefits of maintaining a personal journal and how it can help heal us and help develop more clarity .I am using this book as a guide book in maintaining my own personal journal and hope that it will help me unlock my own potential as a better yoga teacher .Also I was equally impressed by reading the speeches of Charlie Munger friend of the greatest Investor Warren Buffett . Charlie Munger's wisdom is complied in a book called "Poor Charlie Almanac" and they are termed as Mungerisms .Though I do not have that book I have access to many of Munger's wisdom through the net and one thing that attracted me to Munger was the fact that he laid enormous amount of stress on self education through voracious reading across multiple disciplines .Munger believes that the world is not linear but a complex entity with various interrelationships and one cannot find solution to anything being just a unidirectional person .He illustrates this by his famous saying "To the guy with a hammer every problem appears to be a nail fit to be just hammered upon " ,what he means is that if a carpenter carries just a hammer he will be ineffective in doing a proper work but if he carries multiple tools like screw driver , spanner , wrench , hammer etc then he will use the appropriate tool for the appropriate job and stop finding solution to everything using just a hammer .Now what does that have to do with yoga ?
I find Mungerism is very valid for a Yoga Teacher as most of Yoga Teachers are just uni-directional and use one tool just asanas or their own favorite posture sequence to address the problem of a student .While this may prove useful in a group setting for a set of healthy and fit yoga practitioners it many not help solve problems for many students who need a personalised solution .A yoga teacher is effective when he has maxamium number of tools at his disposals like posture sequence , pranayama , warm up exercise , meditation , self enquiry ,nutrition ,psycology ,chanting etc . I am sorry I am expecting lot from a yoga teacher but I feel a real effective yoga teacher is one who has a mastery over multiple disciplines and uses a wonderful combination of these disciplines to help strengthen a student who comes to him .
It is not that this is a new concept ,Swami Sivananda already started this concept way back in the early 1930s when he started the Yoga of Synthesis : a combination of Hatha , Bhakthi , Jnana , Raja Yoga and Karma Yoga and first give a student a training in all these multiple disciplines nd identify in which area he is more intersted and develop him accordingly in that area .Swami Vihsnu devananda redefined these things in his 5 points of Yoga saying Yoga is not just postures but a combinationof asanas , pranayama, relaxation , diet and meditation .Unfortunately what we find is many Yoga teachers are very uni-directional and while it is good to develop an expertise in one discipline it is equally necessary to develop necesaary competance in auxilarly disciplines as not all students are alike and not all should be treated the same .So the need of the day is to have Yoga teachers who are having competance in multiple disciplines .It takes a long time for a person to be such a multi disciplined Yoga teacher but in this complex world we need such teachers to help solve students problems otherwise like a man with the hammer many of the yoga teachers will be touturing students rather than helping them . It is this quest to be a multiple disciplined yoga teacher I am on right now and I hope in due course I will develop my expertise in many areas appropriately .
