Comments on: Changes in Ashtanga Teacher Standards

By: laura

laura — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 09:36:31 +0000

live well and free and let live well and free!
learn your chosen method well through ALL the good sources you can find, take what’s good, effective and reasonable and leave out all the rest! breath freely, trust your inner guidance and enjoy your journey!

By: robyn

robyn — Tue, 02 Dec 2008 12:36:32 +0000

If something is not complicated and does not involve something to argue over, it is not worth doing. Isn’t that the way we human beings seem to make everything out to be. It’s yoga. Be happy and breathe.

By: KostaN

KostaN — Mon, 03 Nov 2008 13:32:00 +0000

I really canÂ´t see some of the older people, like those who have a 30 years practice behind them, to have some respect for SharathÂ´s attitude as a teacher. I mean, these guys where in mysore praticing advanced series when Sharath was a kid! Those who started this yoga when Sharath was already teaching and are willing to submit under his control, it is fine. But in my opinion these guys are far better experienced than him in many aspects of yoga. When SKPJ leaves his body the split within many ashtanga seniors and sharath will be inevitable.

Somebody from the Jois family told me regarding his money and control manners: ” I am very dissapointed at him”.

I have the deepest respect for this lineage, but the jois family are teachers and not owners of the timeless yoga.

Just as you donÂ´t have to visit the pope to be a good christian, you do not need their approaval to be a true ashtangi. Just lots of dedication and love for this beatiful practice.

BW
K.

By: swaroopa

swaroopa — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:27:22 +0000

Times are changin’….
Or is it just ‘the lucky ones’…..

By: (0v0)

(0v0) — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 20:12:51 +0000

Thanks, Grim. This is an interesting and learned comment.

Could someone say more about what an actual guru relationship would look like in the Hindu tradition? From the popular books (Autobiography of a Yogi and the writings of Ram Dass and his contemporaries), I guess we all have a picture of very unique personal relationships that begin after a period of student searching and pretty rigorous inquiry. The two regularities I can see is that (1) Hindu guru relationships are emphatically not a fee-for-service kind of thing and that (2) any one who demands to be treated as a guru is… definitely not a guru.

But… these things all get mixed up at some point. Are we in the Hindu system, Zen system, Tibetan or Vajrayana system…? Who cares? For those of us who are not Hindu Shavaite Brahmins, seems the one model that even makes sense at all is that set by the first westerners who went to India and took a teacher. How did that work… and did it work? Indra Devi and Mark Whitwell are the westerners Krishnamacharya took as his students. Westerners who want to do the guru thing… wouldn’t we want to understand those bridge-builders’ experiences as part of choosing/creating a path?

Whitwell is still teaching all over the world. He a simple articulation of nondual practice and easily inhabits the lineage as it is without getting confused at all. I won’t share what he sees has been lost in the most recent generation of the tradition.

By: swaroopa

swaroopa — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 13:33:50 +0000

Grimmly
Inspiring knowledge. Thank you for this comment and it is truly well placed here in this topic and really very interesting.
Just a question please…
So do you mean our feelings for a particular Guru/ Teacher are ‘warped’. As I do agree we deploy/project/analise too much. But it is directly out of desire and fear ?
So the circle continues…we go to a Guru/ Teacher for help in ridding these dis-eases yet we pick more up along the way?
What are they to do with us?
Fondly
swaroopa

By: Grimmly

Grimmly — Wed, 15 Oct 2008 08:16:24 +0000

Just to add some perspective to Blisterkiss’ comment. She/he appears to be mixing traditions. The Dali Lama is Buddhist as is the scriptual tradition Blisterkiss is refering to concerning the questioning of a teacher (teacher rather than Guru in the buddhist tradition) Zen too, is of course Buddism.

PKJ is coming from the Hindu tradition.

The Dali Lama’s comment and the scriptures B refers to are probably derived from the fourth of the Four reliances. Teaching that are suposed to have come direct from the Buddha. Interesting to note the other three

Rely on the message of the teacher, not on his personality;
Rely on the meaning, not just on the words;
Rely on the real meaning, not on the provisional one;
Rely on your wisdom mind, not on your ordinary, judgmental mind.

It’s interesting to consider the role of Guru from another tradition but important to make clear that it is another traditon (in this case Buddhist) we, traditionally questioning, westerners are applying/employing/deploying.

By: dessi

dessi — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 11:36:02 +0000

There used to be a few on the old list.
There also used to be a lot more great teachers on the list.

By: Konno

Konno — Tue, 14 Oct 2008 08:18:55 +0000

Anyone know why there are no certified or autorised indian teaachers of ashtanga yoga, outside the jois family?

By: blisterkist

blisterkist — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 04:59:47 +0000

Related to parampara the Dalai Lama says the following:
“This (the taking of a teacher) should be done in accordance with your interest and disposition, but you should analyze well. You must investigate before accepting a lama or teacher or guru to see whether that person is really qualified or not. It is said in a scripture that just as fish that are hidden under the water can be seen through the movement of the ripples from above, so also a teacher’s inner qualities can, over time, be seen a little through that person’s behavior.
We need to look into the person’s scholarship — the ability to explain topics — and whether the person implements those teachings in his or her conduct and experience.”
The critical attitude that Nico108 derides seems, on the advice of the Dalai Lama, to be an essential factor in seeking out a teacher/lama/guru.
Is it a form of ‘grave disrespect’ to take issue with Patthabi Jois sitting behind his electronic money counter at the registration desk in the shala or to question the excessive fees for studying in mysore? Or is it rather our duty to consider the contrast between this behavior and the demands made by the sacred texts in the yoga tradition for a life of greedless simplicity. Would the Dalai Lama not have us ask the kind of questions that ashtangis seem so willing to gloss over or ignore, the difficult questions that relate to money and behaviour in a tradition that originally and in all its sacred texts demands a commitment to asceticism.? How many women who have studied directly with SKPJ have been made uncomfortable by being kissed on the lips after touching his feet? How many of us have watched this happened and shrugged it off, made excuses or, for the sake of the practice and the notion of a sacred tradition, just tried to ignore it?
The Dalai Lama gives us advice for seeking and critically assessing a teacher, a horde of sacred texts provide the requirements for being one. It is not a question of forcing the guru/lama/tacher to conform to our idea of what he or she should be, but asking whether he or she conforms to the demands and strictures of their own sacred tradition.
The notion of the unbroken lineage that is central to parampara forces us to ask if Patanjali, the river’s head of classical yoga, directly transmitted the lineage in an unbroken line to those who now wear Rolexes.
The Dalai Lama would encourage anyone seeking a teacher/lama/guru to critically assess that person’s behavior. The fact that western students en masse refer to SKPJ as their Guru with little exposure to the man (besides their one or two adjustments per month and their offer of substantial shala fees) forces one to ask whether a more, not less critical approach is required if the tradition of Classical Yoga is to be preserved and transmitted.
Parampara implies the direct, continuous and unbroken transmission of a lineage. Do you believe that this has taken place in those that you refer to as your teachers? Does their behavior truly attest to this? Are you forced to ignore or excuse certain actions or behaviors in order to maintain the idea of a truly unbroken, sacred tradition? Is parampara a loose enough garment to enshroud modern paradoxes about money, consumption, and contact with the opposite sex and to excuse your chosen teachers actions in all these areas?
What is remarkable in contemporary yoga practice is the lack of iconoclastic fury so present in the Zen tradition, where there is a living and continuous engagement and debate about the notion of transmission. I believe that the Dalai Lama would be more attuned to the Soto school’s mockery and subversion of anyone claiming to be a teacher, and to the very idea that there is anything to be taught, than he would be to our common and too often unquestioning acceptance of the behavior, methods and revelations of our teachers.