August 2016 Bksiyengar.co - BKS Iyengar Yoga Institute .

August 2016 www.bksiyengar.co.zanews magazine of the bks iyengar yoga institute of southern africaYogAfrica august 20161

Geeta and Prashant Iyengar

Contents4Editor’s note5 A tribute to Geeta Iyengar7Yoganushasanam notes9The five kosha’s explained11 Interview with Radio Sonder Grense12 International Day of Yoga: A delightful yoga morningin Soweto14 International Day of Yoga: Johannesburg celebration15 International Day of Yoga: A gathering of Yogas inCape Town16 Body consciousness17 Notices & advertsAUGUST 2016 www.bksiyengar.co.zaEdited by Riva HirschowitzCompiled by Stratford CanningDesign & layout by Lauren RycroftOur sincere thanks to all who took the timeand made the effort to contribute to thecontents of this magazine.Anyone wishing to contribute articles, photos,information or suggestions to YogAfricamay contact the editor on 082 782 8275,riva.hirschowitz@gmail.com.

Editor’s noteDear Members,I trust that you are keeping warm this winter. The signs of spring are all around, withjasmine flowering and buds on the trees here in the Cape.The biggest event in the past few months was the International Day of Yoga whichwas celebrated by many of our communities throughout the country. Look out for thephotographs and articles of those events.We are eagerly looking forward to our 40th Anniversary National Convention inSeptember with Faeq Biria. The Convention is nearly fully booked, so if you havenot yet booked, please contact Stratford to make your bookings atbksiyengar.nat@gmail.com. I look forward to seeing you at Goudini.If you would like to contribute to the magazine, please send any articles, photographsor adverts to riva.hirschowitz@gmail.com.Yours in YogaRiva“Spirituality is not some external goal that one must seek, buta part of the divine core of each of us, which we must reveal.”– B.K.S. Iyengar, light on life4YogAfrica august 2016

A tribute toGeeta IyengarExcerpt from the article In LovingGratitude: A Tribute to Four WomenWho Revolutionized Yogaby Anna Dubrovsky28 November 2013When Geeta Iyengar (known as Geetaji) beganteaching in the early 1960s, very few Indiansfelt that women should practice yoga, muchless teach it to others. She spent a lot of timeanswering questions like, Will standing on thehead prevent a woman from getting pregnant?Geeta was a mere teen back then, but herwords carried a lot of weight. She is, after all,the eldest daughter of B.K.S. Iyengar, now94-years strong, who has taught Indian royals,politicians, and celebrities, as well as suchinternational personalities as violin maestroYehudi Menuhin and philosopher JidduKrishnamurti.Geeta Iyengar is hardly a household name,and she wouldn’t have it any other way. Since1973, when her mother died, she has been thewoman behind the man. She has cooked herfather’s meals, edited his manuscripts, and runthe Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institutein Pune, India, the nerve center of Iyengar Yoga.She sidesteps praise and recognition, redirectingthem to Guruji, her father-slash-guru. But shehas long been a yoga master in her own right.At a time when women outnumber men inmost yoga classes, she is arguably the foremostauthority on yoga for women.Geeta Iyengar’s yoga training beganvirtually at birth. “It was always around me,”she told an interviewer in 1995. “I remembervery well how I used to imitate Guruji while hewas practicing. Guruji used to make me bendand twist and make me topsy-turvy on his feetwhen he did headstand and Shoulderstand.”But her childhood was far from idyllic. Likeher father, she was a sickly kid, enduringeverything from colds and stomach-achesto typhoid and diphtheria. At 10, she wasdiagnosed with nephritis, a potentially deadlyinflammation of the kidneys. After a flare-upleft her unconscious for four days, her fatherput ‘the list of medicines aside’ and said sternly,“From tomorrow onwards no more medicines.Either you practice yoga or get prepared todie,” she recalls in her seminal book, Yoga: AGem for Women.By 15, she was teaching yoga to herschoolmates. Two years later, some of herfather’s students asked if she could teach themwhile he was away in England, and the masterconsented. She’s never looked back, dedicatinghalf a century to supporting and furthering hiswork – first as an apprentice and then as hissuccessor, directing the institute along with herbrother, Prashant.The three Iyengars are famously fierce.“They scold, and they yell. It’s a trait that’seasily misunderstood,” says Patricia Walden,a senior Iyengar yoga teacher who hasstudied with them since the mid-’70s. “Somepeople are confused by it. They don’t get thatsomebody could be screaming and yelling atyou, but they’re doing it because they reallycare that you understand the material, or theyYogAfrica august 20165

really care that you’re injured and they want tohelp you to get well.They are also known for a sort of all-seeingness—an ability to spot struggling students ina class of hundreds, to catch you the momentyour attention drifts, to ‘call you on your stuff,’”Walden says. “Studying with them is like beingnaked. You can’t hide.”Geetaji has distinguished herself byspecializing in the specific needs of women.First published in 1983, Yoga: A Gem forWomen is an encyclopedic reference onasana and pranayama for different stages of awoman’s life. Her latest book, Iyengar Yoga forMotherhood: Safe Practice for Expectant andNew Mothers,which she co-wrote, addresseseverything from fertility issues to post-deliveryflabbiness. Her teachings on how womenshould adjust their practice throughoutthe menstrual cycle have inspired at leasttwo books.Though she has never married—never hadany interest in it, she explains—she is attunedto women’s struggles in balancing family lifeand other callings. In fact, the matriarch ofthe Iyengar family has admitted to neglectingher yoga practice. “The demands on me havemade it impossible to be completely regular,”she once said. “For men it is different. They canbe strict with their program because there issomebody supporting them.”6YogAfrica august 2016Her greatest gift to women may be theexample she sets. “Because she is such apowerful woman, such a fierce woman, she hasempowered many,” Walden says. “She’ll standup to anybody. She’ll say whatever she feels likesaying. She stands in her truth, and don’t we allwant to have role models like that?” Never too late:“Yoga is a gift for old age. One who takesto yoga when old gains not only healthand happiness but also freshness of mind,since yoga gives one a bright outlook onlife, and one can look forward to a happierfuture rather than looking back into thepast which has already entered intodarkness. The loneliness and nervousness,which create sadness and sorrow, aredestroyed by yoga as a new life begins.Hence it is never too late to begin. Yoga, ifstarted in old age, is a rebirth that teachesone to face death happily, peacefully, andcourageously.Therefore, nobody is exempted fromdoing yoga and there are no excuses fornot doing yoga. How useful is yoga canonly be understood by practicing it.”– Geeta Iyengar, Yoga: A Gem for Women

Yoganushasanam notesBy Janet SwinnySpring 2016, Iyengar Yoga News No. 286th December 20151. Everyone is interested in upgrading. Butit’s easier to upgrade the exterior ratherthan the interior, and yoga is the process ofupgrading the interior.2. Mind, intelligence and ego – all ofthese have to be restrained. There is aconsciousness above all of these.3. Think of the eight aspects of yoga as eightpetals linked to a central core. The flowerblooms step by step.4. If you ignore yamas and niyamas, yogabecomes just physical exercise.5. One must practise ‘involution’. This meanslooking inward, reducing one’s engagementwith and enjoyment of the externalworld. ‘Bramacharya’, for example, meansfocusing on the business of Brahma, ratherthan externalities.6. Aparigraha means avoidance of holdingon. We beautify ourselves in order to tryand hold on to youth. We live our lives asthough we are going to be here for ever.We must learn to let go (as Guruji did atthe end). Nor should you hold onto yourachievements. You did something: it mayhave benefited someone, that’s all – let it go.7. If you practise in this manner, i.e. mindfulof yamas and niyamas, your experiencewill change.8. The experience (e.g. stress, turmoil) thatyou don’t want, don’t get involved with it.Turn the sense in-over (pratyahara). Youhave to know how to practise so that youdon’t create problems for yourself.9. Control what you can control.10. Dharana, dhyana and samhadhi cannot betaught. But read on 7th December 20151. Be internally aware. Be present in wholeof the pose the whole of the time. Aim formulti-pointedness, not one-pointedness.This inter-nality is what differentiates yogafrom physical exercise.2. At the start of your practice, in sukhasana,take the gaze in, towards the back of thehead, where there is nothing to look at.3. Some people think that when the mind hasbeen emptied, then the ultimate goal hasbeen achieved, but no, there’s more 9th December 2015Today’s key messages:1. It’s important to have honesty/integrity inyour practice: no good having a difficulty,masking it and carrying on regardless.Yoga is not about being in a race withother people: it’s about facing up toyourself, that’s the hard thing. If you have aproblem, you need to investigate the causeand sort it out.2. Just going to workshops with differentteachers will not do the trick. A teacherwho does not see you regularly does notknow your body and cannot communicatewith you about it.3. You should not throw yourself at the poses‘willy-nilly’. You need to know what youare doing and approach them step-by-step.4. Doing just what you fancy is no good,either. You must explore what needs to bedone, and do it. This requires discipline. Adisciple is one who applies discipline.5. Don’t burden students with the negative bytelling them about the risks they might betaking in doing something. If you do that,you are already encouraging them to set uplimitations in their own minds. Instead, tellthem positively what needs to be done. (Itstruck me here what a risk-averse societythe UK has become.)YogAfrica august 20167