I spent this past weekend with the Indian yogi Suryans Thakur, who was teaching a workshop in Brussels. Sandra Hasson, a yoga teacher with whom I have trained, opened her beautiful studio Yama Yoga for the event. Suryans teaches in the Iyengar tradition, which I like, with full use of props and detailed alignment, but what really sets him apart is his intuitive approach to yoga, linking your practice to your own experience in a very powerful manner. So, he’d tell us in the beginning of the practice to sit unsupported, see how that works, then raising the seat with a support, and repeat again to make us trust our own experience and see what happens. It doesn’t sound very revolutionizing when I say it, but it had a very profound effect on me.
Intuition is one of those words which is easy to use but hard to describe. The programme he followed for the workshop (first day all levels, second day for experienced students and teachers) was intelligent and, yes, intuitive. Suryans’ teaching was as much about looking for the subtle change in the posture, and about repetition to experience this change more profoundly. Those who have trained with me know that I’m keen on repetitions. If you only do a posture once on each side, it’s like erasing the writing on the black board (stone age imagery, I know). Repeat and you’ll have time to copy and understand what’s in the writing.
Sunday evening and Monday I could feel the work of this challenging weekend, in tired muscles but also enhanced muscle memory. we were using the props to make an imprint in the body and create a memory in the physical, energetic and mental body. On a weekend like this I’m faced with my physical weaknesses and strengths and that’s all good. The weaknesses become a fertile field for further ploughing and sowing new seeds. The inversions are part of my strengths, probably because in the upside down position, I’m not challenged by the inequality of my two legs. Head-, hand- and shoulderstand are more like a playground, but they are the gateway to a meditative state, if I stay long enough.
Absorbing a full weekend is hard, but in the end it boils down to a deep dive into your yourself, and the expansion of that sattvic field of clarity and harmony.