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I began this year in a rather joyful mood which was not only due to the recent start of my 3 months’ vacation & the replacement of European winter with nice summer weather in Asia, but of course to the one month purely dedicated to yoga learnings in Mysore, India.
During the past few years I have learnt my lesson that whatever you can fit into a (big) backpack should be more than sufficient in Asia. My trip from Budapest to Bangalore went very smoothly, no big crowd at the immigration, no hiccups with the visa process, could withdraw cash from the very first ATM with minimal rip-off, and found my driver easily too. I just needed to survive the remaining 4 hours of car ride so that my restless (and slightly weary) buttocks could finally reach the Samyak ashram, which lies about 170 kms from Bangalore airport.
I figured that I will try to obtain a local sim card from a random road store right away so I don’t need to worry about wifi for the rest of my trip and I can roam 4G for barely no costs. Unsurprisingly, this wasn’t as easy and straightforward as it sounds. The shopkeeper was asking for some “local ID proof”, so I have quickly flashed out my Indian tax-card proving that I’m indeed a “local” person. Yeah, he kept telling that this is not good enough, a local ID proof is mandatory, so I had to leave as there was clearly some gap in our communication. I have learnt it only a couple of hours later that the required formality was a local (i.e. Indian) citizen’s signed passport or ID card copy. I did not even bother asking why is this really needed, all my past memories from India clearly reminded me, it would have been a pure waste of everyone’s precious time.
So, we have successfully reached the Samyak yoga centre, which is located in a charming remote location near Srirangapatna – about 16 kms from Mysore, where my nice & tidy room was already waiting for me.
Even though the entrance side of the building did not show much, the view from my room was quite impressive.
Soon I have met with couple of the other students and as we did not have much to do during the first day – aside from the opening ceremony – we had the chance to explore a bit in Mysore, drink the first coconut water, devour our first dosa, and to adjust a bit to the Indian rhythm. By the opening ceremony all of our classmates arrived safely, we were 16 students for 3 teachers. Funny enough, 7 out of the 16 were from France…
The yoga shala before the opening ceremony
Then on the very next day the education started, by the end of which I felt pleasant tiredness throughout my body and mind. Also, I have quickly realised that my knees are not quite used to sitting in crossed legs position for hours. On the 2nd day I decided to push myself slightly beyond my limits and see how it goes. I was stretching my body intensively, forced the cross-legged position so that my knees can get adjusted to it etc… Well, as any reasonable person would expect, it did not go that well… I went sleep with my hamstrings being super sore, my knees felt destroyed and I had a rising doubt, how on Earth will I survive the remaining 26 days???
pascimottanasana - final position is when your chin is down on your shins while keeping the back & legs straight. Well, this will take a while...
As per the description of the course, we have started to teach in small groups (5-6 persons) from the 2nd day already, well, we quickly realised that there is long way to go before becoming a teacher. In the beginning we were only teaching 1-2 asanas to each other per day, we needed to explain those for the group, how to get into the positions, how to dismount those, what should we pay attention to, what mistakes to avoid etc… By the end of the first week we were able to conduct a 75 mins vinyasa module within our respective groups by everyone teaching about 12-15 minutes.
I enjoyed the classes very much, our timetable looked like the following during the first week: traditional vinyasa flow (7:00-8:30), breakfast with small break (8:30-10:00), yoga philosophy (10:00-11:30), asana clinics (deep dive into the smallest details of all asanas, corrections, advancement technics, tips & tricks…) and group teachings (11:40-13:30), lunch and mid-day break (13:30-15:45), personal practice and workshop (15:45-18:00), break (18:00-18:30), breathing technics and meditation (18:30-19:30), dinner (19:30-20:00). Every 7th day of the course was an off day, which were Tuesdays.
baddha konasana - in the final position your knees & nose should touch the ground while your back is straight. Well, my back is straight so I'm on track!
All of our 3 Indian teachers were extremely nice and knowledgeable during the course, they are in the beginning of their thirties, and familiar with both the academic & physical aspects of yoga teaching on a rather professional level. They also complement each other very well as their personalities are quite different. Trupta – who was conducting the morning classes and asana clinics – is super-humble guy who reminded me of a XI. century monk. He was able to demonstrate even the most difficult asanas perfectly while talking uninterruptedly, like gravity did not affect his body at all. Aravind represents the classic professor type, he conducted the yoga philosophy classes and a few afternoon asana sessions, besides his brilliant academical knowledge, we learnt soon that his endurance is also well above an average human being. Rakesh taught us breathing technics, meditation and also held various classes in the afternoons. With his most appealing charisma he could easily be a stand-up comedian too, actually he used to teach yoga for celebrities before deciding to become a teacher in Samyak. The 3 of them are the corner stones of Samyak Yoga, they built up this paradise from scratch with hard work, discipline, well, and of course massive investments.
From left to right: Rakesh, Trupta & Aravind
So, after a heavy first week, finally we have reached our 1st day-off! Not that I had any problem with the fixed time schedule throughout the week, rather my body needed some soothing. So, we decided to explore a bit in Mysore, after all we have been away from the urban civilisation for the past week. Also, most of us wanted to pamper our bodies with various massage treatments.
To ease the soreness in my body I decided to give a chance to an ayurvedic massage. Well, the experience was rather unusual and maybe a bit weird too… Though I felt better after it. Anyway, let me explain. First of all, in the concept of ayurvedic treatment only your own gender will treat you. And in this specific case, it was not 1 but 2 guys at the same time. It was a quite memorable hour when the 2 Indian guys were sliding their hands all over my body in a small, dim, steamy, kitchen-like room, while I was lying on a hard, wooden board, and the only thing (partially) covering my private parts from their hands was a paper like, extremely thin loin-cloth. So, as part of the treatment they spilt hot oil on my whole body (yes including the top of my head) then using the slipperiness they make sure the oil is getting thoroughly rubbed it into the body. In the first 10 minutes I simply felt uncomfortable, various horror and medieval torture movie scenes were crossing my mind, then came the dreaded moment, when they asked me to turn on my belly and started to untie the thin string of my loin-cloth… I was ready to scream & run for my life, but luckily the story did not turn into a thriller, neither needed I report them for sexual harassment. To put it delicately, the elements of the root chakra did not get assaulted. Once they finished, I was told to lie into a steam cabin from which only my head was out, and while I was trying to decide whether that’s good or bad, the two guys were non-stop staring at me with emotionless faces. After getting boiled in the steam for a good 10 minutes I took shower 3 times so that most of the oil and its rather weird fragrance could be wiped off from my body. So, all in all, it was a quite memorable experience.
After the massage we explored a bit in the area called Gokulam, which is famous for its "yoga tourism". Not only many yoga schools are located here, you can also find various shops to buy yoga related goods & accessories. And of course the presence of many foreigner looking guys & girls roaming around with their yoga mats hanging on their shoulders.
View from a local cafe in Gokulam.
Some of the small streets in Gokulam area reminded me of rather Italy than India. Mega-like!
Of course, it was recommended to do practice even on our off-days. And obviously we did! To a certain extent. As the picture proves we were in the yoga hall:
So, back to the training. During the 2nd and 3rd week we have been focusing more on the teaching part, every day we taught something different in our small groups than the day before, also the groups got rotated from time to time so that we are getting more exposure. The morning sessions became harder and harder every day, both the number of asanas per session was increased and the difficulty level of those was raised gradually too. Trupta highlighted us every day that we are here to learn and practice, but we should not push our body over our limits nor should we expect to improve our flexibility within this one month. The more days we spent in the course the less cooperative our bodies started to became actually. I started to encounter soreness in muscles of which existence I was not even aware of. It happened often that I could not stretch as much on a particular day than a day before. Fortunately, none of us suffered any severe injuries, we managed to survive with medium-light soreness. No matter how hard I tried to protect my knees and avoid painful positions, the heavy morning sessions and the 90 minutes of practices in the afternoons did not allow my body to recover.
Partner yoga class.
The ultimate sentence of our practices was: “Breathing is the key, so breathe!”. Yeah, right, thanks for this brilliant idea, I would have probably choked without you telling me this quite obvious point. But it took me a while – and a couple of sessions – to realise, there is a massive difference between breathing some oxygen into your lungs and actually focusing the breath. Focusing on the breathing itself is the third level – I will get there later. So, why breathing is so important? It conveys the oxygen – you can name it energy, prana, chi or the Force itself – into the muscles and the cells. Proper breathing allows your muscles and cells to get sufficient amount of energy & get used to the position by creating memory patterns in those. This is basically how your body learns the asanas. What does it mean to breathe properly? Breathe slowly, steadily, and comfortably without any gasp or effort. Once you are forcing your muscles and create pain – which means that the muscles and cells are not getting sufficient energy – then your breathing and the flow of energy is getting disturbed. Which should be avoided as it will prevent your body to improve.
During the first few days of the course I have been pushing myself heavily and wasted a lot of energy to force my body into certain positions in the name of improving those, which did not bring any development. On the contrary, sometimes a certain position was even more difficult a day after, as my muscles were sore, and my body was unstable. So, how can you improve your asanas? Find your boundaries. And stay on the edge of those. Yes, I know that life begins where your comfort zone ends, which is a beautiful concept how to experiment life, yet, it will not help your asana practice. So, once you find your limitations, try not to exceed those deliberately. Find the position where you don’t feel pain. Slight discomfort is OK until your breathing is undisturbed. Then breathe. And enjoy the asana.
This sounded like bullshit to me. No pain, no gain, right? Well, in this case, it is wrong. After experimenting – and failing miserably – with the “power” concept, I gave a chance to the other idea “not to push over the limits”. And it worked beautifully. I was breathing properly, and without any heavy efforts, my body was more stable in the asanas where I was sweating my ass off by trying to strain my muscles and collapsing 1-2 days before. Even my flexibility improved in certain forward folding positions – which are really not my favourites – by being able to relax e.g. my hamstrings. For me, this was an extremely important lesson to learn.
mayurasana a.k.a the peacock pose - here, just flex your muscles, maybe all of them. A moment of joy :)
So, the 3rd and 4th weeks passed rather fast, by that time everyone got used to the daily routine. I did not even leave the ashram on our last day off, the relaxing river side and the nearby peaceful landscape looked way more soothing than the busy city noises.
Our little river next to the ashram.
With Arnaud (France) & Gimmi (Italy)
Also, our group of students built up very nice relationships not only among ourselves but with the staff of Samyak too. Some of us challenged them to a cricket match, others helped them to cook, someone tried to learn some Hindi language, or some local dance movements – yeah, I have also tried to teach them my signature moves ;)). Also, the staff was extremely nice to us, they were smiling none-stop, which was really appreciated after some challenging days. But my all-time favourite was Jeetu, the Samyak master chef, who upon learning about my rather strong emotions towards coriander (i.e. hatred), started to cook personal portions to me without involving the “evil herb”. In my eyes, Jeetu will always remain a true hero.
Jeetu (left) prepared personalized coriander-free version of this magnificent meal. Shivam (right) aside from helping Jeetu with cooking also assisted us with more delicate matters (laundry).
During the last week the morning sessions were conducted by 2-3 students instead of Trupta, every day by different 2-3 people. We were randomly split into these small groups, and it was the group’s responsibility to prepare a 90 minutes session for the remaining students, so each individual had about 30-45 minutes to teach & shine. No matter how hard our actual teachers were trying to convince us that this is not part of the examination, it felt a bit too suspicious :)) Well, as we learnt later, the actual success condition of getting the certificate at the end of the curse was our overall expressed dedication through this one month, so our “examination” started on day 1 already. We had an actual written exam too before the closing day, yet that was more like a formality so that we could prove ourselves that we had learnt some theoretical knowledge too.
The magnificent 16 - Vinyasa TTC January 2018
And if someone was open minded & dedicated to learn, then the amount of acquirable information was tremendous. Almost 80 asanas down to the finest details, correction technics, improvement steps & tools, yoga philosophies, various breathing & meditation technics, bandhas, kriyas, mantra chanting, sloka singing etc… None of our questions remained unanswered, despite we had tons of them. The patience level and positive attitude of our 3 teachers was absolutely amazing. I believe every student had a few ups and downs through the month, yet the surrounding positive vibe helped all of us to achieve something really great here.
We had a beautiful and slightly overwhelming closing ceremony on the last morning, before which we had to create a colourful flower petal mandala – ah yes, this is a skill I forgot to mention above. We actually got up 4:45am to have enough time to complete.
Then once finishing our last breakfast in the ashram, it was time to say goodbye to our beloved teachers, the remaining staff of Samyak and of course to the fellow student. After then we were released to continue our individual yoga journeys somewhere else…
Rakesh promised us discounted samadhi so we dressed up accordingly. Trupta (in the middle) knew it is not going to happen.
Our little present to Samyak Yoga.
