A self-proclaimed advanced yogi posted to my page yesterday: A student bought your 6°Flow and showed it to me. Im sure youre selling lots of copies, and no offense intended, but its nothing but very, very basic vinyasa modified for people who have never taken a class from an advanced teacher before. Im sure youll get a lot of people interested in learning what yoga is beyond the basics youre showing, but a true yogi would be teaching more advanced practice rather than these rudimentary steps. You cant just modify basic yoga for inflexible people, add movement for fitness, and expect an advanced yogi to take you seriously. I see what you did there, but seriously... thats not yoga. What is it with advanced yoga that has you so enamored? The actual definition and purpose of yoga: to unite breathing, movement and alignment. If ones breath is severely restricted by distress and arousal, if ones movement is significantly diminished due to tension and tightness, and if ones alignment is dramatically mal-adapted due to repetition of poor function, then shouldnt a yoga teacher be able to help them/us unite too? Shouldnt those very, very basic steps be the bulk of what we learn and teach, to give as much care and compassion as possible to the mangled and distorted bodies that injury, stress and trauma from our jobs, activities and life have wrought upon us? IF there is such a thing as advanced yoga (and Im not convinced that there is), then wouldnt it be a deeper refinement of these very, very basic steps, both embodied and shared? Ive seen the kind of ego with which your words prejudice our very, very basic practice. Its the same ego that derogated my very, very basic steps in learning martial art because of my learning difficulties as a child and young man. Yet, in martial art, there are no advanced techniques; only a deeper refinement of the basics. The truly advanced martial artists, are the ones with beginners minds - continually returning to the refinement of the rudimentary steps, and maintaining an empty cup to revisit what theyve already practiced, but with new eyes and open hearts. I dont take what youve written as a criticism, but as a complement. I am bringing to my extended family what I aimed to create and share: accessible exercise which reduces pain and prevents injuries while increasing quality of life. If you dont want to call it yoga, fortunately, you dont need to return to my facebook page to see it. I hope for your sake, when the time comes that you once again suffer pain or an injury, that you do not only have access to your advanced yoga techniques, because then, you will become soberly aware that they do not serve you any longer, and the ego that once held them with such elitism may very well have been the cause of revisiting pain and injury upon you. I dont strive for you or any advanced yogi to take me seriously. Recovering from pain and injuries is much too serious a topic to be taken seriously. Maybe you should consider laughter yoga for your recovery day? :P Nama-freaking-ste, Scott Sonnon SixDegreeFlow
Posted on: Wed, 04 Jun 2014 22:47:38 +0000
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