Arranging The Structure: Raya Uma Datta - Bahiranga Sadhana Workshop - Day 1
Yoga Connections
Look at your body like you are looking at a map. Where are you going?
Raya Uma Datta offers a unique perspective with his incredible perception into Iyengar Yoga, having begun his training at the Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute (RIMYI) at the young age of 10 years old. What a gift to be able to learn the vast subject of Iyengar Yoga from the source at such a formative age.
Raya continued his Iyengar Yoga quest and by age 20 began teaching at RIMYI. After demonstrating for BKS Iyengar’s 80th Birthday, he formally became BKS Iyengar’s student. He traveled to Russia and China with Guruji (a name given to BKS Iyengar, meaning one who brings light). He later accompanied Guruji’s daughter, Dr. Geeta Iyengar, for an Australian and South African Convention. Since 2002, he has taught general classes at RIMYI.
Having had the opportunity to study with Raya at RIMYI, I know him to be a well-respected and dynamic teacher. He instructs from the heart and is dedicated to understanding and sharing the wealth of knowledge BKS Iyengar and the Iyengar Family have offered us. Below is a glimpse into the workshop’s first day from my level of understanding.
The workshop, hosted by Iyengar Yoga of Greater New York is titled, Bahiranga Sadhana which Guruji describes in Light on Yoga (p.21) as an external quest. Raya explained the external quest includes the ten moral/personal disciplines of Yama and Niyama and the physical disciplines of Asana and Pranayama. Raya added that it’s important to understand that asana is the quintessential medium that Iyengar Yoga works with and from to explore the 8-limbed path of the Astanga Yoga of Patañjali. Iyengar Yoga explores asana using the ten precepts which are prescribed in Sutras 11.30-11.34 (conversely, you could say, the precepts can be explored through asana). The precepts are further described in subsequent Sutras that all have the definitive Sanskrit word Pratisthayam associated with it. While the word is transcribed to mean “firmly established”, Raya alluded to subtle meanings that enrich its place in these descriptions. The precepts have a “do” and “not do” rhythm to them, which we learn to apply to our efforts in asana until we are more grounded in them and they become part of our practice.
On the grosser level, there is structure and arrangement to asana. There is also a particular way to describe asana. The Sutras of Patañjali offer a definitive description that BKS Iyengar transcribes in his book, Light on the Sutras of Patanjali: “Asana is perfect firmness of body, steadiness of intelligence and benevolence of spirit.”
11:46 Sthira sukham asana
Raya sited other Sutras to demonstrate the many descriptions, prescriptions, and characteristics that describe asana. He used a map as metaphor with its True North and then explained the broad lattitudes of what is still considered north to the east and west of that until it shifts into something else like northeast or northwest.
“When one moves from the grossest to the subtlest neither the beginning is seen nor the end.” ~ BKS Iyengar
Raya quoted Guruji and guided us to explore the concept of structure by devising a map of our body through a masterful arrangement of asana. Where do we begin an asana? Words communicate and guide us, he continued, but it is imperative to know what actions those words initiate. Rotating the foot versus rotating from the hip create different experiences. He used the idiom "crack the code" to encourage our quest to understand our asana's arrangement and structure. He challenged us to be ever-present to study and explore limb by limb, inch by inch, word by word, sinew by sinew, breath by breath, standing, seated, inverted and prone, beginning to end, end to beginning from the grossest to subtlest, and the infinite degrees between them both.
Thank you, Raya for sharing your insights, Iyengar Yoga of Greater New York for hosting, my mentor, Kquvien DeWeese, and The Iyengar Family for making it all possible. I look forward to tomorrow.
Namaste