Does Dynamic yoga promises Enlightenment/ wealth/ world peace?
Dynamic yoga is an invitation to uncover the depths and subtleties of the human condition: whatever they may turn out to be. It is based on, and demonstrates, the premise that although it often does not feel like it, there is an inherent wholeness to life, and to being human. This wholeness expresses itself in the human body as a functional integrity: whereby life sustains, expresses and extends itself. This is discovered in yoga posture practice through action. This only hapens if the activity of yoga posture practice is an investigation of the true needs, capabilities and nature of the body. It can not happen if yoga is directed towards any cultural goal: including flexibility, strength, fitness, health or enlightenment. When actions are refined in response to sensations they create, then the inherent integrity of the body is clarified. This allows the inherent unity of body, mind and spirit to spontaneously express itself. This delivers a deep, experiential, trust in the body and the life that guides and sustains it. This trust of life, in its wholeness and in its details, is the possibility that dynamic yoga offers.
Why is Dynamic Yoga less familiar than, for example, Power Yoga?
Dynamic yoga has never been regarded as a product, nor human beings regarded as a market. Besides which it not only makes no false promises, it neither offers a quick high nor an easy fix. What it offers is the possibility of taking action, and experiencing life, in an unfamilar but totally satisfying way.
How can one be a devoted yogi and at the same time live a normal life in modern society? There is no inherent conflict between the practice of yoga and living a worldly life: except where yoga, as it so often is, has been reduced to a cultural reaction. When yoga is undertaken as an open investigation, it transforms every aspect of life without necessarily changing or removing anything. The direct fruits of genuine yoga practice are not denial, detachment or any other sanctified escapism. An accomplished yogi is someone who loves and engages fully with life, unafriad of what it may bring, and undaunted by what it does.
It is said that dynamic yoga styles strengthen the ego. What is your opinion about that?
The succesful pursuit of any cultural goal strengthens the ego. Dynamic yoga is not about fitness, flexibility or strength. It is about accessing the inernal dynamic of integrity whereby life sustains, expresses, fulfills and extends itself. This is facilitated through the intelligent use of movement as a methodical preparation for stillness: thus "The Dynamic Yoga Training Method".
What influence has your education in Zen meditation on Dynamic Yoga?
My experience, understanding and teaching of yoga have been more deeply influenced by my training with zen masters, than with yoga gurus. But it has been shaped much more by the inherent wisdom of the human body expressing itself through phsyical sensations: they are my guru.
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