Ashtanga Yoga

Ashtanga yoga traces its lineage to an ancient sage named Vamana Rishi and it is through a long line of students who became teachers themselves that we now have access to the heritage of yoga.

In one of the most influential classical texts on yoga, The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, you will find the Sanskrit word, Ashtanga, which literally means “eight limbs”.  These 8 limbs are presented as a path to self-realisation. This is not a linear process and students tend to experience and study aspects of the eight limbs in different ways throughout their own unique lifetimes - hopefully with the guidance of a teacher who is prepared to walk alongside them with integrity, compassion and love.

The eight limbs are:

• Yamas (moral codes)

  Ahimsa (non-violence), Satya (truthfulness), Asteya (non-stealing), Bramacharya (preserving vital fluids), Aparigraha (non-possessiveness).

• Niyamas (self-purification and study)

  Sauca (cleanliness/purity), Santosha (contentment), Tapas, (spiritual austerity/devoted discipline), Svadhyaya (study of the self), Isvara pranidhana (surrender or devotion to god)

• Asana (physical postures)

  In Ashtanga yoga the postures are taught in sequences which the practitioner learns by heart and (ideally) practises six times a week, resting once a week, on moon days and during menstruation. Traditionally, postures are taught one by one giving the student time to integrate them before moving on.

• Pranayama (breath control)

  Initially in Ashtanga yoga, pranayama is directly related to the steady and strong nasal breathing (the ujjayi breath) which is used during asana practise.

• Pratyahara (sense control)

  When practising postures it is easy to be distracted. Through the practice of pratyahara, the student brings the mind back time and time again to the task in hand, that is, the physical practice. Ideally the student will transfer this skill of being focussed and present (not distracted and wandering) into all that they do.

• Dharana (concentration)

  Eventually the mind, throughout the physical practise will be mostly concentrated on the breath, bandhas and drishti. This will bring a sense of effortless ease and lightness to the work. A feeling that may then also arise in everyday life.

• Dhyana (meditation)

  The asana practice in Ashtanga “is the constant coming and going of postures, the constant change of form, which we never hold on to. It is itself a meditation on impermanence. When we come to a point of realising that everything we have known so far - the world, the body, the mind, the practice - is subject to constant change, we have arrived at meditation on intelligence.” - Gregor Maehle

  At first we may just experience fleeting moments of meditation and then eventually come to reside more consistently in this place, from which we know and accept that everything is in a constant state of flow and change.

• Samadhi (total peace)

  Samadhi is of two kinds - Objective and objectless

  It is said that objective samadhi is a a state of clear mind. A state in which the mind no longer modifies sensory input so what we experience is the ultimate reality.

  Objectless samadhi “is the highest form of yoga… a pure, ecstatic state in which there is total freedom and independence from any external stimulation whatsoever.” - Gregor Maehle