What did Krishnamacharya study with his Guru in Tibet- Yogacarya Krishnamacharya - The Purnacarya.

Edited by Mala Srivatsan from Yogacarya Krishnamacharya - The Purnacarya. Edited by Mala Srivatsan The first biography of Krishnamacharya Unfortunately long out of print NB: Italics in brackets are my explanatory notes

"Krishnamacharya went searching for the ashram of Rama Mohana Brahmacari. In a cave, a very tall hermit with a long beard, wearing wooden shoes stood at the entrance. It was evident to Krishnamacharya that this was his guru. He prostrated before him, gave his name and asked to be his disciple. Krishnamacharya was questioned in Hindi on the reason for his visit. After he expressed his desire to learn yoga he was called in. He met his guru's wife and three children. he was given fruits called Ankula to eat and the escorts who accompanied him were dismissed with a cup of tea. Krishnamacharya's first instruction from his guru was, to take a bath and perform acamana. The first precept of pranayama was then taught. For eight days, the master said he would not teach him anything else and that Krishnamacharya should eat only fruits. Thereafter Krishnamacharya became a part of the Rama Brahmacari's family who belonged to the Kasyapa gotta (family lineage). His daily food was chapathu (Indian bread), halwa ( a paste of vegetable or fruits sweetened along with ghee and tea). His period of gurukulam (stay with the guru ) in Tibet lasted for seven and a half years. Rama Mohana Brahmacari made him memorise the entire Yoga Kurantam in the Gurkha language. The various stages of Patanjali's Yoga Sutra were dealt with in that book. Various kinds of of yoga practises were also described with great clarity. Only with the help of Yoga Kurantam' could he understand the inner meanings and science of the Yoga Sutra. The first three years he was made to memorise the Yoga texts in the form of adhyayanam ( to memorise and recite correctly, with proper accents). His focus was in the study of the Yoga Sutra, Vyasa Bhasya and the Samkhya Darsana. In the next three years he practiced yogabhyasa and for the next one and a half years he studied the siksana krama (planning of practices based on the stage of life of an individual) and the cikitsa krama (therapeutic approach). During his seven and a half year stay with his guru, Krishnamacharya learnt all aspects of yoga practice, therapy and philosophy. His capacity to learn, his previous education and his discipline made him an ideal student.

Having spent seven and a half years with his guru he would happily have spent the rest of his life learning and serving him but Rama Mohana Brahmacari then told him to go back to society, lead the life of a married man and spread the message of Yoga. Following his guru's words he returned from Tibet in 1922" Yogacarya Krishnamacharya - The Purnacarya. Edited by Mala Srivatsan p26-28 ----------------------------------------------from Yoga Makaranda T. Krishnamacharya "This text contains the essential concepts from many texts of antiquity listed below. I have studied the texts listed below under the blessing of a great teacher and have explained the truths contained in them that I have personally experienced. I request that the Lord of the auspicious Karnataka throne, the great Lord and Emperor, the fourth Sri Krishna Rajendra, accept this work and allow my humble self to fulfil my endeavor and bless me. More than this, I have nothing to say in this preface. Bibliography 1. Rajayoga Ratnakaram 2. Hathayoga Pradipika 3. Yoga Saravalli 4. Yoga Balaprathipikai 5. Ravana Nadi (Nadi Pariksa of Ravana) 6. Bhairava Kalpam 7. Sri Tattvanidhi 8. Yoga Ratnakarandam 9. Mano Narayaneeyam 10. Rudrayameelam (Rudrayamalam) 11. Brahmayameelam 12. Atharvana Rahasyam 13. Patanjala Yogadarshanam 14. Kapilasutram 15. Yogayajnavalkyam 16. Gheranda Samhita 17. Narada Pancharatra Samhita 18. Satvata Samhita 19. Siva Samhita 20. Dhyana Bindu Upanishad 21. Chandilya Upanishad 22. Yoga Shika Upanishad 23. Yoga Kundalya Upanishad 24. Ahir Buddhniya Samhita 25. Nada Bindu Upanishad 26. Amrita Bindu Upanishad 27. Garbha Upanishad Thirty Minor Upanishads TR. BY K. NARAYANASVAMI AIYAR [1914] SUNDAY, 27 JANUARY 2013 What is Ashtanga? What is a Mysore Room? Excuse the ontic form of the question, perhaps it will lead us to the ontological.

Patanjali's Yoga Sutras, his Ashtanga, eight limb path to self inquiry Some questions from the comments to my previous post Best Yoga dream ever - My mysore Room and my response ( I added a bit). Question: "Grimm.... I think you are going to have to come up with a different name for your room. 'Mysore room' isn't just a couple of words, they actually refer back to what happens here in Mysore. I hope you can agree to call this an 'open self-practice room', or come up with another name for it, as I'm sure you can see that pointing it back towards Mysore is simply inaccurate?? This isn't a place where you choose what practice to do on the day. I am kind of anticipating you objecting to that on the grounds that all of this originated with Krishnamacharya in Mysore in days gone by, but if so I think that would be a bit disingenuous, because it's pretty clear that 'Mysore style' refers to what's been going on in here in the last several decades and what is still being practiced here".

Mysore, it's a big place Response: I think you still have a long time yet before we have to worry about what I call it ( and unless, I don't know, Anne Hathaway and/or Lady Gaga start practicing in ' my room' who's really going to care what I call it in my insignificant corner of yogaworld.... that said... I'd probably just call it self-practice but your right Mysore style should perhaps refer to how it was practiced in Mysore, and Krishnamacharya used to teach ( while in Mysore and at the same time he was teaching the young Pattabhi Jois) long stays and long slow breathing and kumbhaka and vinyasa (variations) and....

old shala I think what is confusing is that Pattabhi Jois used Ashtanga to refer to his approach. Story goes I think that David asked him what to call the practice and he just said Ashtanga as in Patanjali's Ashtanga approach. Less ego there than saying, call it Jois yoga but it would perhaps have been less confusing. Iyengar supposedly doesn't particularly like his approach being called Iyengar ( so he says). Desikachar

forbade anyone calling it Desikachar yoga....all of them are Ashtanga (patanjali) yoga of course...confusing.

BNS Iyengar's Mysore room I think that's where the problem comes with the '...intended for young boy's' thing. Ashtanga (Patanjali) yoga IS intended for everyone but the approach Pattabhi Jois got from Krishnamacharya probably was an approach originally intended for the young boys of the palace and designed for them in mind 9 he was teaching Indra Devi differently supposedly for one). Now I think it can be adapted such that most anyone can practice it ( of course whether everyone would then allow that 'adapted Ashtanga practice' to be referred to as Ashtanga or Mysore style is another question) but was it an approach to practice originally intended for young boys? Probably. There is a problem with the word Ashtanga being appropriated for a style of yoga that arguably mostly focuses on one of those eight limbs. What is Ashtanga? The approach to asana practice Patabhi Jois taught or the Yoga of Patanjali as found in the yoga sutras, the eight limb path....confusingly it refers to both.

New shala ( if anyone recognises themselves here and would like me to take this picture down and choose another let me know) Picture by Tom Rosenthal. http://lightonashtangayoga.com/ What is a/the Mysore room or Mysore Style? is it the simplified approach to practice developed by Pattabhi Jois from what he was taught by Krishnamacharya or does it/should it refer to the approach to practice that was developed in Mysore by Krishnamacharya and still practiced there in myriad forms (think BNS Iyengar for instance) that is broader than the current generally known usage.

NB: Patabhi Jois said it was Krishnamacharya standing on him in Kapotasana, do you know how long a picture took to shoot back then (long stays) Yes it is no doubt a political discussion that probably wont go away, can't really be bothered with it myself anymore. Should it stir things up? Probably, if it gets people to question what their Ashtanga practice is and what self practice should be or what Mysore style means but I'm happy to leave it to the new crop of bloggers and the next and the next..... it wont go away, it has legs. We should be questioning what we practice, hell what else SHOULD we question. Why should we question what we practice? Because Ashtanga is a practice of self inquiry, enquiry into self and all that self attaches too. Yoga is Applied Smakhya it's Raison d'tre is to question...though not perhaps our Western idea of/approach to questioning.

Mysore, been around a while We do this, don't we, we start out practicing for fitness perhaps but then we start to question that and start to pay more attention to the breath and what that means ,what's going on there and the same with the bandhas ('though, ideally, not during actual practice itself ). What else is Sharath doing in those Sunday Conference talks than encourage us to question the meaning of our practice, our intention. Those books of Krishnamacharya, Yoga Makaranda, Yogasanagalu (written in the 30's and 40's while in Mysore, and while teaching Pattabhi Jois), they were written for us, distributed freely by the state, he wanted us to know this stuff, this IS the lineage, We question our practice as a series of postures and think of it as a whole, one great posture where each asana is part of that one great asana or perhaps mudra (ties in with that new anatomy idea you linked to on fb). We question it as an approach to physical fitness and begin to reflect on it as a means to mental fitness, as mental preparation perhaps and so on... at each stage we then question if the form of the practice best suits our shifting focus of practice. Should we practice a little more slowly, stay longer, are some postures more suited than others...should we focus on bandhas more in this posture or one or two bandhas more in this posture than another or should we focus on the breath here, both the inhalation and exhalation equally or in this posture more focus on the exhalation and this bandha and in that posture more focus on the exhalation and another bandha...should we introduce a kumbhaka here. Should we focus on each posture equally or practice these postures more quickly to allow us to spend more time in the finishing postures or should we cut out postures to allow

for more time in finishing or for Pranayama or for Japa....and does this approach to practice despite all it adaptability, best suit us at each stage along the 'spiritual journey' or as I prefer, path of self reflection. All these questions come up over the years no? We don't have our guru or teacher to hold our hand, he gives us the tools and sends us off to do the work remaining there for when we require more tools or a better understanding of how to use them. What would I do if a student asked me such questions if I hadn't asked them of my self. I would expect a teacher to not only have asked such questions but to have explored them. I'd value that much more than whether they could help me bind in marichi D or catch my heels in Kapo, my ankles after dropping back or flipping me over in a backflip.... And it doesn't stop there that's just the asana... Surely this is Advanced practice or rather advancing in practice ( or better still, moving forward in practice let's get rid of the word Advanced )... and Primary series, even half of Primary series or a little Vinyasa Krama or some Iyengar postures etc... is all we ever need for this. Krishnamacharya says it's not required to practice all the asana ( how can we there are as many as their are species of life' we're just rediscovering/reinventing them) although it's good for some of us to learn as many as they can but just to preserve them, (and to have them available ) not because they are necessary for our practice. "All asanas are not necessary for a routine practice for everyone. Age, ailments, peculiarities and individual constitutions are to be considered to find out which asanas are to be practised and which should be avoided. One important thing to be constantly kept in mind when doing the asanas is the regulation of breath. It should be slow thin, long and steady; breathing through both nostrils with rubbing sensation at the throat and through the esophagus inhaling when coming through the oesophagus inhaling when coming to the straight posture and exhaling when bending the body . "...We have already mentioned that all asanas are not necessary for each individual. But a few of us at least should learn all the asanas so that the art of Yoga may not be forgotten and lost ". Yoga Makaranda (Part II) Krishnamacharya p76

Krishnamacharya's Mysore room OK, now it's time for practice... will look pretty much like the first part of of Ashtanga 2nd series with some Vinyasa Krama additions from Bow and Meditative sequences ( a few omissions from standing to make room), but only up to kapo because of the slow breathing and the longer stays, then a long paschimottanasana and on into finishing and pranayama, pratyahara, Japa mantra mediation. Is this an Ashtanga practice, is it Mysore style? Post this later. This post is no way intended as a critique of Ashtanga, Patanjali's or Jois' but rather a celebration of the possibilities of both.