A Round Table on The Advanced Practice
When we’re at home, most of us practice with a different intensity than we do in Mysore, whether it turns out to be more or less postures is another story. We spent an afternoon discussing what this looks like and why we do what we do with power couple Kate O’Donnell and Rich Ray from Ashtanga Yoga Portland Maine. We talked about Advanced Asanas and our relationship to them both personally, as well as collectively.
The first aspect we discussed is what sacrifices a person must make to practice Advanced Series on a regular basis, and barring those sacrifices, what then is Yoga and what is it for?
Not all people can do these complex advanced postures. And yet, all people can practice Yoga.
We discussed how exploring the minutia within a single posture can allow for the time and space to fully examine oneself within a posture, and how using asanas as benchmarks creates hierarchies of status (for better or worse). One thing we all seemed to agree upon is that all aspects of the body and mind can be examined in Surya Namaskar. Even simply examining your tongue might be enough to send your consciousness to other planes of reality.
“The more proficient you are, the less asanas you need, to get to the good shit.” - Kate O’Donnell
Somehow we must find the middle path between systematic practice and individualized practice. We must find the balance between orthodoxy and freedom. And discover all the ups and downs that lay in between the extremes.
“Without some sort of systematic approach, yoga is a hobbled.” - Kate O’Donnell
Rich Ray has been practicing meditation and yoga for over 20 years. He trained as a resident monk for 4 years at a silent monastery. He taught yoga and meditation at state prisons in California and New Hampshire and started a meditation program at a women’s county jail in Boston, Massachusetts. He is the director of Ashtanga Yoga Portland Maine.
Kate O’Donnell is the author of three Ayurvedic Cookbooks, including The Everyday Ayurveda Guide to Self-Care, The Everyday Ayurveda Cookbook: A Seasonal Guide to Eating and Living Well and Everyday Ayurvedic Cooking for a Calm, Clear Mind: 100 Sattvic Recipes. She is a nationally certified Ayurvedic Practitioner and the founder of the Ayurvedic Living Institute.
Harmony Slater is a Certified Ashtanga Yoga Teacher, who has been teaching in the Mysore method for close to 20 years. Harmony is a strong presence in the Ashtanga community worldwide having founded two Yoga Schools in Canada. She has shared her experiences with the practice, pregnancy and childbirth in the books: ‘Yoga Sadhana for Mothers’ and ‘Strength and Grace: A collection of Essays by Women of Ashtanga Yoga.’
Russell Case was the Founding Director of the Stanford Mysore Program for the last ten years. Prior to this he was the founder of the largest Mysore program in East Asia from 2005-2010, while living in Taipei, Taiwan. Since then Russell was project manager for the Jois Foundation collaborating with the child psychiatry team at the Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford University in undertaking the largest and most comprehensive longitudinal study on the effect of mindfulness and yoga on school age children in history. Currently he is focused on cultivating a robust career as a painter because yolo.
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Opening and closing music compliments of my dear friend teaching Ashtanga yoga in Eindhoven, Nick Evans, with his band “dawnSong” from the album “for Morgan.” Listen to the entire album on Spotify - Simply Click Here.
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