Shanti Nathini - Hatha Yoga Practice: Disciple against Wall

Hatha Yoga Practice

Disciple against Wall

Shanti Nathini

(Maria Nikolaeva)

First Russian Edition:

Ritambhara Publishing House (Moscow, 2005) Demonstration of Asanas:

Shanti Nathini, Surinder Singh, Edgar Ortize, Michael Jekel Photography: Maria Nikolaeva, Mikhail Tzelman Correction: Tatiana Morozova

Cover Design: Oleg Kosarev

Copyright

2005 Maria Nikolaeva (Shanti Nathini) All rights reserved.

ISBN 1-4196-6105-1

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Hatha Yoga Practice

Disciple against Wall

Shanti Nathini

(Maria Nikolaeva)

BookSurge Publishing

2007

Hatha Yoga Practice

Disciple against Wall

Preface.

Hatha Yoga Schools in Russia

Contemporary Yoga is equal to asana for many west-erners, which dont discriminate between Yoga and Hatha Yoga and treat meditation as a separate subject. Modern Hatha Yoga is not the same everywhere; there are a lot of different schools based on several major traditions. Each school of Hatha Yoga finds the way for development in India and abroad including Russia. Practice of Yoga was prohibited in Soviet Union, though some people could learn asanas illegally, but during the last twenty years Yoga has been spreading all over the Russia very fast. Except of some articles on Yoga as a physical culture published in Soviet period, originally Yoga appeared in Russia thanks to self-developed Yoga-masters who learned asanas by themselves from books. They became first Yoga-teachers and their disciples taught Yoga in many cities like Moscow, Petersburg etc. As a result when the genuine Indian tradition came to Russia it found a paved way for itself but at the same time it was required to satisfy the special needs of Russian mentality, which was unusual for Indian yogis. In an extremely difficult period of political and economic change in the motherland serious character of Russians forced them to apply the highest results in asana-practice and the deepest studying Shanti Nathini (Maria Nikolaeva)

of Yoga-philosophy, trying to discover the truest sense of human life. After reading the next pages Dr. Frawley wrote to me:

I do hope that the Russian Yoga goes more deeply into the greater Yoga tradition and the great spiritual gurus of Yoga than what is happening in the USA.

That is why you should not be surprised that in a very short historical period in Russia a lot of Yoga-centers were established, many professional Yoga-teachers appeared among Russians, and Yoga have already become the important part of daily life for the majority of educated people and students of in-stitutes. Book-shops are full of translated literature on different Yoga-traditions, and some years ago first Russian Yoga Magazine started to be published four times a year. Also even ordinary people can practice simple Yoga in any fitness-club, where the main aim is the restoration of health and emotional stability after a hard working day. During the recent years Yoga has become a special subject of studying in philosophical departments of state universities, and students are allowed to maintain a di-ploma-work in Yoga as a science. Russian indologists translated from Sanskrit into Russian many classical texts on Yoga such as Yoga Sutras, Bhagavad-Gita, Yoga Upanishads,

Hatha Yoga Pradipika etc., and now anybody can read these books in his mother tongue. Definitely Yoga in Russia is the vast area for scientific research, and in this article well try to reflect on the destiny of the most famous Indian Yoga-schools after their contact with distinctive Russian culture.

Hatha Yoga Practice: Disciple against Wall Iyengar Yoga in Russia

It is well-known that Yoga became widely popular in Western countries after the famous yogacharya B.K.S. Iyengar visited Europe in the middle of XX century, and according to general opinion till the present time Iyengar Yoga is the most attractive stile of practice for people in the entire world. Certainly Russia didnt become an exception: B.K.S. Iyengar came to Moscow at the end of October in 1989 to participate in the First Russian Yoga Conference, and he stayed there for about ten days. Obviously practical teaching was the most important part of his work, including two mega-classes for the whole crowd of concerned people. First of all yogacharya asked them to remove socks and denude knees, but just after Soviet period it was completely unusual and even such simple action made a splash. All people tried to perform asanas with great enthusi-asm, and of course they asked many very different questions.

However there were too many new terms in teachers answers, and interpreting was not good enough for proper understanding of direct sense. Anyway, Iyengars visit produced inexhaustible inspiration for self-practice, and people continued to learn Iyengar Yoga themselves at home during the next several years.

In 1992 B.K.S. Iyengar gave an official permission to establish the first Yoga center in Russia, and in spite of some problems Moscow Iyengar Yoga Center was opened just one year later. Now, after almost 15 years full of innumerable and 3

Shanti Nathini (Maria Nikolaeva)

indescribable difficulties and advances this center has several Yoga-halls in the city and about twenty professional Yoga-teachers. Its difficult to count, but its possible that more than several thousand people became permanent students of Iyengar Yoga and its not the final result: every day the administra-tors answer endless phone-calls. New Iyengar Yoga centers were established in Petersburg and other Russian cities, and they are developing successfully, as well as some groups in Ukraine and Moldova. The first Russian translation of the book

Light on Yoga by B.K.S. Iyengar appeared in 1993 and was reprinted many times though later all other books by the same author were published in Russian. Also you can find alternative editions on Iyengar Yoga, for instance this my book is dedicated to technical explanation how to master asanas with the support of wall, basically according to main principles of using props in-trinsic to Iyengar Yoga. But its necessary to emphasize that I dont follow them strictly. Its just an example, because there is a choice in literature on this topic.

Talking of the historical development of Iyengar Yoga in Russia its necessary to notice the peculiar role of Faek Beria, the favorite disciple of B.K.S. Iyengar and the director of Paris Iyengar Yoga Center. First he went to Moscow from France in 1989 specifically to accompany his teacher, but Iyengar himself asked him to visit Russia from time to time and teach Yoga there. Faek Beria accepted the responsibility and for many years he became a guardian of Iyengar Yoga in Russia and the 4

Hatha Yoga Practice: Disciple against Wall very favorite Yoga teacher. Just one month after the First Russian Yoga Conference he came back to Moscow to give some classes and support the interested people, who couldnt imagine their life without Yoga. In 1990 Faek Beria came to Moscow again but except of a common class he took part in a TV-program for popularization of Iyengar Yoga in the entire Russia.

Next time he visited Petersburg, and just one year later there was a permanent group of Yoga-practitioners which established new Petersburg Iyengar Yoga Center. Faek Berias seminars still attract a lot of Russian people almost every year. As a whole, you can see a good example of indirect way, by which sometimes Yoga goes from India through Europe to Russia.

Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga in Russia Though Iyengar Yoga is without doubt recognized in Russia, we should emphasize that Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga is much more popular. The keeper of this Hatha Yoga style is Pattabhi Jois from Mysore, who is respected by practitioners, however Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga is taught by Russian Yoga-teachers in a different way. Basically the vinyasa (dynamic sequence of asanas) is accepted as a principle but the order of asanas complies with the so-called Free Flow, and each class is different from another one. In Moscow and Petersburg every beginner can choose one of such Yoga-teachers, who dont claim that they teach Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga, though their stile is very similar to this type of practice. Still there arent any Rus-5