Pandoraspace

Day 2 of cramming for Faeq Biria’s worshop: The word to describe today’s class in UNEXPECTED.

To borrow the words of Forest Gump - “[Yoga] is like a box of chocolate, you never know what you are going to get.”

I was not expecting Rina to teach today but she did.

Before class started, Rina asked if anyone had asthma.  I thought that Rina had asked this question to warn us that today’s class would be difficult.  I was wrong.  Rina asked the question because she wanted to light incense to scent the room.  Also, I thought today’s lessons would be standing poses, which I dread.  I was pleasantly surprised that today was all about forward bends and twists.  Although forwards bends and twists are tough, I enjoy them because I am at peace when I execute those poses.  

Classes usually begin when the teacher tells the students to sit in sukhasana (sitting with you legs crossed and your palms pressed together), and with eyes closed, say “Om”.  Today, Rina began the class, with a short talk about the Puruksha (the Seer or soul) and the Prakrti (the Seen or everything else). From what I remember, Rina said that the soul or Puruksha is our true selves. Our true selves know no sadness, happiness, pain or joy.  Rather, in our true selves, there is peace from finding ourselves.  Often times, however, we do not recognize our true selves. For this reason, we feel sadness, pain, happiness and joy.  Rina further explained that Prakrti is everything else that we sees.  Prakrti is what gives us false impressions about our true selves.  According to Rina, our Puruksha is like the sun, which is the true source of light.  Whereas, our Prakrti is like the moon, which is capable of giving light but is not the true source of light.  Like the moon, our Prakrti bears something of our true nature but is not quite us.  The reason Rina spoke of Puruksha and Prakrti is because today’s lessons are intended to aid us look within ourselves to find our Puruksha and rid ourselves of the impression of ourselves that we get from the Prakrti.  According to Rina (and by experience I confirm that what she says is true), today’s lessons allows us to fold into ourselves when we do forward bends and to open up our chest and hearts when we do twists.

Half way through the class, we were told to go into paryankasana (this is a pose where you start by kneeling on the floor and slowly bend backwards).  In the variation of paryankasana that Rina asked us to do, I suddenly felt fear as I was bending backwards.  For some unexpected reason, I felt that I was going to drown head first.  It called to mind that time, when I was in college and would get nightmares that I would not be able to wake up because I was drowning head first.  After reminding myself that my fear is baseless, I forced myself to get into the pose and I was able to sustain the pose for some time.

As a rule, I am a very realistic person.  I believe that you cannot squeeze blood from the stone.  During this class, Rina forced us to get into another pose when we were all tired and she said that she would try to squeeze blood from a stone and she did.  Rina was able to get everyone to do several more poses.  This was unexpected to say the least.

So, do I think that I would survive Srichan Faeq Biria’s class?  Maybe.  But, he will have to squeeze blood from a stone like me.