Article in Yoga and Total Health June 2011

Click on the pic to enlarge and read.

Yoga and Total Health is a monthly magazine published by 

The Yoga Institute, Santacruz, Mumbai.

Article in Yoga and Total Health Feb 2011

Click on the pictures to enlarge and read.

Note: Yoga and Total Health is a magazine published by The Yoga Institute, Santacruz, Mumbai, India.

I Learnt Karma Yoga from a 4 Year Old

"Do not train a child to learn by force or harshness; but direct them to it by what amuses their minds, so that you may be better able to discover with accuracy the peculiar bent of the genius of each."   - Plato

Teaching yoga to very young children is generally not advised, but I have a four year old student to whom yoga was recommended by her doctor; and teaching her has been the most harrowing and most enlightening experience of my life. 

This child is sometimes so enthusiastic, that I have to keep up with her changing ideas. She gets tired of one thing very fast and moves on to another. This keeps me very alert, constantly on the lookout for changing moods.

She is also moody and sometimes just sticks her thumb in her mouth, lies down and refuses to move. No amount of coaxing or scolding can shake her. In fact, that only instigates her more. What I slowly learnt was that being her friend, rather than a teacher worked better for the both of us. A lot of flexibility and patience is required on the teacher's part. 

No kid likes to be ordered around all the time. They need someone to listen to them and humour them. We need to give them a bit of free hand, let their creativity blossom, ask them to invent fun Asanas of their own. If they get carried away, enthusiastically bring the attention back to some aspect of yoga like it's a game. 

My student's mother once told me, "She looks forward to your class because it is one class she feels is for herself." This really helped build my self-esteem. This girl was my first student. I had never dreamed of teaching children and wasn't sure I knew how. In the beginning, it was pretty rough. I didn't know how to keep things lively, to catch her attention. Scolding her, being strict would impact her very strongly as she is extremely sensitive to negativity. I did not want to hurt her, but how to continue like this? Many times, I didn't feel like going to class. I almost picked up the phone and cancelled it many times. 

However, something in my heart told me to keep trying. Be creative, I told myself. "But I'm not creative, I'm very practical!" my mind argued. But I realized that was just an excuse. I thought of different ways to teach, did some research online, found interesting stories with morals, learnt new games. I started getting small gifts like channa, or almonds as a surprise and explained how and when to eat them, why they were good for health. These tiny surprises also excited her so much. 

Today, I am confident that no matter what mood she would be in, whether crying, sleepy, angry, happy or distracted, I can spend some positive time with her and teach her something worthwhile. 

I remind myself to always be interested and encouraging in whatever small thing she does and praise every small achievement. Positivity and enthusiasm always work better than scolding and putting them down for not behaving. 

Because of my first student, I can now easily make friends with any kid I come across; and to tell you the truth, they are the best company to have- full of innocence, non-judgmental, enthusiastic, joyful and they have perfect concentration an observation.

Karma Yoga is all about concentration, constant improvement, creativity and joy in work. And so, I learnt Karma Yoga from a 4 year old and even today, I play, jump, crawl, chat, draw, stick, water plants and learn from my little teacher.

Prevent Flu

Almost everyone I know is coming down with the flu. If one person in the family catches it, the others soon follow. We have so many natural ways to prevent and combat this flu. If we are aware of them, we can forget our fears and be confident that we will be able to handle whatever comes our way.

Awareness
The first and foremost thing to do is to be aware. Make sure that people around you are not infected. If they are, and you have no choice but to be close to them, make sure that you do not touch anything that could be infected by them. eg. do not use the same napkin to wipe your face, do not use the same glass/bottle to drink water from, do not share the food from the same plate.

Watch your own body. Does anything seem out of the ordinary? Does your throat pain or irritate even a little? Do you feel heavy in the head as though the sinuses are clogging up? BE AWARE so that if you find anything amiss, you can take immediate action.

Observe Hygiene
Wash your hands before every meal, use a handkerchief if you cough or sneeze. If anyone around you is not using a handkerchief for the same, feel free to tell them. Better safe than sorry.

Sore Throat
If you find that the throat is slowly being affected, take action immediately. Drink warm water, do Kapalarandhradhouti. Make the following mixture:

Neem powder- 25 gms
Tusli powder - 25 gms
Adusol powder - 25 gms
Amla powder - 25 gms

Buy these powders separately (do not buy a ready mixture). They will be available in any ayurvedic shop.
Mix these powders, take a teaspoonful, mix with required amount of honey (1tsp) and have the mixture thrice a day. This will help prevent/cure sore throat.

In case of lots of cough in chest, keep a hot water bag on chest for some time. It will loosen up the cough. Then lie the left hand side so that the cough can come out easily. (Left side so that the Pingala/right nostril is open- helps heat the body).

In case of Cold
Take regular steam
Kapalarandhradhouti
Mix ginger (sooth) powder with hot water and apply paste on the face. It burns on the face but generally does not affect the skin. It melts cough in the sinuses.
(Note: People with very sensitive skin avoid this mixture)

Do try these few tips. If you feel you need medicine/antibiotics, you can follow the above in any case. It will complement the medical treatment.

Any questions, you are welcome to ask.

Stay Well!

Fighting Corruption Within

There is a great movement going on under Anna Hazare's guidance. I heartily support his cause.

Fighting corruption is not easy and it needs real guts to fight a powerful corrupt government.

However, I wonder how many of us who support him and are fighting against a corrupt government, are actually honest ourselves.

If we fight a cause, we need to believe in it completely. How many of us have not broken a single traffic signal ever in our lives, how many have not given bribe to the traffic police? How many of us have not paid a peon extra to get our work done quickly in college? How many of us have not used influence/ contacts to get admission in college or a job?

How many of us completely deal in white when doing business and show our complete records honestly for income tax? How many of us silently add our own commission when doing a favour for a friend?

Well, what's done is done, but the way ahead looks more hopeful. For starters I admit that I have not been honest in my dealings and I vow to never do it again. The only way ahead is to be honest to yourself. So go ahead, first admit your own follies. Confess and redeem yourself. Then we will really be fighting a just cause.

Anna Hazare Zindabad!

The Story of The Yoga Institute

Am I a Sincere Student of Yoga?

I have been blessed to have access to some of the most senior Sadhakas at The Yoga Institute. They have been pursuing Yoga since more than 30 years, and due to my interest in helping out with activities and other lucky circumstances, I ended up being invited to the meetings they have for helping each other progress in their practice of Yoga.

One day we were discussing on the topic, "How do I believe I am a sincere student of Yoga?"

Most of us claimed that we were not as sincere as we should be. We were lazy, or lost our balance of mind many times, did not practice asanas religiously with the right attitude etc.

However there was one Sadhaka who said, "There is nothing like a sincere or insincere student of Yoga. There is only a Student of Yoga."

We cannot reach Samadhi so easily. It may take lifetimes. But what is important, is progress in our mental, spiritual and household aspects.

Our Guru, Dr. Jayadeva nodded and said, "Religiously trying, never giving up, persistence," are a few qualities we should have. Keep doing good deeds, keep good company. Keep trying. Progress will follow on its own.

Whenever I see Dr. Sahab or hear him say a few words, I find will power to be disciplined in my practice. That is why I keep going to such meetings (Satsangs).

Laziness- the biggest obstacle to spirituality

As you can see, I haven't written a blog post for some time now. It was not for the lack of a subject to write.

In fact, every waking, sleeping, walking and talking moment I find another interesting thing to write about and I file that topic away into the list in my head. But that is the main problem. We have a habit of filing things away for later use and then sometimes we never end up using it.

I suffer from this habit a lot. Just last week, I decided that I will be very regular in my Asana practices. My body has become unusually stiff and it needs oiling. But I ended up actually practicing asanas only on two of those days.

Since childhood, my problem has been laziness. I was lazy when doing my homework, lazy when it came to walking (till I was 5 years old, I forced my parents to carry me everywhere we went). I even used to be lazy when it came to brushing my teeth.

Thankfully, I'm not that lazy anymore. I can assure you I am clean and so are my teeth. Still, when it came to writing this blog, I became a victim of the old habit again.

Patanjali's Yoga Sutra 1.30 also talks about laziness as being one of the obstacles on the path of Yoga.

Sutra 1.30 says that disease, languor, doubt, indecision, carelessness, laziness, sensuality (i.e. hankering after objects), erroneous perception and instability are the obstacles on the path of Yoga.

Over the past two years I have been struggling in my fight against laziness and doubt, which have prevented me from regular disciplined practice of Yoga and prevented me from believing completely in the Yoga principles, my gurus and myself.

During this struggle I found three solutions to overcome my laziness.

1. Laziness is due to an excess of Tamasic (dull) state. There are 3 gunas- Rajas, Tamas and Sattva (which I will explain in a later post). To overcome the tamasic state and get into the positive Sattvic state, I made some diet changes, like having freshly cooked, natural food and positive thinking.

2. I forced myself to practice asanas. I made a vow that I would not eat my next meal untill I did me asanas. I had to force myself for a few days, but then the body started craving asanas on its own and I did not have to force myself. Asanas became natural.

3. I stopped planning and started doing. I used to think "I'll do asanas in the afternoon". In the afternoon I'd think "I'll do them in the evening." I kept planning but did nothing. Now, in the morning, I do not give my mind time to think. I just slide out of my bed and onto the mat on the floor and start with my asanas.

So if you are feeling lazy today, don't give in to the monkey mind. Zip its mouth shut and do your thing.