27 yoga poses, 54 pages of study material, 26 pages of notes and 6 beautiful days full of joy, laugh, amazing people and a positive energy. That's how I'd describe the Neo Yin Yoga course with Deep Kumar.
During spring I randomly came across an announcement of a yin yoga course in Olomouc. I fell in love with yin yoga some time ago and when I discovered that this course is led by an Indian instructor, I felt like I had to go there. I didn't know what to expect, so I tried not to expect anything so I wouldn't be disappointed. I just told myself I'm gonna enjoy it as much as possible. Well, no matter what would I expect, it would be definitely far from the real experince after all ...
Deep (the instructor) says, that yoga shouldn't be taken too seriously. That there's a difference between being "serious" and "sincere" towards yoga. We shouldn't be serious - we should stay playful and curious like little kids. Deep's yoga classes were designed according this idea. First day of the course, we were supposed to say something about ourselves and our hobbies and he also gave everyone a question - do you prefer dancing, singing or laughing? And during the week, we enjoyed all of those things - Yoga philosophy classes were full of jokes and laughter (at the end of the week, when Deep said "I'm going to tell you a joke", everyone was laughing before he even started the story). One of the types of meditation we were doing was the laughter therapy and during the final afternoon, we had to dance to get our certificates ...
The course was every day from 9 in the morning till 5 o'clock in the afternoon. In the morning, we usually started with ásanas, meditation and mantra chanting:
We were learning the yin yoga poses, the possible mistakes, we were learning how to use the tools to create comfort and ease. In the first few lesson, all of us tried to get into the pose on their own and hold it. During the week, we realized that yoga is not about holding the pose tightly and trying to make it look perfect. It's more about feeling relaxed and comfortable and to create modification of the pose for your own body. In the end of the week, when Deep announced a change of a pose, everyone automatically put several bolsters, blocks and blankets under their knees, back, arms .. and made the pose so comfortable that they were able to even fall asleep there.
A good yoga teacher should always show his students the right aliment. Deep went even deeper. He showed us the little things that none of us was even thinking about, but which can really help to get much more from the postures. He showed us that the way you stand on your feet affects your breathing, that stretched fingers in nadi shodhana (alternate nostril breathing) cause tense in our mind, that in some poses your just have to move the "flesh" of your butt a bit backwards and it gets much more comfortable immediately ...
I feel like I've learned much more about yoga in those six days than in the three years I've been doing yoga.
After lunch, we had a philosophy class, which was probably my most favourite part of the day. We were talking about the yin and yang energy, meridians ... and also about the fact that the whole world lives in kind of an illusion, that sometimes all we have to do is to forget that we can think and talk ... that we should realize that time is not real, that we actually created this idea and that there is no past, no future and no present - it's just now ... trying not to give names to all the things around us and just stay fascinated by them, to be in unity with the trees, with animals, with people, with the sky and the whole universe ...
We were talking about the joy that is not dependent on the outer world, about the feeling of happiness that comes from the inside. When Deep started talking, everyone just had to start smiling at him and smiling at each other ... If someone wasn't intertested in the topic, they could just relax or take a nap on the bolster. I've never experienced such a beautiful relaxed atmosphere anywhere.
During yoga festivals in Ostrava and Brno, I attended different yoga classes with different yoga teachers and different attitude towards yoga. Altough some of the classes were amazing and I'd love to meet those teachers again ... Deep's attitude towards yoga was somehow better than anything I've ever experienced. I've never met such a positive person in my life. Really. There are many people out there who are positive in that weird, fake way .. people who keep telling you things like "Never give up!", "No pain, no gain" .. you know, these people whose motivation doesn't help anyone. But Deep didn't even have to say anything, the positive energy was just comming from the inside and after a day with him, everyone was charged with it.
Every morning I went to the studio and I was curious, what is going to happen. On the other hand I was a bit afraid, that the next day won't be as great as the previous one - cause I thought that's not possible. But it was. Actually, every single day was even a bit better than the previous one.
One day, after the meditation, Deep told us to hug the person who is standing next to us. And then to hug another person .. and another person ... and you know, when you hug twenty people in ten minutes, you just can't get rid of a smile for hours. You're not even smiling - you're shining. You shining when you're watching the people in the street, not matter if the people frown or smile back at you. You're smiling at a dog, waiting behind a shop, at a baby in a baby-carriage, at your reflection in the mirror and at the clouds in the sky. Like if you were in love with the whole world, with yourself and with the whole universe. In that moment, there was nothing but the present moment - no worries, no past, no future. We were right here, right now - which is the goal of yoga after all.
The course was every day from 9 in the morning till 5 o'clock in the afternoon. In the morning, we usually started with ásanas, meditation and mantra chanting:
Om Sarve Bhavantu Sukhinah
Sarve Santu Nir-Aamayaah
Sarve Bhadraanni Pashyantu
Maa Kashcid-Duhkha-Bhaag-Bhavet
Om Shaantih Shaantih Shaantih
We were learning the yin yoga poses, the possible mistakes, we were learning how to use the tools to create comfort and ease. In the first few lesson, all of us tried to get into the pose on their own and hold it. During the week, we realized that yoga is not about holding the pose tightly and trying to make it look perfect. It's more about feeling relaxed and comfortable and to create modification of the pose for your own body. In the end of the week, when Deep announced a change of a pose, everyone automatically put several bolsters, blocks and blankets under their knees, back, arms .. and made the pose so comfortable that they were able to even fall asleep there.
A good yoga teacher should always show his students the right aliment. Deep went even deeper. He showed us the little things that none of us was even thinking about, but which can really help to get much more from the postures. He showed us that the way you stand on your feet affects your breathing, that stretched fingers in nadi shodhana (alternate nostril breathing) cause tense in our mind, that in some poses your just have to move the "flesh" of your butt a bit backwards and it gets much more comfortable immediately ...
I feel like I've learned much more about yoga in those six days than in the three years I've been doing yoga.
After lunch, we had a philosophy class, which was probably my most favourite part of the day. We were talking about the yin and yang energy, meridians ... and also about the fact that the whole world lives in kind of an illusion, that sometimes all we have to do is to forget that we can think and talk ... that we should realize that time is not real, that we actually created this idea and that there is no past, no future and no present - it's just now ... trying not to give names to all the things around us and just stay fascinated by them, to be in unity with the trees, with animals, with people, with the sky and the whole universe ...
We were talking about the joy that is not dependent on the outer world, about the feeling of happiness that comes from the inside. When Deep started talking, everyone just had to start smiling at him and smiling at each other ... If someone wasn't intertested in the topic, they could just relax or take a nap on the bolster. I've never experienced such a beautiful relaxed atmosphere anywhere.
Every morning I went to the studio and I was curious, what is going to happen. On the other hand I was a bit afraid, that the next day won't be as great as the previous one - cause I thought that's not possible. But it was. Actually, every single day was even a bit better than the previous one.
One day, after the meditation, Deep told us to hug the person who is standing next to us. And then to hug another person .. and another person ... and you know, when you hug twenty people in ten minutes, you just can't get rid of a smile for hours. You're not even smiling - you're shining. You shining when you're watching the people in the street, not matter if the people frown or smile back at you. You're smiling at a dog, waiting behind a shop, at a baby in a baby-carriage, at your reflection in the mirror and at the clouds in the sky. Like if you were in love with the whole world, with yourself and with the whole universe. In that moment, there was nothing but the present moment - no worries, no past, no future. We were right here, right now - which is the goal of yoga after all.
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