Interpreting The Practice Of Yoga In A Group Setting

The practice of yoga in a group setting is a new phenomenon. Modern postural yoga in the East and in the West, find the components of the shala (practice space) and the Sangha (gathering for practice) to be very important components of the practice. Nevrin describes that empowerment depends on social situations and shared practices in ways that typically remain unacknowledged from a psychological viewpoint. Here, empowerment is one way of summarizing how many practitioners experience and interpret their yoga practice. Nevrin goes on to try to explain the experience in modern postural yoga through analytically including the practice environment in ways that go beyond individualistic models. Though community helps to create a meaningful experience

Styles of interaction that predominate in these spaces, such as the kind of greeting offered by receptionists, teachers, and other practitioners and the ways in which the teacher interacts with students during practice, further shape practitioners’ experiences of yoga. When arriving at the Ashtanga Yoga Research Institute, there is a marked atmosphere in the room. While the students begin their practice, Pattabhi Jois and his family move around the room, physically intervening in their students’ practices by adjusting their poses. These interventions are extraordinarily authoritative, often wordless or accompanied by minimal and abrupt instructions, manifesting a no-nonsense style of teaching. This no-nonsense approach also extends to interventions where a student is seen to be practicing incorrectly. Adjustments are also commonly physically strong, even overwhelming, marking the teacher’s authoritative control over the students’ bodies and practice. Pattabhi Jois’s authority as a teacher is also made evident in his control over the development of each student’s own practice. After a few days, the student will be stopped at a certain point in the set sequence of asanas and sent off to the finishing room for the closing sequence of postures. Over time, as Pattabhi Jois and Sharath see fit, the student will be given further poses to add to the sequence until the complete

Deriving from the Sanskrit root tap, “to give out heat,” or “to be hot,” tapas variously refers to a process and a product of ascetic practice and the sacred or magical heat that the effort produces. This ritual heat, when produced in the practitioner’s body, is linked to personal transformation and spiritual refinement. Tapas is noted as a means for perfection of the body and the organs through the lessening of impurities, a necessary foundation for the perfection of yoga. Lino Miele’s book Astanga Yoga presents accounts both of toxin-eliminating qualities of vinyasa and the role of heat in a parallel form of internal cleansing, purification, and transformation. Vinyasa is said to imply the synchronized relationship of breath and bodily movement, alongside the practice of energetic “locks,” to produce an intense internal