Iyengar Yoga Association of the Southeast U.S.

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Homage To A Guru: Manuso Manos July 31st Atlanta Weekend Intensive (8/5/2015 10:28:46 AM)

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The Manouso Manos Weekend Intensive in Atlanta, hosted by Stillwater Yoga began on a very special day. July 31^st is not only a rare blue moon; it is the day that Guru Purnima is celebrated. Purinma is Sanskrit meaning full moon. The word Guru is made up of two Sanskrit root words Gu (darkness or ignorance) and Ru (remover of). Manouso said having a workshop on July 31^st was one of the worst and one of the best days to have one. I have to agree. July 31, 2006, is the date my mom passed. I could argue she was my first Guru. Though she was not a spiritual teacher in the strict sense, she was enlightened in her own way. She taught us from a deep spiritual place of knowing and we embody her lessons today.

BKS Iyengar

Manouso’s Guru is of course BKS Iyengar and though he too is no longer with us physically, he is working his magic light through others with more vibrancy than ever.

Stillwater Yoga studio owner, Kathleen Pringle explains, "Manouso¹s years of dedicated study with Guruji, and the depth of his personal practice shines brightly through his teaching, helping to illuminate our path. Our community is grateful that he comes to Atlanta. And I¹m personally grateful for his guidance and support all
these many years."

Kathleen Pringle with Manouso Manos

Manouso shares BKS Iyengar's magic light through stories and sensations that attach themselves deep within our body’s intelligence. He engages us with an anecdote and teaches us by fixing our minds on a particular action, so our mind doesn’t wonder. It is focused. Perhaps, at first, it is just our imagination on the action, “I am extending the inner line of my big toe forward.” However, that unwavering focus, becomes our Dharna point or concentration, which becomes our Dhyana, our meditation, and then something amazing happens – our imagination turns into intelligence as it seeps into the layers of our skin, to our muscles, and bones, and our intelligence. The physical parts yoke themselves together with the mental parts in ‘beautiful synchronicity’ and nothing else exits. Or perhaps it is more fitting to say that everything yokes to the one action in singularity. The yoking of our intelligence to the action gets stronger and stronger. It brings to mind the Sutra 3.25: baleshu hasti baladini, by practicing samyama (Dharna, Dhyana, Samadhi) you can become as strong as an elephant. In time, we learn to yoke our intelligence to that particular action at will – and then we discover deeper and deeper yoking taking place. Who knows, at some point perhaps we could say, “I reached Samadhi by extending the inner line of my big toe forward.” Stranger things have happened in Iyengar Yoga.

Manouso shared a particularly strange story about one of BKS Iyengar’s special Vibhutis or powers, namely being able to shift the hairs on his body at will. Yes, you heard that right. I wish that could have been captured on film with all of the stop motion technology we have today. The story goes something like this, that BKS Iyengar could make the hair on his legs move towards his hips as he drew the skin of his outer thigh towards the hip in Utthita Parsvakonasana. When Manouso saw this, looking on with mouth agape, BKS Iyengar proceeded to show him another ‘parlor trick’. BKS turned around and made the hair at the nap of his neck stand straight out, a powerful demonstration of his intelligence yoking to pores of the skin and hair. Needless to say, most of us are a long way away from being able to do anything like that, but it goes to show what a steadfast, uninterrupted practice over a long period of time: 1:14 sa tu dirghakala nairantarya satkarasevito srdha bhumih can do.

Manouso Manos in Utthita Trikonasana

Manouso systematically worked our upper and middle backs on Friday evening. On Saturday, he woke up our hips, sacral area, and coccyx. On these boney masses of ignorance, he attempted to fix our intelligence in such a way as to help us discover parts of ourselves we have yet to know intimately. Repeating some actions from previous workshops with more depth and detail to an abiding audience of “more seasoned practitioners”. In Bharadvajasana I and II, we shifted the lift under each buttock, turning to one side and experienced new feedback on the inequities of effort in the right and left sit bones. The poses became a curious wonderland of sensation that deepened with the exploration of the neck’s role in the revolutionary actions.

The Upavistha Konasana, Marichyasana, Janu Sirsasana, and Virasana hip sequence prepared us for Sunday’s hip work, which expanded on our new awareness of the benefits of opposing actions on each hip through poses like Utthita Hasta Padangusthasana at the wall – something introduced in previous workshops, and yet, totally different-- it felt like reading a book once as a kid then reading it again as an adult. His Supta Parsva Padangusthasana with strap singed our awareness even deeper. Personally, I felt a branding iron in my hip joints as I realized how much work I still need to do to get stronger there to avoid hip surgery in years to come. His upper body lessons over the weekend were similar in intensity and resulted in the same branding-iron awareness. However, none of this happens unless we learn to listen and fix our intelligence to the integrity of the directions Manouso provides.

During Geeta’s Birthday Intensive in India, it became very apparent that part of our practice involves the evolution of our hearing capabilities. One student was asked to leave the stadium to put her notes away. Manouso did so as well in his Atlanta workshop. However, I want to stress that having our pen and paper taken away, so we can’t take notes is not a punishment. It is a gift. It is part of our yoga practice. Evolving our hearing faculties in order to remember and yoke mind to body is part of the lesson. Our teachers provide lessons; however, these cannot be taken lightly. These are mere introductions for further exploration.

This is one of the many distinctions between Iyengar Yoga and other yoga. Iyengar Yoga demands the student continues to explore even after the class or teacher training is over. The answers aren’t given to you. You have to seek the answers. Your body and your mind have to embody the lessons, which is why Iyengar Yoga demands a certain level of evolution from its students. It may also be why Iyengar students tend to skew a little older and have higher educations than other yoga students.

Either Iyengar students are smart enough to know they must open themselves up to a new view of themselves, or they actually have enough self-awareness to know they know very little about themselves and Iyengar Yoga is the way to learn more. Regardless, Iyengar students have the discrimination to know there is no other yoga practice that will give them the kind of detailed instruction to bring them to the level of self-awareness they seek better than Iyengar Yoga.

BKS Iyengar spent his entire life, every minute of every day, seeking self-realization. Not only that, he cared enough to figure out how to verbalize his innumerable quests (Bahiranga Sadhana, external quests, Antaranga Sadhana, Internal Quests, and Antaratma Sadhana, Inner Most Quests) through his Kriya Sadhana practice of Tapas, burning interest, Svadyaya, Self Study, and Isvarapranidhana, devotion. Iyengar Yoga demands that of every student and especially their teachers.

Iyengar Yoga can teach you how to gain self-realization and freedom from suffering; however, it is up to you where you take it from there. Iyengar Yoga has a strong community and it is very much yoked around the teachings of BKS Iyengar and his children and grandchildren who carry his legacy. At the same time, the path of Iyengar Yoga is a very individual one.

To gain even a thimble full of the imperishable enlightenment that seemed to seep from every cell of BKS Iyengar's body, you must develop indomitable striving for your own self-realization. You can't be pacified by an illusory community of "thought" or by simply regurgitating Sanskrit and Sutras so that your ego gains the pat on the back it so desperately seeks. The lessons must penetrate your inner-most being.

The pain of that seeking is your guru. Manouso Manos is a testament to that and to the humble albeit grand rewards of liberation that result. He knows his work is not done, he still has much to learn. An example of his continuous striving came when he talked about how many times he practiced the lessons from Geeta's Birthday Intensive last December, so he could understand in his body what she was describing. At sixty-three years old, he truly embodies the intelligence of the lessons he learned from BKS Iyengar and continues to learn from the Iyengar family, and like his Guru, he takes great care in sharing it with us.

Thank you, Manouso.

Namaste.