Anusara Yoga

Anusara Yoga is not limited to mere asana technique or technical instruction. At the heart of yoga there must be an inspiration – a feeling, an attitude, a ‘bhavana’ – which fills the practice with life, so that your yoga becomes a force that transforms your life in line with your own highest intentions – and in line with the intention of the Divine for you. Yoga begins with your choice to participate, your own intention – pravritti – which from the Sanskrit literally means a ‘turning’ of your heart toward your own highest good. Yet yoga is not simply an affair of human intentions; by turning toward your highest good, you draw closer to the greater, more inclusive divine intention by which we are all united.
The highest good we seek to experience through yoga is the abiding experience of our innermost Self. This Self is not the limited ‘I’ that we experience as doing, thinking, feeling and sensing. The Self is the abiding, expansive experience of ‘I’ that we have in moments of calm and peace, or in moments of mental focus, heartfelt compassion and service, and in the experience of unconditional love. The experience of the Self is always present and is at the root of our natural state of awareness; yet we are generally unaware of the presence of this expanded awareness as our minds become busied in the details of life. Our own awareness literally contracts as it adapts to and embraces our finite affairs, and we forget that we can step back and experience the glory and peace of our natural awareness even in the midst of our affairs. Yoga is the practice of ‘re-collecting’ and returning to this state again and again until we once again become settled in it as our home.
This state at its most immediate means to be fully in the present moment as the true and eternal reality. It is in this moment – the ‘Now’ – that Consciousness is present in its fullness, undiminished by the mental ideas and impressions of past and future, and fully potent to realize its creative freedom, its svatantrya. The inner state of yoga is not static; it is a state of being in the flow of the freedom of universal consciousness. In this state there is the quietude of being centered in the still point around which all things turn; it is a state of perceiving and realizing stillness in movement, as well as movement within that stillness, because we become stillness itself. A yogic asana or posture, a yogic breath, a yogic mind or heart, holds the experience of stillness and movement, one inside the other, one constantly transforming into the other.
The experience of being ‘in the flow of grace’ in your practice of yoga – which is the literal meaning of the Sanskrit term ‘Anusara’ – is a living experience not easily communicated through instructions in a book, since so much of the experience is the direct outcome of what you bring to your practice and how you participate in what the yoga has to offer. The technical details, though powerful and effective, are secondary, since yoga is an unfolding from your heart, from the fullness of your inner feeling, rather than from your head. Just the same, technique is what I have to offer here, as a support to your own intention to unfold the beauty of your own heart through yoga.

The Tantric philosophy of intrinsic goodness underlies the methodology of teaching Anusara yoga. Consequently, Anusara yoga teachers, first and foremost, look for the good in all things, especially within themselves and their students. Anusara yoga teachers help enhance and reveal the beauty and Divine qualities that are already present in the students' poses. They do not try to "fix" or "correct" students' alignment. Instead, they are dedicated to serving each student and helping them unveil their innate goodness, worthiness, and Supreme nature. Furthermore, Anusara yoga teachers are committed to helping build and empower each student's self-esteem, while inspiring light-heartedness, playfulness, and joyful creativity within the yoga practice.
Teachers apply an elegant, concise set of alignment principles called the “Universal Principles of Alignment” throughout an Anusara yoga class. A central idea within the Universal Principles of Alignment is the 3 A’s: Attitude, Alignment, and Action. This foundational concept within the Anusara method infuses every pose with a meaningful intention connected to the grand purposes of yoga, creates awareness of specific postural alignment, and fosters balanced action between stability and freedom. The first Principle is ‘opening to Grace’ while Muscular Energy and Organic Energy are the two complementary forces that provide each pose with balanced action between stability and freedom. Secondary alignment principles include Spirals and Loops, which help to bring refinement and precision to each pose.
Ultimately, each student leaves an Anusara yoga class feeling better about him or herself, empowered and delighted by the revelation of his or her Divine nature (Chidananda).