An Ode to Flow, Part I

I respect all forms of yoga and I like practicing many of them.  I enjoy learning from masters of different disciplines. In this way I build a breadth of experience in order to weave together universal truths that then inform my practice. After twelve years of practicing many forms, however, I have come to feel a loyalty and unshakable enduring love for Vinyasa. 

I say unshakeable because more than a few practitioners and teachers of other forms would have me believe that Vinyasa is a shallow, fast-paced yoga for “fitness” only. And that its lack of attention to alignment will result in injury. Thus it is not true yoga.

What is true yoga then? The Sanskrit term yoga translates as yoke or union. And those original Yogis were looking for union with one thing and one thing only…the divine.

Not all forms of Vinyasa are equal. The Vinyasa I know however is steeped in Bhakti (devotion) and offered like a prayer by masters of the breath, flow, word, and yes, the playlist. When practiced in the clarifying light of Bhakti, it embodies the very definition of yoga as “yoking” to the divine. It is a yoke on a very short rope. Vinyasa for me is a rocket ship to God. But it is not just any old Vinyasa that will take me on that rocket ship. It is the unique combination of a full Bhakti-heart, mastery of connecting breath to the flow and the flow of asana to the Rta (divine order) of the universe.

Tapped in to that cosmic order, I unite with the divine. It is from flowing on this devotional mat that I have looked into Shiva’s third eye and been burned to ash, taken up the loyal heart of Hanuman, was reborn like Ganesh with an elephant head, rose up from the churning sea of milk like Lakshmi to sit on the knee of Lord Vishnu, and basked in the dance and maternal love of Shakti in all her forms.

Those who would say that Vinyasa is not yoga because it doesn’t focus on alignment would be missing the whole point. Flow is the point of vinyasa. Union is the point. However you get there.

Out beyond the ideas of wrong-yoga and right-yoga there is a mat. I’ll meet you there.