Namaste Ripple Yoga Community
When we step on the path, we consciously evolve and join forces with the Universe. This is a gradual process that requires patience, persistence and a connection to a living tradition. In stepping on your path and participating in the courses within Ripple Yoga, you are connecting with the living tradition of Gitananda Yoga. Know that you have gained access to a wealth of information and support. We wish to build a bridge from a westernized approach to yoga back to the true teachings that have been time-tested through the ages.
The power of the lineage is not just the teachings themselves but the way in which they are taught. In the way they are taught, they often produce similar results in everyone. That is a beautiful thing when it comes to understanding the unity of all our human existence. We tend to get caught up in the differences and duality. This is why we have laid out the curriculum in the manner that we did. It allows you to experience the practices and teachings in a wholly integrated, step by step manner. This will allow the teachings to come alive in you over time as you evolve and progress.
When we study and practice teachings that are tethered to a particular lineage, it allows the teaching to remain pure. Much of westernized yoga has become diluted and taught from a place of misunderstanding and lack of true experience. This is due to over commercialization and profit-seeking. Somewhere along the way, we lost the true essence of what yoga is. What spoke to me about Gitananda Yoga at ICYER at the Ananda Ashram was the emphasis placed on the quality of students seeking the teachings, rather than the quantity. There were only about 7 of us on Team 47 during the six month intensive teacher training program. As a result, it became a truly special, soul-enriching, challenging and life-changing experience.
Our teacher, Dr Ananda gives a beautiful talk on Gitananda Yoga, a humanistic tradition of yoga in his Scintillating Saturdays video series that speaks to the truth and depth of what we are discussing here.
I feel blessed to have learned Yoga the way it was taught thousands of years ago, in a gurukula (house of the guru) setting in southern India, living and breathing Yoga of the entire self and soul for 6 beautiful months. My story, which I am sharing with you at Ripple Yoga, is a lifetime in the making, and I am grateful and blessed that my dharma is to now share it with you so that you can continue to write your story, become your intentions and be a part of the Ripple Effect in your own life.
In Love and Unity,
Sarvesh
