As part of an exercise in working with the sutras during a workshop with Patricia Walden, I was able to connect the theme of aparigraha with a meaningful event in my life.

For my study, I read commentaries on the subject from four sources: B.K.S. Iyengar, Reverend Jaganath Carrera, Edwin Bryant and Rohin Mehta.

Carrera’s definition is to be free of greed, non-hoarding. Guruji says it is non-possession and non-rigidity of thought. Bryant elaborates that if we are seeking enjoyment, bodily or otherwise, that is an outward expression, and we can only become aware of past and future lives by having clarity, which only comes from inward seeking. Mehta’s commentary is the longest and was the most challenging for me to understand, but it was his that brought the idea of aparigraha and its teachings into my own experience.

Mehta says it is not non-possession, but non-possessiveness. Discarding stuff is relatively easy, but non-possessiveness happens in our minds.  With non-possessiveness our minds become homeless—or not rooted in, or clinging to, any conclusions on the meaning of life. It involves giving up its projections and patterns—the same rigidity of thought that B.K.S. describes in Light On The Yoga Sutras. Only by giving up these preconceived notions, can we truly understand the significance of life, and, more importantly, what true action is. This true action is ahimsa, which is only possible when the mind is completely free from all corrupting influences of psychological memory.

My 40-year-old daughter has lived in Rishikesh for 15 years. She has taken vows first as a Bramachari and then as a sannyasini. She is the most content, beautiful, nurturing, nourishing woman I have ever met. At the time of her first vows, her spiritual leader, Swamiji Chidanand Saraswati, bestowed the name Bhagawati on her, and that is how she became known.

When I was a young teen reading The Catcher in the Rye, I decided I would have a daughter named Phoebe. When my daughter was born she was Phoebe. It suited her beautifully. She was, in the 70s and early 80s, the only Phoebe in Los Angeles. Bhagawati was a name I could barely pronounce correctly. Over the years each time she came home from India, my husband and I began calling her “sweetheart” or “cutie” or anything BUT Phoebe or Bhagawati. I was stuck, rigid, and clinging to my past.

Recently when she was at our home a new friend of mine came to the house and said “Phoebe I am glad to meet you.” I could feel her shrink. She would never say anything to me in anger, but I could feel that I had committed an assault on her being. Later, when I apologized, she explained that if I kept referring to her as Phoebe, of course people would continue to call her that.

A few evenings later, she and Swamiji were guest speakers at a studio in Los Angeles. The place was packed. She spoke for 15 or 20 minutes about inner peace and freedom.  I was overwhelmed by, and marveled at, her insights, intelligence, poise and serenity.

When the program was over I said to her “Phoebe has gone and in her place you have truly become Bhagawati.” By releasing my rigidity of thought I was able to truly feel the meaning of ahimsa in a sincere and thoughtful way. And I can understand how, by practicing aparigraha I had prepared for my future life as Bhagawati’s mom.

Living my life has been series of holes and gigantic craters.  I usually walk with passionate intensity that at times translates to insensitivity towards a destination.  Then life or my insensitivity creates a hole or a gigantic crater along my path. I fall and depending on my rigidity, bruise my skin, break couple of bones, or crack my heart into billion pieces.  Then I laboriously nurse my skin, mend my bones or attempt to gather my heart into a whole.  My body mends because I'm alive and to live it must mend.  But my heart, each time it's broken doesn't knit into a whole.  I always leave behind a piece that I couldn't find in the darkness or the piece that caused the crater. Then I meet someone who saw a gigantic crater that I was dying to meet and without any prompting from me spread a safety net in the hungry crater.  As I fell, I didn't see or felt the difference from all the other craters I have fallen in the past.  But as I laid on the safety net with bruised heart, I wondered who placed the net.  I checked my body and felt for bruise and didn't see any.  I checked my heart and felt the bruises turning to purple with shame and mortification.  I looked past the walls of the crater and saw people staring down at me with pointed fingers saying that's what happens when you walk with such passionate intensity.  Others were whispering that she is insane.  My piece of heart that wanted to conform with the pointed fingers and whispers shriveled up and disappeared.  I looked at the purple areas of my heart and thought it will turn the colors of the rainbow.  I realized the piece of my heart that wanted the blandness of conformity needed to disappear for me to see the rainbow. I buried my bruised heart in a deep drawer to pretend that it didn't matter.  That the rainbow of bruises will appear when its time and tried to forget that I was missing my heart.  My poor heart was shivering in fear and wondering why it was being punished.  I didn't know but felt my heart's pain.  Then someone saw that I was missing my heart and showed me to breathe.  To fill my lungs with air and gather them to the center of my heart and release the air.  In observing my breath, I felt my heart expanding and taking uncertain steps trying to think from my heart's center and trying to lose the I of my brain.  I forgot that life is a gift and my heart celebrates with joy in living that at times is filled with pain. Dear teachers, thank you with love from my heart.

On June 16th, B.K.S. Iyengar attended the 2011 China-India Yoga Summit in Guangzhou, China. He met with important Chinese Tai chi and Bagua Kungfu masters, comparing yoga with Chinese physical and spiritual practices. It was one of the most significant cultural exchanges between two civilizations.

From June 17 to 19, Guruji also conducted a 3-day course to give special yoga training. Ten of his distinguished students from around the world assisted including Manouso Manos and Patricia Walden from the U.S., helping to communicate and coordinate between Guruji and the students.

Here Patricia shares her impressions.

Greetings as I return from China. I want to share with you a few precious moments from the extraordinary event that was B.K.S. Iyengar’s historic trip to China. This was the largest group that he has ever taught - 1000 students were expected and almost 1400 were present. In an interview with the Times of India, Guruji spoke of the importance of the event and described it as being the latest step in the thousands of years of cultural exchange between India and China. Chinese speakers likened BKS Iyengar to the Bodhidharma (who brought Buddhism from India to China) and Lao Tzu (one of the founders of Taoism). The Chinese community received Guruji and the senior teachers with overwhelming love and appreciation. Guruji was indefatigable, dynamic and passionate. His teachings were simple yet profound.

At the summit before the conference, Guruji received a rock star greeting at the convention hotel. There were so many students and well-wishers that we were a bit concerned he was going to be trampled!

Before the summit began, there was a day of sightseeing lasting late into the night. The next day a press conference was held where Guruji entered to the sound of the 2001: A Space Odyssey theme! On that second evening, there was a fifteen-course banquet and two hours of talks by yoga teachers from all over Asia.

Guruji talked about the heart continuously and the divinity that lives within it. His words were simple, direct and profound. He closed by telling us to love each other and live peacefully. At the convention he told us how to approach learning: with an empty brain, letting go of our own ideas, with eyes wide open and with heartfelt, attentive awareness.

He began the first day of teaching by holding up a leaf and comparing it to our feet. He was poetic and inspired. He then taught Tadasana, Utthita Trikonasana, Utthita Parsvakonasana, Prasarita Padottanasana and Parsvottanasana. He explained that these are the most important standing poses.

He said, "The brain becomes light when we have good alignment. Our movements should be dynamic, lovely and lively." He ended class with a very deep Savasana.

Guruji was scheduled to teach two hours for each of the first and second days. The first day, he taught all 1400 students for almost three and a half hours. He stood the entire time, and came back halfway through the afternoon class that Birjoo Mehta was teaching (a review of the morning class) to determine if the students were "understanding well." Hard to believe our beloved Guruji is in his 93rd year.

On the second day, he taught for three and a half hours and reviewed the standing asanas from the first class, and then taught Bharadvajasana, Virasana, Parsva Virasana, Marichyasana III and Pascimottanasana. He wove in many of the yoga sutras: I.2, I.14, I.16, II.17 and II.34.

He taught and explained the elements and wove them into his teaching with a special focus on the skin (akasa), both inner and outer. "To work with motion,” he said, “the skin has to be soft." Here's a taste of this teaching: in Bharadvajasana on the back body, the posterior skin moves down. On the front body, the inner skin turns. The skin on the back body should be soft to turn.

On the third day, Guruji's teachings were beyond words during another three and a half hour class. He taught with simplicity, yet at the same time it was subtle and practical. He began by responding to what he observed in the students, saying that some practice for fitness and to be physically attractive and that “This is important, but it’s the beauty of yoga that makes you naturally beautiful.”

“Don’t practice for cosmetic beauty, practice for cosmic beauty. Practice for inner beauty and inner light. When you have inner light you have inner beauty, cosmic beauty. Go from cosmetic state to cosmic state.”

He then began teaching through demonstration by his granddaughter Abhijata. His focus was on how to practice when you are in a mudha (dull) state. He showed supported backbends and supported inversions. For tamas or dullness, he taught to work from the periphery. For a rajassic or over-active state, the same poses done differently. For rajas, you work with the inner body.

Tamas turns to rajas, and rajas turn to sattva. In other words, dullness and lethargy transforms to attachment and activity, and this ultimately transforms to wisdom and peace.

The rest of the class was like a teacher training. He taught five different ways of doing Sirsasana, Sarvangasana and Urdhva Dhanurasana. He taught how to begin working with inversions. It was a very beginner group so he taught from the base in all the asanas, but once again he balanced simplicity with subtlety.

We broke at 1:00 and came back at 3:00 for questions and answers followed by a group photo with all 1400 people. Next came yoga demonstrations and talks. We, the assistants, were honored and garlanded. Then Guruji was garlanded and honored again, and again and again. The Chinese students sang a song about love lasting for ten thousand years. It went right to our hearts. The event was scheduled to end at 6, but continued to 8:30. It was a spectacular event. The Chinese community welcomed us from their hearts and showered us with love.

We are part of an extraordinary lineage, in which the teachings have been passed down to us faithfully.  We have a tremendous opportunity to practice what we have been given and transform our lives.

I return from this experience with joy, fullness and love in my heart.

— Patricia

I am interested in what people have to say about getting insurance for a yoga studio. I have had mine through Fitness and Wellness and needed to change something recently. I have found it very difficult to communicate with them, my premium would be over $700 and I can't find out in a simple way if it would cover what I need. I have one instructor who has her own studio, pays her own insurance and has paid to have me mentioned on her insurance - still Fitness and Wellness think I have to have insurance for her! Any help with getting any other insurance would be welcomed.