What's In The Envelope?

This page is an Overview of some of what you'll be learning, and why, if you sign up for the DSL Trainings. This is the first page of the six sheets of paper in the package I am mailing to Yoga Teachers, Therapists, and those interested in Conscious Stretching, around the Greater Boston and New York City areas.

What's This All About, Anyway?

You and I both know that yoga is changing, and in some cases, dramatically. Some modern approaches are barely recognizable as "yoga" in comparison to traditional teaching, or each other. Needless to say, some people believe many of these modern changes are for the worse. For example, the more-or-less slowed down but intense exercise type classes taught in some health clubs are called yoga, but often lead to injury, and there is often no real inner-attention paid to, no real awareness of, what the class members are doing, and maybe not even the teacher. … Probably not what Patanjali had in mind.

Yet many of todays yoga masters from India, who claim to be teaching an authentic, traditional, even ancient style, in many cases teach very differently from each other. … Which one would Patanjali approve of, or not? And why? … What would Patanjali say about these more recent, diverse changes? How could we know? Does it really matter?

And some so-called modern-day experts will start out with "Yoga is …" and then fill in the blanks to their own personal preference or interpretation of what Yoga IS. But it will be phrased as if they are going to, or have access to, the definitive source.

And the level of attachment some people have to yoga being done or thought of in a certain way is something to behold. It sometimes goes to the point of verbal violence. Makes you wonder how they'd behave if they had not studied detachment at all! (Of course, J. Krishnamurti said that many ideas about attachment — both in the East and here in the West — completely miss the original meaning, but that's another story for another time.)

Well, there are a lot of "Yoga is …"'s out there, and some very different from each other, and any one definition tends to leave at least somebody's interpretations out of the picture. I, on the other hand, am NOT going to try and tell you what Yoga IS. I do hope to give you some idea what Yoga is for ME, and why, and how you might benefit form taking my programs.

Tradition versus Transcendence

Joel Kramer, whom Yoga Journal calls the First American Yoga Master and the Father of American Yoga, says that tradition is like history. It is a way of understanding and learning from yet going beyond the past. Tradition is not, ideally, "a vice to squeeze the present into." 

Ken Wilber, one of the most widely published and read authors on transpersonal psychology and spirituality in the world, says that human evolution is about transcendence. We must continually go beyond our traditional understandings and practices. Yes, we include and master the old insights, knowledge and skills, but we must continually go beyond therm to keep up with human evolution. Often, this means abandoning certain elements that do not serve us, or are no longer relevant.

The contents of this envelope are my attempt to communicate with you about an approach to yoga that I will admit upfront to be very non-traditional. And to tell you the truth, you might not like how untraditional it is. You might prefer to be one of the people who preserve the traditional teachings as best you can, so that people who want them can have access to them. And you know what? That's truly great by me. I think it is extremely important that knowledge of and from the past be preserved.

Charting New Territory

You might, on the other hand, have chosen to be one who explores newer, less charted territory. You might be more interested in yoga as a tool of living that must keep up with the changes in human beingness and cultural reality. You might prefer more innovative approaches to yoga.

I too like to think the innovative approach is at least as important. And I've devoted most of my life to that process, of helping bring yoga into the 21st Century, into the Western Paradigms of living, thinking and being.

And yes, on the surface, because of the more physical, outward focus of the West, my work appears more physically focused at first. Yet, from a Western psycho-philosophical and spiritual point-of-view, the methods I teach are, I believe, a very conscious and introspective approach to bodymind practices — to physical/mental Yoga or, Conscious Stretching if you prefer. Yes, we start with the physical body. But we quickly start digging deep into the mind-body connection and the psycho-emotional forces that drive our yoga, and our lives.

And just so you know, I do not engage in nor teach any of the more mystical, cultural, aesthetic, guru-oriented or religious elements from the East. I'll leave that to others. Maybe even you. … And you can do both, you know.

Yoga for the WEST of Us

Yes, there ARE Essential Insights from the East that are VERY important and included in the programs I hope to be working with you on. Yet we live in America, in a Western culture and tradition. For those over here who still have a spiritual outlook on life (which is admittedly dwindling), it is a very different and more diverse spirituality here than it is in the Traditional East. (Although many of them are breaking from their traditional past as well.) 

Many others have just about zero interest in spirituality, and they are not getting into yoga for those reasons. Not in the beginning, anyway. To me, their needs and desires, even if it's just about loosening their muscles some when they get up in the morning, are just as important as anyone else's.

Philosophy, Psychology & Science of Being Human

If you are really interested in the background philosophy and psychology of how this all works, then we'll have plenty of that for you too. It will, however, be presented in a Western framework. … I have assembled a large body of perspective and knowledge that helps us understand the human condition in a Yogic way, but in Western context.

Now, to tell you the truth, that used to bother me. The ideas, concepts and insights I found to be most important just weren't much addressed in Eastern terms. And I found it too difficult to communicate via Sanskrit or Eastern terminology to most Westerners what I wanted, so I gave up and now rely fully on the English language and Western ways of thinking. Yet I was for years still afraid I was losing something in the translation, or lack of it.

Compared To Ancient, Traditional Yoga

But … In 2002 and 2003, I was invited to teach human sciences, plus my own principles of yoga practice and therapy, to month-long yoga teacher trainings in Sedona, Arizona, at 7 Centers Yoga Arts. And they were steeped in the ancient Bihar Yoga Tradition of Swami Satyananda Saraswati in Bihar, India. It's a tantric approach to Yoga and Kriya, and very traditional and pretty intense. They do a lot of borderline mystical stuff, too. Ruth Hartung, the co-founder, often sat in on my classes and would often comment to the students on how what I was teaching was directly correlated with this or that concept they were teaching from their far more traditional, tantric approach, only delivered in English language and concepts.

I did find a few things that were out of sync, but many traditions within the Far East itself have points of disagreement too, so there's not much one can do about that. … So based on my experiences with Ruth and 7 Centers, and their students, I stopped worrying about whether I was getting the job done even though I was not presenting it in the traditional language and concepts.

Regardless, it is my hope to present yoga in a way that is more relevant and useful to the Western mind, body and culture. …

An Anatomical, Scientific Approach To Asana Creation

For example: When choosing a particular yogasana to practice, we do not start, or even end, with the classical positions. In my YogasAnalysis™ program, we'll look at the structural anatomy (locations of muscles, fascia, tendons, ligament, joints and bones) and functional kinesiology (the study of what happens when a specific or group of muscles contracts or relaxes) of the human body in general. Then we'll check the unique structural relationships and posture of the Student or Client standing in front of us. And of course, in the more challenging cases, we might have to apply our knowledge of neuromuscular, myofascial & musculoskeletal physiology to understand the different possibilities of what might be going on for that individual.

Only then do we build the asana from the ground up, the inside out, selecting which individual movements should be incorporated, based on the total of relevant scientific and structural knowledge and in-the-present-moment observations we make.

As a result, the asana may or may not look like one of the traditional asana, and we might internally work it very similarly or quite differently. But it will be closely tailored for the individual human being standing in front of us, regardless of their level of skill, from beginner to advanced practitioner or teacher.

We will NOT be attempting to get their body to conform to some Recommended Asana and so-called Proper Alignment that some people are often forced into by their own egos or their instructor. For many people, that is a direct ticket to injury, pain and dysfunction.

Yes, doing this approach in group classes can be a challenge, and sometimes not very possible. But you might find yourself redesigning the way you work with your students, at least the beginners, after you start gaining this kind of knowledge.

If that is something you want to be able to do, but are not yet too sure how to go about it, then I'm your guy. At least, that is, according to a lot of other people who've taken my programs. And you can check out what some of them say by clicking on the Testimonials link on one of my web pages.

Applying Mental Yoga

When it comes to mental yoga, we also include many insights into human psychology — the mental and emotional, the sub- and unconscious dynamics — that work in every asana one performs, not to mention life itself. As you know, for some people, this can quickly become a greater focus than the physical aspects. … At least for a while.

Helping You Help Your Beginning &
Therapeutically Challenged Students

Since this is a ground up, inside out system, and, frankly, most of this stuff is not taught in many places that I know of, all participants in my trainings start from the very beginning. You'll be encouraged and supported in thinking and feeling everything from the point of view of your least experienced or most challenged Student or Client

And because yoga is now attracting many kinds of people that formerly were not prone to trying or practicing yoga, this system is designed primarily with them in mind. Yet many of my Private Clients have been yoga teachers practicing and teaching for decades, who studied with some of the top world-masters, and now find themselves in pain or dysfunction to the point they can barely teach anymore.

Yet most of them, after a few session with me, can become pain free quite quickly. Although most of them find they have to change certain things about how they were teaching, including stuff that their world-class master taught them to do.

So this approach is to help better prepare you for working with:

• Beginners who've never done yoga
• Very Tight People
• People with Injuries or Dysfunction
• People who need Stress & Tension Reduction, more than Fitness
• Long time Practitioners (even Teachers) who need their approach redesigned

In one way, although this approach is definitely designed to help YOU enhance your abilities as a teacher and practitioner, it is not aimed so much at you. It is aimed at your students who fit, more-or-less in the above list.
So you don't come to my programs expecting to do YOUR yoga. You come to learn about how to work with the beginners, the therapeutically challenged, how to put your self in their shoes (well, they might not be wearing shoes, but you know what I mean), how to relate to where they are at, rather than where you think they should be.

Adding To, Not Replacing, What You Already Do

And this work is NOT about you giving up what you already know. It is about adding to, possibly modifying what you already do. But because it is science-based, it can only add to your understanding of how the human body works, how to figure out what needs to be down, and how to get there.

I do hope you'll read the rest of this package of materials, and then give me a call or send an e-mail, and discuss how I can help you expand your Knowledge, Insights & Skill In The Practice & Teaching Of Yoga.

Please GO TO The Next Page In This Series of Pages

Thanks for Reading,
David Scott Lynn