Sunday, February 22, 2009

Parsvakonasana fried Trikonasana - remembering Mary Dunn in Pune

A week after the NY Institute spent the weekend celebrating the life of Mary Dunn, I reflect in Pune upon how lucky her students were. Taking wonderfully inspiring and challenging classes at R.I.M.Y.I. has reinforced these feelings of good fortune. Mary accurately transmitted the teachings coming from Pune. She helped us tap into what Prashant refers to as the body's innate "will to do", goaded us on to develop our "will to learn", and always allowed our "will to be" to surface and come to the fore. When useful, she translated the teachings for us so that they could resonate with our experience and cultural background. And of course there were the food metaphors... Prashant recently challenged us to not be overwhelmed by the combinations he offered us to work with. He supposed that we wouldn't be overwhelmed but instead very pleased by a lengthy restaurant menu, even one, perhaps, the size of a phone book... Two weeks ago we were asked to take trikonasana after first "frying" it in parsvakonasana. This parsvakonasana-fried trikonasana was meant to be altered indelibly in its preparation - not simply trikonasana with some Parsvakonasana on the side! My yoga practice and that of so many others around the world, has been, if I may so, unalterably fried in Mary Dunn and how wonderful is that!

Dmitri