Yoga - A Practice for Modern Times?
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Swami NiSCHalananda, Founder director of mandala yoga ashram
A twist of fate brought me to Mandala Yoga Ashram. It’s an amazing place; a collection of old farm buildings lovingly transformed into a spiritual retreat.
Last week, I had the pleasure of speaking to Swami Nischalananda, the founder director of Mandala Yoga Ashram. Swami Nischalanada set up the ashram after years studying with his teacher in India. He wasn’t born into a spiritual life, but started off much the same as other young man of his age. His early years were spent playing football, cricket, rugby and fishing. He first came across yoga while travelling, then decided to pursue it while working in Belfast. The yoga centre he found there eventually led him to India.
You might wonder why I’m including this interview on an acupuncture website. Firstly, I am privileged to call Swami Nischalananda my teacher. He has been instrumental in my journey to becoming an acupuncturist. That might seem strange but without him I wouldn’t be doing this.
Secondly, because the practice of yoga is so relevant to modern day times. Stress is a factor in many conditions I see in clinic and yoga has ways to help people deal with stress in day-to-day life.
Here's part of our conversation – you’ll find a full recording at the bottom of the page along with a link to Mandala Yoga Ashram. The ashram offers free resources which are well worth a look, as well as the Ashram Sanga, an online membership with weekly teachings, and residential courses.
What are your thoughts on the proliferation of yoga in the West, from meditation classes to hot sweaty classes based on pure physicality?
“it’s the initial step where people actually start to deepen, start to get in touch with their bodies, and in this way, get in touch with their emotions and their feelings and their thinking.”
Most of us start in the physical stuff because we feel good, and it stretches the body and so forth. If you start automatically you are then, how should we say, being initiated into yoga at that level? And of course, if you carry on practicing yoga generally, it automatically leads to questions about, what are these other forms of yoga? So, yeah, in the modern world, there's all kinds of yogas going on, most of which I've never heard of. Actually, they're all modern creations. But it's the initial step where people actually start to deepen, start to get in touch with their bodies, and in this way, get in touch with their emotions and their feelings and their thinking. Some people are quite happy to practice Hatha Yoga, physical yoga, for years and years and years, that's no problem. That's where they're at and it is absolutely perfect. But many people also, they start to wonder about about mantra yoga and meditation and all these other forms of yoga and even some of them discover, for example, that there's an ashram here in Wales, which I started, of course. And they wonder, what's an ashram? And they come along here for a weekend or a week or even longer, and it gives them an opportunity to take time out from the world's activities and to to go deeper into yoga. So it's all good. And when I was in India, people told me that yoga is now being taught in different adult education centres - and someone said, but it's only physical stuff. But I said, that's great. Doesn't matter what kind of stuff it is. People are actually going to some form of yoga, and it will bring changes, qualitative changes, in those people.
Q. I think you've partly answered my next question, which was, how can yoga help a person in the outside world, someone who hasn’t got the time or the inclination to go and live in a spiritual community, but is there anything else you'd like to add?
“ Once we realise that it actually improves the quality of our life and reduces our stress levels in our daily life, then we can see that it’s time justified”
I think even if you go to a yoga class once a week, you're sharing, with like minded people or different. But you're just giving an hour or an hour and a half just to deepen, just to be with yourself, actually. Most of us, we're very busy, but I think we can all give an hour, hour and a half, or something like that, every week to improving the quality of our thinking, feelings, so forth. So that's something, the fact that there are classes available in every nook and corner of the UK and elsewhere, you'll find there's some kind of yoga class going on. Even though we're busy, if we realise that the quality of our mind also means that we're more efficient and less stressed, then we think, if I can spend 15 minutes, or even 10 minutes or half an hour every morning doing some kind of practice, whether it's physical stuff, whether it's chanting, whether it's meditation, whatever it may be, we realise that time given requires some kind of discipline. You've got to say, every morning, even if I don't feel so good, I I will do some practice. Once we realise that it actually improves the quality of our life and reduces our stress levels in our daily life, then we can see that it's time justified. So I think these are the important things, and that's the best way to start.
Following on from that, if you're that time challenged person, and you're thinking, I just want to start with 10 minutes, what is the the number one practice you would recommend for somebody?
Well, I think physical stuff, because we are living in a stress filled world, and I think many of us spend too much time in front of screens. We don't exercise the body enough. If you can do 10 minutes of physical Hatha Yoga, simple practice, and maybe finish with closing your eyes and dedicating your practice to the benefits of your society and the people around you.
Up it to 15 and then chant a mantra. The vibrations of the mantras are very powerful. They have a very direct impact on our mind and our body and our feelings, and they needn't be Sanskrit mantras. Most of the mantras in yoga are Sanskrit based because they've been used for hundreds or even thousands of years, and they've been time tested. But it could be a mantra from your own language. You can use a word or a couple of words which has a meaning and just repeat it, or think about it. All these kind of things can have an enormously beneficial impact on our lives and and then, if you get time, come along to the ashram.
I think a lot of people might not know what to do. Could you give a mantra that people could use?
There's two that come to mind. One is the mantra Om and it's a very powerful mantra. It comes out of Hinduism. It comes out of yoga. It's there in Buddhism, also there in Sikhism. It's a very powerful sound vibration, and if we chant it, then we can feel the impact on our body and mind, and if we're disturbing our neighbours, then, of course, we can do it mentally. Actually, I think it's more difficult mentally, but it also is doable. It has a very important, profound meaning, which I won't go into a moment - I can explain that in another discussion. But it's the vibration. It's the vibration which somehow penetrates into us and can help us to remain balanced and less stressed. The second one, which I'm also very fond of, it's the Gayatri mantra. You'd have to learn that from someone, and that's a very powerful mantra. In that mantra, as you chant it aloud or even whispering or mentally, you try and feel the sun in your heart. It's been a visualization here, and by feeling the sun or light in your heart, you are kind of, again, diminishing the stress level, and it gives you an openness to life and the experiences of life
Resources
Mandala Yoga Ashram
www.mandalayogaashram.com