Course overview
Delivery mode: 2-day workshop
Designer & Instructor: YogaVaahini Foundation and Ritambhara under the banner of INDICA Yoga
Medium of instruction: English
Dates: July 27-28, 2019
Background
The most popular motivation for Yoga these days is health and wellbeing. Given the alarming rise of lifestyle disorders – both physiological and psychological, Yoga-based therapy and/or counseling is fast becoming a sought-after skill both for one’s own personal use as well as for a career.
However, it is not easy to decide where to enroll in a Yoga therapy course. There is a bewildering variety of flavors of wellness interventions such as Yoga, Ayurveda, Naturopathy. Even in Yoga, there are numerous schools and their distinction or synergy is often not clear. To add to the confusion, everyone of them seems to be self-sufficient and “better” than the others.
However, ancient Indian wellness methods, though diverse, are all based on a common underlying model of the human system and the environment. The difference among the methods arises typically from their emphasis on one or other aspect of the common systemic model and interventions based on that aspect.
It would be nice to have a Yoga-based wellness scheme that (i) clearly defines its place and scope in the comprehensive Indic model, (ii) has proven rigorous and effective techniques of wellness diagnosis and intervention rooted in the model and (iii) admits the value and role of other schools of wellness and its synergy with them. Such a system is amenable to rigorous academic study and research in a University setting to advance the knowledge and its application further.
Target audience
- Yoga instructors
- Students and faculty of psychology and naturopathy
Details
The features of the Krishnamacharya-Desikachar Yoga tradition as seen above, were amply demonstrated at this recently concluded 2-day introductory workshop on Yoga therapy, hosted by MIT Vishwashanti Gurukul CBSE School in Kothrud, Pune in collaboration with Maharshi Vedavyas School of Vedic Sciences, MIT-ADT University, Pune.
The Krishnamacharya-Desikachar tradition skillfully combines the principles of Ayurveda, several dimensions of Yoga, Sankhya and Indic Aesthetics to bring a well-rounded approach that addresses wellness comprehensively from its roots.
The participants were able to understand that there are three actors in the wellness process – the self, the body and life itself along with their models of operation and mutual interaction. The participants got an overview of the 4-stage treatment process derived from the Patanjali Yoga sutras and its theoretical underpinnings.
They were taught aasana-cum-breathing exercises to assess as well as regulate the operation of pancha-praanas and three gunas. They could appreciate the need as well as method of personalizing the intervention regime to suit the inner and physiological state of the wellness seeker. They understood the role of chanting in healing via its interplay with udaana vaayu.
The instructor, Sri Parthasarathy Ramanujam is an ace Yoga therapist of YogaVaahini as well as a seasoned software architect. He was able to articulate the conceptual structure of Yogic wisdom and its rationale very well by connecting its relation to Ayurveda and saankhya traditions. He could thoroughly satisfy the inquisitive participants who were predominantly from Psychology and Yoga background, and were seeking those foundations to better appreciate the practice.
