Author:
Publication: The Times of India
Date: January 1, 2004
URL: http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/398781.cms
Introduction: He has become a legend
in his lifetime. B K S Iyengar , or "Guruji", has played a key role in
putting the ancient art of yoga firmly on the global map. He has helped
separate the physical aspect of yoga from its spiritual side, taking it
into a secular space beyond the boundaries of India .
The man who allowed yoga to be branded,
albeit reluctantly, in his name spoke to Rohini Nilekani on the eve of
his 85th birthday.
Q.: Looking back at your life and
accomplishments, how does it feel?
A.: I feel really happy and satisfied
that I succeeded in my mission to make yoga respectable. Now, when I see
the wide reach of yoga, I sometimes forget the desperate struggle and the
hard work. I remember only the love and affection I have received from
all my students.
Q.: How do asanas help a student
to realise his inner self?
A.: There are gradations in asanas
, starting from the gross, crude method. Then you refine it and bring it
to a point where the various aspects of the consciousness are made to unite
into a single entity.
Then you go to the source of the
consciousness - the epicentre. In the epicentre, there is no feeling of
the past or the future. Though time is linked with the future, the mind,
the consciousness - everything remains in the state of the present. That
is the highest practice of asana .
But there is a hierarchy in the
progression of an asana , which cannot come in a day. There must be sadhana
. Just abhyasa or doing asanas day in and day out is not sadhana . You
have to search, you have to filter and you have to reach a tranquil state
- that's sadhana , the light of gyana or knowledge.
Q.: Haven't you come full circle
in your teaching? You started with emphasising the spiritual aspect, quickly
realised that people needed to train their bodies first, and concentrated
on asana practice, even at the risk of being called the physical yogi.
Now you are going back to explaining the spiritual moorings of yoga practice.
A.: It is all about the hierarchy
of practice. Do you think all are fit to understand the atma ? Naturally,
I had to start with what people can see and feel. And then guide them from
the body to - in that order - the sense of perception, to mind, to intelligence,
to ego and, finally, to consciousness and atma .
Q.: But if many more students have
to be guided down that path, a lot more work needs to be done and again
we come back to the question of creating teachers for the millions of people
in India.
A.: That, my friend, is not possible.
If you read the Mahabharata, Krishna was the only Yogeshwar, though there
were so many dharmik people at the time. But who gave the knowledge? Only
Krishna ! The art of teaching is very refined. So how can you produce thousands
of teachers, when even in the Mahabharata there was only one Krishna ?
Q.: What then is the future of yoga?
A.: The future of yoga, I am sure,
is very bright. For one, there is a new health consciousness in India
. Yoga did not become popular on account of my teaching of classical methods.
It became so popular in the West because I took the therapeutic value of
yoga and through that propagated yoga.
Here too, life is becoming very
costly. Medical treatments are expensive, and people are not always in
a position to afford them. The only preventive is yoga. Patanjali says
" Heyam dukkham anagatam " (The pains which are yet to come can be and
are to be avoided).
Why do you allow your body and mind
to become a victim? Begin your work today so that you won't become a victim
at all. People cannot afford medicine but they can afford yoga in their
own homes. They used to call me furniture yogi.
But the props that I founded are
the equivalent of the ICU in yoga now. My radical methods have been proved
right. Now yoga has been accepted in the medical field. Through my cassettes
and books and CDs, I have tried to present a theory of asanas - how to
understand asanas by balancing the elements and taking the asana
to the spiritual level.
I have spelt out the philosophical
background of asanas . By reading, listening and practising, even a common
man can save time and learn to experience this art.
Q.: Is any part of your mission
is still pending? Or do you feel a sense of completion?
A.: I feel a sense of completion,
but I want to maintain it till God calls me or till my last breath disappears.
I have to establish what I have given.
Q.: Finally, what is your message
for this country which is so troubled by disharmony and stress?
A.: In India , there was spiritual
satisfaction, peace and happiness in the days before the invasion of Alexander.
You must know the difference between 'before invasion' and 'after invasion'.
Indians developed poverty in intelligence, poverty in material as well
as spiritual wealth after the invasion.
But if you practise yoga; if you
start, then the self goes on progressing and then the self becomes like
Brahma and starts reflecting the character of brahman and then the whole
of India will be in a state of prosperity - not just material prosperity
but auspicious prosperity and I am hoping for that - that India should
come back to the glory of what it was before Alexander's attack.
