About Lakshyan's Teaching Style, Methods and Goals

In my teaching, "Less Is More". The goal is to 'undo', to restore your health. Too often, a forceful practice reinforces the illusion that health is something outside of yourself.

The difficult Asana (hatha yoga posture) is not the one with the fancy technique, the pretty looking one, the fashionable one. The difficult Asana is to be with yourself, to be with your strength and weakness, to be with your pain, and at the same time doing no harm and being completely honest. The difficult task in Yoga is to face the truth of yourself. Since the job of facing up to who you are is so formidable, it is the perseverance, and the repetition of practice that guides you to go deep and leads you to success. Because of this need for steadiness and regularity, I teach sequences which should be practiced regularly and for mastery. From Beginners to Advanced Hatha Yoga, I start with a core of traditional therapeutic practices. When the student is ready, these core practices gradually and naturally evolve into technically more difficult ones that integrate aerobic fitness and flexibility. My teaching style invites you to go deep into your being by cultivating a meditative attitude of surrender along with precision in technique.

The 'backbone' of my Beginner's classes is a systematic and therapeutic series of about 25 essential practices including: general stretches, backward bends, forward bends, simple inversions, twisting, deep relaxation and basic breathing practices. This series evolves. While you work meditatively and within your limits, you will learn variations that, step by step, take you to the Intermediate level of practice.

My approach to the Intermediate level adds about a dozen more core Asanas, and greater depth to Pranayama (breathing practices). The focus here is on both the fundamentals of alignment and on bringing the meditative state into standing poses. This is also an introduction to the early "Jumping" series of BKS Iyengar. As with the Beginners program, step by step, you will advance in level of practice.

If you are regular in your practice and like to focus on fitness, the Advanced classes encourage you to challenge your limits. Here, more advanced "Jumpings" serve as a springboard to integrate a wide variety of technically more difficult asanas and pranayama. Frequently I will use inversions at the start of the Asana practice, and we may work in pairs. My approach to the Meditation course is based on the Raja Yoga of Patanjali (at least from 500 BC).

While asana practice is the external means, meditation is the internal and most significant level of yoga practice. As in the Asana classes, my teaching of meditation is systematic with students gaining experiential understanding of the skills they need to become long term meditators with a solid practice that can evolve. Thus, I use both the traditional practices found across cultures, as well as techniques often associated with personal growth.

Asanas | Couples Yoga - Lakshyan Schanzer