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Less is MoreI've been teaching Yoga for 28 years, and during this time, my teaching style has gone through a number of transformations. I'm at the stage now where I like to 'keep it simple'.
When the exercises and postures are simple - it's so much easier to be aware of the breath, to feel the body parts, to sense the energy, to feel both the movement and the stillness and to practise with both an ease and a simple joy. For me, practising in this way, leads me out of the mind, into the body, into the senses, into the stillness, into the Sacred. I see all the various practices of Yoga (postures, breathing, meditation, chanting, philosophy) as tools to help create an environment in which Yoga / Truth / Love can more easily be sensed and known. When I teach, through the words I speak and through my presence, I encourage stillness, inner focus, freedom from obsessive thinking... and within this environment, I invite you to explore who you really are / what life is all about . Of course, the practices of themselves have many benefits - helping to maintain health of body, mind and soul... and if this is what your intention or reason for practising, that's absolutely fine - Yoga is certainly a great way to maintain flexibility of body, peace of mind and a happy disposition. Meaning of YogaAs you may well know, the word 'Yoga' means to join or to unite.
It's taken decades for me to have a sense of what this really means - for 'the union' to take seat, so to speak... And I know that there's no end to the depth of realising what Yoga truly is... ('Yoga' could be replaced by 'Life', 'Truth', 'Love'...) For me, right now, Yoga is:
This is
Siva-Shakti Radha-Krishna Ha-Tha Purusha-Prakriti |
The Beginning
When I was 27 years old and living in London, I signed up for a beginners' course in Yoga. At the end of the first class, during the final relaxation, I experienced a profound sense of Freedom... - the teacher's voice drifted off into the background,.. and it was as if time stood still... I found myself paused before an open doorway... I stepped inside, and was bathed in Peace, Stillness and Silence.
It felt like Home, in a way - a place my Soul knew well..., and a place the body-mind had been searching for for an eternity.
Once I'd fallen in love with the physical practice, I started to meditate; I found my singing voice through chanting; I studied Sanskrit to better understand the chants and the various texts on Yoga; I studied North Indian classical music and I travelled to India. After a couple of years of being Yoga obsessed, the next obvious step was to become a Yoga teacher. Since that first day, I've breathed, walked, eaten and slept Yoga - it's been a complete way of life.
It felt like Home, in a way - a place my Soul knew well..., and a place the body-mind had been searching for for an eternity.
Once I'd fallen in love with the physical practice, I started to meditate; I found my singing voice through chanting; I studied Sanskrit to better understand the chants and the various texts on Yoga; I studied North Indian classical music and I travelled to India. After a couple of years of being Yoga obsessed, the next obvious step was to become a Yoga teacher. Since that first day, I've breathed, walked, eaten and slept Yoga - it's been a complete way of life.
Now
I've recently realised that being a way of life isn't necessarily what it's about however - to some degree, I simply changed the clothes I was wearing, the words I spoke, the things I bought, the food I ate... - in a way, I just changed the story of who I believed I was... and don't get me wrong - it's been a wonderful, exciting, exotic, adventurous, esoteric, mystical story...
But that's not what Yoga's about - at its chore!
Yoga is a tool to help one know what's real and what's not real... and to know who and what one truly is...
It's not what you wear, what you call yourself, what you eat, how you decorate your altar...
It's not all the adventures, the experiences, being a 'spiritual materialist'...
It's not enough to simply have a practice..., to talk about the theory... to have some pleasant experiences along the way...
That's all on the outside...
One needs to turn it around and look within...
- to feel the aliveness, to experience the vividness, to have a sense of wonder and awe, to know the Truth.
Of course, if what you want from your practice, is to feel healthier, happier and more peaceful, that's absolutely fine!!! Many people come toYoga for these reasons... and maybe they continue for these reasons... and some may realise the practice can lead one deeper into the existential experience of being.
But that's not what Yoga's about - at its chore!
Yoga is a tool to help one know what's real and what's not real... and to know who and what one truly is...
It's not what you wear, what you call yourself, what you eat, how you decorate your altar...
It's not all the adventures, the experiences, being a 'spiritual materialist'...
It's not enough to simply have a practice..., to talk about the theory... to have some pleasant experiences along the way...
That's all on the outside...
One needs to turn it around and look within...
- to feel the aliveness, to experience the vividness, to have a sense of wonder and awe, to know the Truth.
Of course, if what you want from your practice, is to feel healthier, happier and more peaceful, that's absolutely fine!!! Many people come toYoga for these reasons... and maybe they continue for these reasons... and some may realise the practice can lead one deeper into the existential experience of being.
A student's synopsis on my teaching style:
'Lauren’s approach to teaching Yoga is unique, and left a profound impression on me. Her main emphasis is about attuning the body to a state of relaxation, employing Yoga and meditation as tools to help people to feel the state of their bodies and tune the body into a state of relaxation. This, to me, is one of the most valuable assets of Lauren’s course - one has the possibility of a whole week of allowing one’s body to exist in a state of relaxation. Although it was a little challenging for me at first, once I stopped pushing and started to simply be with the process unfolding, I came to experience a quality that I’ve never found present in any other Yoga course.
Lauren’s way of teaching feels much more personal than other classes I’ve participated in. She’s not teaching a set of exercises so much as teaching one to listen to one’s body. And when you see her and listen to her, she feels like an embodiment of someone in a state of relaxation herself - a living breathing Yoga in physical manifestation. She appears to live, walk and breath in a Yogic state of balance. Just being in her presence drew me to shift my consciousness, such that instead of going through a prescribed set of exercises, I found myself listening more to my body’s experience as I was practicing the Yoga, and by the end of the week I found that I felt I was living the Yoga for the first time in my life, and feeling it inwardly instead of practising it outwardly.
Lauren’s approach is not about following the technique or regime with a goal in mind, it’s more about living it as if it is an integral state of being. We are no longer seeking something outside ourselves as some distant goal, but actually ‘being it’, and this quality is imbued by relaxing into this state of being. The Yoga and detox appear at the end of the day to be nothing more than instruments for helping us to listen more deeply to the state of our inner bodies and mind.
Feeling Lauren’s state of composed relaxed presence in the Yoga helped me to feel into my own state of integral relaxation and presence. I found myself no longer fighting to maintain a Yoga pose, but simply feeling my body state whilst in a pose. I feel immense gratitude to Lauren for helping me shift my consciousness around the Yoga as I feel I am able to now approach Yoga from an entirely different place in myself.'
'Lauren’s approach to teaching Yoga is unique, and left a profound impression on me. Her main emphasis is about attuning the body to a state of relaxation, employing Yoga and meditation as tools to help people to feel the state of their bodies and tune the body into a state of relaxation. This, to me, is one of the most valuable assets of Lauren’s course - one has the possibility of a whole week of allowing one’s body to exist in a state of relaxation. Although it was a little challenging for me at first, once I stopped pushing and started to simply be with the process unfolding, I came to experience a quality that I’ve never found present in any other Yoga course.
Lauren’s way of teaching feels much more personal than other classes I’ve participated in. She’s not teaching a set of exercises so much as teaching one to listen to one’s body. And when you see her and listen to her, she feels like an embodiment of someone in a state of relaxation herself - a living breathing Yoga in physical manifestation. She appears to live, walk and breath in a Yogic state of balance. Just being in her presence drew me to shift my consciousness, such that instead of going through a prescribed set of exercises, I found myself listening more to my body’s experience as I was practicing the Yoga, and by the end of the week I found that I felt I was living the Yoga for the first time in my life, and feeling it inwardly instead of practising it outwardly.
Lauren’s approach is not about following the technique or regime with a goal in mind, it’s more about living it as if it is an integral state of being. We are no longer seeking something outside ourselves as some distant goal, but actually ‘being it’, and this quality is imbued by relaxing into this state of being. The Yoga and detox appear at the end of the day to be nothing more than instruments for helping us to listen more deeply to the state of our inner bodies and mind.
Feeling Lauren’s state of composed relaxed presence in the Yoga helped me to feel into my own state of integral relaxation and presence. I found myself no longer fighting to maintain a Yoga pose, but simply feeling my body state whilst in a pose. I feel immense gratitude to Lauren for helping me shift my consciousness around the Yoga as I feel I am able to now approach Yoga from an entirely different place in myself.'