Consciousness in Motion
Vinyasa yoga teaches us to cultivate an awareness that links each action to the next—on the mat and in our lives.
By Shiva Rea
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 Sit back and relax. Take in these images and see if you can sense the underlying pattern: the flow of the seasons, the rise and fall of the tides in response to the moon, a baby fern unfurling, a Ravi Shankar sitar raga or Ravel's "Bolero," the creation and the dissolution of a Tibetan sand mandala, the flow of Suryanamaskar (Sun Salutation).
What do these diverse phenomena have in common? They are all vinyasas, progressive sequences that unfold with an inherent harmony and intelligence. "Vinyasa" is derived from the Sanskrit term nyasa, which means "to place," and the prefix vi, "in a special way"—as in the arrangement of notes in a raga, the steps along a path to the top of a mountain, or the linking of one asana to the next. In the yoga world the most common understanding of vinyasa is as a flowing sequence of specific asanas coordinated with the movements of the breath. The six series of Pattabhi Jois's Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga are by far the best known and most influential.
Jois's own teacher, the great South Indian master Krishnamacharya, championed the vinyasa approach as central to the transformative process of yoga. But Krishnamacharya had a broader vision of the meaning of vinyasa than most Western students realize. He not only taught specific asana sequences like those of Jois's system, but he also saw vinyasa as a method that could be applied to all the aspects of yoga. In Krishnamacharya's teachings, the vinyasa method included assessing the needs of the individual student (or group) and then building a complementary, step-by-step practice to meet those needs. Beyond this, Krishnamacharya also emphasized vinyasa as an artful approach to living, a way of applying the skill and awareness of yoga to all the rhythms and sequences of life, including self-care, relationships, work, and personal evolution.
Desikachar, Krishnamacharya's son, an author and renowned teacher in his own right, has written, "Vinyasa is, I believe, one of the richest concepts to emerge from yoga for the successful conduct of our actions and relationships." In his book Health, Healing, and Beyond (Aperture, 1998), he gives a subtle yet powerful example of how his father attended to the vinyasa of teaching yoga. Krishnamacharya, to the amazement of his private students, would always greet them at the gate of his center, guide them through their practice, and then honor the completion of their time together by escorting them back to the gate.
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