The Anusara Sadhana: “Authentic Expression” Practicing using the Universal Principles of Alignment
- Vizer Soluciones Tecnológicas S de RL VST200630BC7
- Apr 10
- 6 min read
“Authentic Expression”
Practising using the Universal Principles of Alignment
What a gift this monthly Anusara Sadhana newsletter has been! Each month I’ve enjoyed reading the inspirations and wisdom from those in our community who have taken the time to share themselves with all of us. Everyone’s love of the yoga practices and the Anusara methodology stands out on the page and resonates in my own heart. My name is Julia Pearring and for this month’s edition, I’m going to share my love of the Anusara Yoga practice by talking about our beloved Universal Principles of Alignment (UPAs) as an ideal structure for authentic expression. One way I’ll aim to do this is by sharing my own authentic expression. Throughout this article I’m going to share my responses to questions that are posed to all licensed Anusara Yoga teachers as part of our profiles on the ASHY website. I recently went to the website to see if I wanted to update and refine what I had written some 10 plus years ago. Instead of changing anything, I was so inspired by my younger wisdom that I’ve been using my responses as contemplations! (I also love to read the responses of different teachers, echoing what I expressed above, how each licensed teacher articulates their responses always gives me something to reflect on and gives me a renewed appreciation of the Anusara Kula.) | Stepping Into the Flow of Grace Anusara Yoga arose from and is founded on the principle of Grace. Grace is a word that not only points to the all encompassing, all inclusive Awareness and Knowledge of Life, Chit Shakti, but it also holds within it the beneficent, commanding, creative Spark of Life, Ananda Shakti. Anusara Yoga is an active and intentional stepping into the flow of Grace. Which means that first and foremost, this highest Truth and greatest Reality of Grace is acknowledged and channeled. Our practice, our methodology, our understanding is ‘tied to the highest’. This is why we call Open to Grace the First Principle, and it’s why the First Principle is indispensable. Staying tied to the highest has incredible rigor, it will show us all the ways that we are devoted and tied to much lesser truths, but it also has incredible sweetness, it keeps leading us to the experience of our essential Self. Now I’ll share one of the question/response from my online profile: Question: In the ASHY website teacher profiles, one of the questions that is asked is “Why do you teach Anusara Yoga? My response: I teach Anusara Yoga because it has continued to refine my understanding, ask more of me, and has always brought me closer to the truth. |
From Grace to the UPAs
Let’s take a moment to look at the viewpoint of Grace as the universal absolute, turning Her gaze on the movement from unmanifest Oneness to manifested multiplicity.
From the viewpoint of Grace:
The outpouring of Grace itself seeks out diversity, manifesting Her infinite potential, knowing the preciousness of our uniqueness, desiring to be in relationship with Herself, celebrating difference. Through each one of us, such beauty and diversity of expression unfolds.
By stepping into the flow of Grace, tying ourselves to the highest, we are committing to fulfill our individual authentic expression, to become ourselves most Truly and Fully. As vast as the array of forms can be, as unique as we each are, our expressions aim to be aligned with Grace, to co-create with Grace in Her unfolding. We don’t have to force individuality, or pit ourselves against conformity. We do stay tied to the highest, focused on what is arising from within us, expressing itself from the inside outward. This also allows us to recognize the same source of Inspiration that is guiding all of diversity. Like Grace, we too become a celebrator of difference. This saves us from getting caught up in comparative hierarchy and/or being swayed by language that pits us against one another and stories based in fear of the ‘other’.
The structure of the Anusara Yoga methodology, including the UPAs, is based on this Divine Reality, on the knowledge and experience of Grace, as we have received it through the Tantric scriptures and the metaphysics of Yogic traditions. The UPAs invite this manifesting process, this embodied cycling, this aligned co-creation with Grace. We begin with Opening to Grace and so much unfolds from there. From tying ourselves to the highest (OtG), to an embrace that integrates us into the core of who we are (ME), to an outward radiating, authentic expression from our essential Self into the world around us (OE)– we powerfully show up in the world through our words, actions and relationships. The UPAs are a complete pulsation of Grace manifesting Beauty, Creativity and Authenticity. What a boon! Question: In the ASHY website teacher profiles, one of the questions that is asked is “What do you love most about Anusara Yoga? My response: It is a method that gives structure, process and context and yet doesn’t limit the expansion and discovery. | Julia Pearring- a bit more about me My application and teaching of the UPAs and the Anusara Yoga methodology are reflective of all that I have learned studying and practicing within this skilled and heartfelt community. My application and teaching is also a cultivation of all that I have learned in all of my related studies. Particularly, through my teacher Amy Matthews, I have studied some extremely beautiful systems of embodiment such as Body-Mind Centering, Laban Movement Analysis and Bartenieff Fundamentals. Through my teacher Gil Hedley, I have dissected human cadavers with the invitation to be taken on a journey through the human form, through the Divine as it presents itself to us in each unique human body. Through my relationship with Gurumayi Chidvilasananda and learning about the power of the Guru/disciple relationship with Rudrani Farbman, I have experienced such moments of divine Grace, and reached such depths of self acceptance and recognition of the Self within. |
I share these pivotal teachers on my path not to be comparative or to place myself above or beyond anyone else’s experience and what has shaped them on their path. Instead, I share to show how Grace has guided me and to celebrate all that is possible, all that can deepen and enrich our shared practices. I know that I am extremely blessed by all of my teachers and all of my students, and this supportive, teacher-led Anusara Yoga kula. And this is true of ALL of us that continue to show up for the yoga practices and hold such regard for this method– we each have so much to offer one another.
Question:
In the ASHY website teacher profiles, the final question that is asked is “Why do you license with Anusara Yoga?
My response:
I want to teach this method to inspire students and aspiring teachers. It holds the principles and right understanding to approach the depth of the yoga practice. Anusara yoga has developed a language that enables me to communicate with those from a wide range of backgrounds, inviting each unique individual into their own experience of yoga’s depth and meaning.
Diving Into the Principles Part 2
It just so happens that this January, I will be presenting the second part of an online course on the UPAs, presented by The School. Part 1 had a wonderful group of teachers and practitioners, we explored the UPAs in very basic and also very unique ways, and learned so much from them and from each other. If you are a licensed teacher, we welcome you to join us for Part 2.
In fact, there’s still time to catch up, you can take Part 1 via the recordings before we dive into Part 2, so that you get the benefit of the full offering. I encourage you to jump in, we will be inspired and renewed by one another!
This video was presented in Diving Into the Principles Part 1, to introduce the intention and material for the 3rd week that focused on Action of the A’s and on the Loops.
Julia makes use of one of the maps of the natural world, the two trees to describe how we can deepen our application and experience of the UPAs. The “The two trees” is a simultaneity reference, inviting us to expand our image of a tree, to not see it only has roots into the ground and the flowering, leafing and fruiting into the sky, but also simultaneously the opposite, to see the roots ground into the sky and the flowering and fruiting take place on and in the earth.
This invites an experience that animates the metaphysical map of the Tattvas– to not only see our viewpoint as individuals, manifested beings looking towards the universal, unmanifested reality, but also how the universal, unmanifested reality looks towards the individual, manifested reality. How we have both of those viewpoints available to us simultaneously and we can physicalize this through the application of the loops.
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As bodies, we are a system of bones, tendons, muscles, nerves, and senses, with electricity flowing everywhere in symphonies of tension and release. Rhythmic pulsations of electrical tension stimulate our muscles to extend and contract, creating the beating of the heart, the motion of breathing, and the whole dance of life.
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