🧡🌟 Chuck Miller - Sama Ashtanga 5 day Intensive – Beginner’s Mind Essential Core Practices

We are so delighted, and excited to welcome Chuck Miller to Yoga Sangha Manchester. Chuck has the most beautiful story to tell about his journey to Ashtanga - I will leave that for him to share with you.

What I will share is this......

In 1980 Chuck met Sri K Pattabhi Jois and continued studying with him intensively for many years and intermittently until his death.

In March of 1988 Chuck received permission from Pattabhi Jois to teach Primary Series and was pushed into the yoga room and began teaching Ashtanga Yoga. He taught in the same school, for 17 years. Many of the students came for years and years.

After selling the school and moving to Hawaii Island, "The Big Island," Chuck began accepting invitations to teach in other cities around the world with his wife Syrena by his side

Having the belief that Ashtanga Yoga is strong enough, with enough internal integrity to withstand scrutiny, he studied with many different teachers and tested those teachings on his own mat... that continues today! He found the same internal truths in the deeper realms of all great practices and started calling the conflicts between them "semantic differences."

Today he likes to point to what he calls "Sama," as that sameness that exists everywhere. Finding the sameness between Philosophy and Practice continues to inform his practice and thus his teaching."

🌟We have the most interesting and inspiring 5 days of practice ready for you to dive into🌟

A sitting practice would be included in every morning as a time to orient us towards Internalizing Practice.

Then we can start with a review of the Samasthiti. Slowly, and thoroughly we will explore what is Alignment. It is a word that is widely used in yoga but do we really understand it? Why is it important? It can feel complicated to learn, but we can in fact simplify our understanding of alignment by creating a natural felt sense of it.

We learn to Stabilize those alignments with Actions and Counter Actions, which is what creates Bandha. We create bandhas from the Root Causes rather than chase the effects. We allow the effects to happen, at their own speed as a result of our focus on developing ever closer to the root causes. This sets us up for the magic and importance of Elongation to create space and length, the victory of the ability to uplift ourselves, the Ujjayi force.

We will use yoga models like PanchaMaya Kosha to focus our intention, Sankalpa, to “Internalize our Practice.” Let us bring to life the philosophy of Ashtanga Yoga. Yama, Niyama, Asana, Pranayama are called the external practices. Pratyahara, Dharana, Dhyana, Samadhi are called the internal practices.

The philosophy informs and guides our practice, as the physical practices also give meaning and helps us to understand the philosophy. Recognizing the Natural Priorities that exist, like Breath, Roots and Core, we can cultivate concentration, Dharana, which is an invitation to return to our chosen point of focus. Dharana extended, prolonged, becomes Dhyana, an unbroken stream of effortless concentration. This is the origin of Samadhi.

We also recognize other natural hierarchies like the spine and adjust our effort to protect the vulnerable and to challenge the strong stubborn habitual patterns, what we call Samaskara-s. We can put the hands and feet, arms and legs to work in service to the spine. This changes the way we practice, changes our direction and ambition in our practice to bring it into alignment with what is real.

The tension we feel when our Sankalpa, our intention, bumps into our Samskaras, our habitual patterns, is the gift of the practice. However, our tendency is to see that tension as a problem to be solved. In fact, the practice itself is a tool for observation. By observing that tension and recognizing it as a Samskara, we begin the process of Nirodha, the quieting and clearing of these conditioned patterns. That is Yoga.

We can develop a stronger Moral Compass to guide not only our practice on the mat but also how we engage in the world. As we investigate ourselves on the mat we naturally observe our lives and are given the opportunity to decide whether we wish to make changes.

This is how our practice empowers us. This is how it helps us help change the world. One breath at a time.

🧡 Morning Practice ( see below for daily times)

Conducted Style with a focus on finding Samasthiti in every pose. We will start slowly and go in deep, developing a common vocabulary and an understanding of basic alignment. Day by day we will work our way further through the Ashtanga Yoga sequence. Exploring how to approach the more challenging postures/practices for all levels of students.

Protective actions (bandhas) will be taught to create stability, elongation and a healthy range of motion. The objective is to learn a sustainable way, for a long lifetime of practice. The focus will be on understanding the essential inner forms that are always present in every part of this great practice.

Knowing those essential inner forms you can find your way in any part of the practice, in any series, any style.

🧡 Afternoon Clinics

We will start after our lunch break with an opportunity for questions and answers, and time to digest our lunch and to investigate what we learned in the morning. Challenges observed in the Morning Practice will be opened up and explored in a way not possible in a regularly paced class.

Bring your questions, an open mind and a willingness to look at this great practice in a new way.

Thursday 9th September
8.30 - 11.30 am
1.30 - 4.30pm

Friday 10th September
11.30 - 2.30pm
3.30 or 4pm - 6.40 or 7pm

Saturday 11th September
8.30 - 11.30am
1.30 - 4.30pm

Sunday 12th September
8.30 - 11.30am
1.30 - 4.30pm

Monday 13th September
8.30 - 11.30am
1.30 - 4.30pm

Please note that this intensive is for 5 days and we are unable to offer just single days.