Ashtanga practitioners are some of the most committed and devoted group of people I’ve ever come across. I’m serious – they’re serious! And maybe that’s because practicing with daily consistency, daily support, forces them to develop an unusual tenacity, resilience, and adaptability.

I am an Ashtanga practitioner but not daily since I am seriously engaged in Ayurveda, and I realized that when I was doing Primary serie everyday – 6 days a week – I was creating a lot of Pitta in my body, rather than building Sattva. My upper body was stiff, my shoulders not easy to open and my neck always tight. Those are signs of too much Pitta in the body.

Last year, I came across a teacher in the Himalaya, who taught me about yoga therapy – (which is yoga according to our own constitution). Even for pranayama, he gave me my own technic related to my body. That felt very good to switch from practicing Mysore style and my own therapeutical program. The therapy was helping me to prepare my body to better enter Asanas that I could not perform right before, because I was forcing. Then I start to open my mind about having an effortless self-practice and building Sattva in my body and mind too – through Yoga and the food I was eating. Also, I stop being discouraged by watching all pictures and videos from extremely flexible yoga teachers all over the internet and start embracing and accepting where I was, and already what I can do with myself, instead of challenging my body to perform more.

From an Ayurvedic view, the aspect of practicing Asanas is to build Sattva and here is some good explanations on why doshic factors are important:

“Knowing to balance between the structural and doshic (energetic) factors of Asana and Yoga therapy, because both have their importance and should be considered together. Each Asana is a particular physical pose or form. But the energy with which we hold, fill and develop that form is also very important. The form itself is like a vessel and can hold various energies. We can fill it with the positive energy of Prana or with the negative energy of excess Vata, Pitta or Kapha. The form and energy are also vehicles for a certain mental condition.

We should fill the form of the Asana and hold its energy with an attitude that is sattvic or meditative in nature. In fact the energy and attitude of the Asana are more important than the form. It is better to do an Asana imperfectly but with a good Prana and awareness, then to do a perfect Asana without a positive Prana or clarity of mind. If we only look to the form of the Asana and not to the energy and attitude with which it is done, we will not understand the real effects of the Asana on a person and our Asana application will be purely outward in nature.

To the form of the Asana, we also bring the different forms of our own bodies. The body is a structure composed of the five elements in which the three doshas are the dynamic forces. Yet the structure of the body is impacted by heredity and by our habitual movement and exercise throughout life, including by injuries. Each person brings a different bodily form into the specific form of each particular Asana.

The structure of our body may or may not be suitable to manifest the full form of the Asana. For most of us, we cannot easily assume the form of different Asanas, particularly those which are more complex. We must make efforts to approximate the form of the Asana as best we can relative to the limitations of our body. We should not force our body into the form of the Asana but accept how far our body can naturally approximate it.

How we approach the form of the Asana is crucial. This depends upon our energy and attitude or upon our Prana and mind. The best results are gained not by forcing ourselves into the correct form or appearance of the Asana but by directing our body toward the Asana with the appropriate energy and attitude of healing and awareness.

We can classify the form of Asanas relative to the three doshas as to whether they are helpful or unhelpful in their effects upon Vata, Pitta and Kapha. While this is useful and necessary, it is not the last word on what Asanas we should do.

In this regard, we must remember that an Asana is not like a food or an herb as something we ingest that can affect us easily by its own intrinsic properties. Asanas are not a form of intake or nutrition but a type of activity or exercise. Asanas are something that we do, meaning that how we do them is also very important, not just the shape we make with them. This is another reason why energy and attitude are important, not just the form of the Asana”.

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Practicing any self-practice with this awareness on the top of using Bandhas, Drishti and Pranayama is completely elevating the practice to another level which feels adjusted also after the time spend on the mat, but also with our attitude in the external world. I gain certainly more clarity with my body and mind functions now, I don’t force and let it be, the way it has to fit to the external world. Removing any conflicts and resistance with my consciousness.

Asanas is about reducing the doshas and increase Sattva guna and this is the main thing to always remember when starting a self-practice. It is the form of the Asana as adapted by the form of our body relative to the development of positive energy and an attitude of peace. In examining the doshic and structural aspects of Asanas, we should not forget this greater question of mind and Prana or attitude and energy in the practice.

Today, I implement this realization in my self-practice and I am teaching it in my yoga retreats or one and one session because what has been benefiting me, can benefit to others. All my years of self-observance and self-transformation, I now open this knowledge to my participants because I trust the power of Yoga.

Much love