Like a Flash: A Conversation with B.K.S. Iyengar

On Dec. 26, 2012, Manouso Manos and Patricia

Walden interviewed B.K.S. Iyengar at the Ramamani Iyengar Memorial Yoga Institute in Pune. Stephanie Quirk and Lois Steinberg were in attendance.

Manouso: Sir, are you enlightened? Have you reached or attained samadhi?

Guruji: Huh?

Patricia: (laughs)

Guruji: That cannot be answered at all. I will never answer about my achievements. That is certain. If you ask me, I am just a student in the field of yoga. What I know is limited compared with what is not known to me. If I think of my life [in the] early days, [I was] a stupid man, uneducated, uncivilized. [To] come to this level is in itself an enlightenment, for me. So I am not here for advertising, that I want to say I am enlightened. I will certainly say I am not enlightened. So that the matter is there only. Enlightenment is not for publicity purposes.

What I was, how I am growing, how I am developing my intelligence, the sharpness, the confidence which I am getting, is no doubt a great thing. So from that angle, I say yes, in my sadhana, really I am enlightening each day in my sadhana.

Manouso: Yeah, how few people can say that.

Guruji: So, culmination I cannot speak.

Patricia: Guruji, you’ve often spoken of loneliness and aloneness. Could you describe the difference?

My friend, without imitation, originality cannot come at all.

Guruji: See, loneliness is a psychological case. Schizophrenic types of people, they are lonely. Loneliness is a negative life. Aloneness is a positive life. So there’s a vast difference between loneliness and aloneness. So aloneness means I am full, with an energy. I am full of the life force, which enlightens me, which triggers me, to do more and more. So how can I say I am lonely? I am alone, because what I do, what I do at that time I am fully alone—I know what is happening in my body, what is happening in my mind. So therefore, aloneness is a positive life. So aloneness is almost equal to liberation. Loneliness is not.

Patricia: Kaivalya, yes.

Manouso: Well, you have lived all your life without peers. You had no one at your level. You had no one to “reality-check” with. How is it that you could go on doing that?

Guruji: Because I had no one to guide me. I had no one [with whom to] compare my practices. Intelligence depends on comparison only. Growth of any person is mostly on contact. If I have to measure your intelligence or if you have to measure my intelligence, there should be tremendous communication and communion. Then only one understands the growth of intelligence. In my case, I have not seen anyone who has come to my level.

Patricia: No. Nor have we. (laughter)

Guruji: So that’s a big handicap for me. And because of that, I learned aloneness. I said, “Let myself alone be the guide, let myself alone be my slave.” So I used myself not only as a master, a Lord of myself, but also as a doer for myself.

Patricia: A doer. When you taught us in Panchgani—I think it was your 75th birthday—before the classes began, you gave a talk. It was an extraordinary talk. You said, “I have conquered the panca bhutas [five elements].”

Guruji: Yes.

Patricia: But you didn’t elaborate, and I’ve always wondered what that meant to you.

Guruji: See, we are all made up of five bhutas. The terminology is “panca-bhautika sarira”—this body has five bhutas: prthvi [earth], ap [water], tejas [fire], vayu [air], and akasa [space]. The yogic practices balance these five, according to the Sankya philosophy, one to five. So one, two, three, four, and five. So akasa is one, vayu is two, tejas is three, ap is four, prthvi is five. So the five parts of the akasa being prthvi—if it is less, disease will set in; if it is more, disease also will set in. So that is how we have to practice: to balance the five bhutas, rhythmically in our system.

Today [during practice], you people did not realize. When I spoke of this [body] part—is it a prthvi part? It was, for you, akasa tattva [element or particle]. It was in the air. So your intelligence was in suspense. You never knew that it contracts. Did you ever know that part?

Manouso: No.

Guruji: So that is known as conquest of bhutas. Why did it become short? That means, my earth contracted. As my earth contracted, akasa became narrow. So I made the prthvi expand so that akasa also expands with the prthvi. This example is enough for you people to know how to study bhutas. I said, when you are in Padmasan, when you sit in Swastikasan, one foot rests very well, which means one foot is balanced [on the] outer edge of the foot. The other [foot’s] edge does not balance at all. So what is the defect? The qualities of bhutas are written in [Patanjali’s] Yoga Sutras, so I did not repeat the qualities of the five bhutas. So one foot is firm, established very well. The big difference is prthvi tattva. The other [foot] is not at all in prthvi tattva. Suppose I increase prthvi tattva. What changes take place in the [other] four elements? That you have to study. I gave today a very good quote: “action and observation.”

So observe, check the aggressiveness of the brain. And action, you know, creates fire in inaction. So you are caught in action. [Checking] that also comes under panca bhutas. Because this is vayu tattva. And vayu tattva belongs to vijnanamaya kosa, so you have to compare the five elements with the five kosas [sheaths]—annamaya, pranamaya, manomaya, vijnanamaya, and anandamaya kosas. So similarly you should know prthvi, ap, tejas, vayu, and akasa. Annamaya [kosa] is nothing but skeletalmuscular body, prthvi tattva. Your muscles [contain] plenty of fluid, so that comes under ap tattva. And bone comes under prthvi tattva. The connections between these are the jnana tattva or vayu tattva. And keeping the body in a stable position is tejas tattva. So we have to study the five panca bhutas with the panca kosas.

The comparative study of panca kosas and panca bhutas will give an idea of how we have to perform. And each element has its quality—like we speak of the three gunas of nature—sattva, rajas, and tamas. Similarly prthvi is smell or odor. Ap is taste. Tejas is fire, keeping the body warm. Vijnanamaya is intelligence, or vayu. Creating space in the body is akasa—where to contract, where to expand. And today even when I gave the explanation of Prasarita Padottanasana—how when you press the center ribs, the rim of the rib, and press in, the knee expands. Did you know those things?

Manouso: No.

Guruji: So that is how the matras react. That’s a quality—the knee becomes not the vayu element but the quality of the element, of the akasa, where your knee was contracted, that expanded, so that is akasa tattva. Do we study like that?

Patricia: No (laughs).

Guruji: So it was a starting point for me in Panchgani—about [the] panca bhutas. I developed. I went on. Now in Tadasan, you know the feet become prthvi tattva. In Sirsasan, the arms become prthvi tattva, but the feet become akasa tattva because it moves. So how to make that prthvi tattva? So today I taught you [in] Sirsasan that the inner ribs—how the latissimus muscles work. So I created akasa tattva in the latissimus muscles for the legs to become straight, stable. So this is reflection that you have to study. It’s a very difficult subject. It’s not so easy. I started yoga in 1934. [In] 1975 I gave you some idea. (laughter) So just imagine how many years it has taken me to learn about yoga.

Patricia: Guruji, Manouso and I were talking yesterday about the Panchgani course, and many of us, Manouso and I included, of course, felt that you had been through a transformation in your teaching. The language you used in those classes was very different from language you had used in the past, and you felt very different to us, and I am wondering if you did go through a transformation—

Guruji: Because my experiences were more than my expression of words. I knew less words, but my experiences were beyond my capacity of words. So it took me [a] long time to [know] exactly what word I have to get at to express my experience. This also did not come very quickly; it took me [a] long time.

Manouso: Well, you had a very different life than everyone else too because you invented the yoga class.

Guruji: No. For example, I speak from the heart not from the head. That is what one should know. If I speak from the head, then I have to calculate what I say. So I just speak from the heart, and what comes comes. Otherwise it does not come at all.

Manouso: Well, this brings up an interesting question. You suggest in Light on Yoga that one could master the asanas in three and a half years.

Guruji: My friend, what you said is true—

Manouso: It’s gonna get more complex— (laughs)

If I speak from the head, then I have to calculate what I say. So I just speak from the heart, and what comes comes.

Guruji: Well, unfortunately, I was immature at that time. (group laughter) For one. Two, I thought everybody would practice like me. (more laughter)

Manouso: This brings up the next question: How long would it take for one to become emotionally mature; how long before one becomes spiritually mature?

Guruji: It will take a very, very long time—30 to 40 years, 50 even in a few lives.

Patricia: More than 30 years. (laughs)

Guruji: No, something establishes in 30 to 40 years. Now it’s a fact that you’re all established. I don’t deny that. Compare yourself, the wavering mind of the early days and nonwavering mind of today. So that shows that maturity has come. But the problem is that you people do not reflect on action, and that’s where you are not making progress. So you have to reflect on the action. But you don’t reflect on the action. You get involved in the action. You have to become a subject and object at the same time. When you act, you are a subjective person. But by acting, I said be an objective person—that is known as reflection. But do you do like that?

Manouso: Well, then the other question that comes out of this is, how do you know when it’s time to withdraw from a teacher, and how do you know when to go back if you’ve left your teacher?

Guruji: A teacher can only guide. Suppose your experience is more than your teacher, what will you do?

Manouso: This happens, we know.

Guruji: That’s what I’m saying. So you should have your own discriminative power. You have to discriminate, “What I am doing is right or wrong.” That’s why I said comparative study. Intelligence grows only with comparative study so even practice has to go with comparative study. Your comparative study’s not with the other person. Let me do myself. Let me compare my right side with the left side. Left to the right. Or right corner to the left corner.

For example today, regarding pranayama, how many points I gave—did you know all those things?

Guruji: So this is what I said, the growth goes on—maturity is there, but unfortunately, you do not observe. See, the knowledge for a mature person, flashes like a second. It flashes only for a second, and it vanishes. And unfortunately, if you are caught up in a certain action, because your mind intelligence is not mobile in action, you are rigid at that time. So that’s why what flashes you don’t catch. So I become an object while I am acting. I am a second person when I am practicing. When I am correcting [myself], I am a first person; after correcting, I stay in that pose and become a second person to study what changes have come in me.

Patricia: Wow.

Guruji: So that is my comparative study with myself. If somebody were in my line, in my level, I would have seen for my eyes, but here I cannot. So I have to conceive myself, so I have to work through conception only. By perception, I cannot give you any knowledge for anybody. So every moment I have [to] compare: What is coming? How is it coming? What imprints come to me? They come like a flash, [and] because my mind is still fresh, I catch fast. You people are too slow. (laughter) So maturity is there, but slowness is also there.

Manouso: Your being a lion in class, being fiery is famous. Everyone knows that. How is it at the same time that people find you to be very friendly, extremely compassionate, and quite warm? How can one do both of those?

Guruji: I do not look at personalities. (group laughter) First of all, I never measure anyone on a personal level. I only work as a subject. From the subject matter, I measure. For me, there’s no difference between Manouso and Patricia or Lois or Stephanie. I can fire her when she’s wrong, I can fire her when she’s wrong. But I don’t say, “Oh Patricia is well-respected so let me guard.” That is diplomacy, and that is not yoga. That would mean I am a political yogi if I talked like that. (group laughter)

So what I see, I correct immediately. And if you adjust—well and good. Otherwise, I’ll shout at it. I’ll go out of my way to correct it. That’s why I am friendly, because I have no animosity. For example, take Lois yesterday in Virasan. She has done 40 years. Did she know that her ankle swells in Virasan? No. So that mean[s] no observation at all. So you have to observe: natural condition. And when you are doing a position which is not natural, does the part become unnatural? How to maintain the “naturality” in the abnormal positions? This is reflection.

Manouso: Yes. And then how is it that the next step happens where she can get fired like that and still be attracted back toward you? (laughter) How is it that your sense of friendliness has become such a gravitational pull on so many thousands of people?

Observation is from the purusha. Action is from the small self. Small self acts; big self is just seeing.

Guruji: Because it does not continue. (laughter) The hatred—

Manouso: There’s never hatred.

Guruji: Malaise does not continue. It’s only short-lived. Again I go with love and affection. Do this a little better. If you fail there, try here.

Patricia: And we can feel that. Guruji, it seems to me that in everything you do you’re totally involved. It’s not just total involvement when doing asana.

Guruji: No, that’s also wrong. You people read in a different way.

Patricia: Okay.

Guruji: When I am teaching you, I am not Mr. Iyengar, I am Patricia Walden. If I am teaching Manouso, I am Manouso, not Iyengar.

Manouso: Poor man. (laughs)

Guruji: That quality God has given me. And that’s why, as he [Manouso] says, I shout because [it is] as if I’m wrong myself, even though it’s you who are doing wrong. I feel I am doing wrong. Therefore I go out of my way to correct it. So I’m at that time only Patricia Walden. And [if] Stephanie comes, Patricia Walden goes away, (laughter) and Stephanie enters in.

It’s very difficult for me to explain, but [that’s] how this quality came. I do not know. It’s not a built-up character. It’s God’s grace. See each one according to their behavior or pattern. And that’s what God gave me.

Manouso: [It] is suggested in Western science these days that we have a gene inside that allows us to imitate—and that we feel for someone even as they stir, almost on our bodies, which does this—

Guruji: My friend, without imitation originality cannot come at all.

Patricia: (quietly) That’s a great line.

Guruji: You have to imitate, because that’s the foundation. But if you take imitation as the final goal, you’re a failure. Can you not convert this same [imitation] into originality?

I’m giving ways, how to find, develop originality. Today [in] Prasarita Padottanasan when the knees widen, that originality is revealed, it came out, akasa tattva expanded, but do you catch that akasa tattva? When you realize [this], then the imitation becomes your original way of thinking.

Manouso: So our job would be to look at Light on Yoga to imitate and then go to find the next understanding.

Guruji: Do you imitate? That’s what I’m asking.

Patricia: Well, we try… (laughter)

Guruji: How many asanas have I shown in class? Look, 1966 is different. Now I’m far advanced to that. Still, that’s a base. When I wrote that book, I thought it was ultimate. Today if you ask me, it’s a base. It’s not an ultimate. So, so much I have progressed.

Manouso: You better start writing again. (laughter)

Guruji: Somehow or other my inner voice says, “Can’t you find something better than what you have been taught?” [For example, if you take] Trikonasan in Light on Yoga, it’s [a] completely immature pose. Take [the] same in [The] Art of Yoga [published 1985]—that’s a mature pose.

So evolution is going on in me.

Patricia: Evolution and creativity—

Guruji: No. For creativity, you should know each and every movement. Now today [in class], [I said to] Abhijata, “See they’re all stretching, but they’re not stretching their heels, back of the heel[s]” in Sarvangasan. Do you know those things? So bhutas are not coming to surface, for you to see. For me the bhuta says, “I am collapsing.” So I charge the bhutas. So the movement is quite different.

In Parsvottanasan, did you know that the back leg gets bent? Even in Urdhva Mukha Svanasan, did you know that the pancha bhutas contract in the calf muscle? So you are in akasa tattva, you become so narrow, and naturally, this cannot function at all. See akasa is the top most in [the] bhutas. Very sensitive. Then comes vijnana [vayu]. Then comes tejas. Then comes ap. Then comes prthvi.

That’s why Patanjali first says “sa tu dirghakala nairantarya satkara asevitah drdhabhumih” [Long, uninterrupted, alert practice is the firm foundation for restraining the fluctuations.] First, the gross bhuta has to be established very well. Then only you can make the other bhutas function. So prthvi becomes the prop, as I use the word, prthvi, the element of earth, becomes the prop for the other subtle elements, for you to understand the yoga. And that’s why [the] skeletal-muscular body should be very well understood. That’s the base. And we do not keep that so firm that our pranic citta does not function at all. Vital body does not get balanced properly because [the] skeletal-muscular body is imbalanced. So if that is imbalanced, the mind is wavering. Tejas tattva is disturbed. So if tejas tattva is disturbed, doubt increases, vijnana becomes doubtful. So that is how you have to study the other aspect[s]. It’s also how doubts come in. So [ask yourself], “Where [have] I lost the prthvi tattva?” For example, in Trikonasan, do you remember how many times I have said that the rear foot becomes small in size?

Patricia: Yes.

Guruji: Have you ever tried again? Tell me, honestly.

Patricia: We’ve tried—

Guruji: Have you adjusted it? [If] you have not adjusted, that means, something strikes you, but you do not react fast. Observe even in Trikonasan, the prthvi tattva, that is the skeletal-muscular body, creates action in the muscle. Do you know that even? Now see, so bhuta tattva has to be stable. [In] Parsvakonasan [it] is the muscles that guide the bone. Muscles are ap tattva. So [in] each asana, have you traced which tattva, which element, is more active? If it is active, why are the other elements not coordinating? [Ask yourself], “What am I to do?”

This balancing of the elements is really important. For example [instructing an unidentified person in the room], do Trikonasan. I’ll give one asana. Now see, see this pelvic girdle. Stand up, [in Tadasana] where is this pelvic girdle facing? Which side? Here, correct? Now do Trikonasan—is it facing the ground or the wall?

Manouso: The ground.

Patricia: The ground.

Guruji: Or parallel to the wall?

Manouso: Ground.

Patricia: Ground.

Guruji: Now, what is the action of the element? Have you not discerned the elemental functions there? The pelvic girdle should be facing exactly parallel to the wall. Top one. And now, are the other elements adjusted or not?

Patricia: Yes.

Guruji: The body moved. It’s not the body straight; it’s how the elements adjust themselves when something has moved. So

So I used myself not only as a master, a Lord of myself, but also as a doer for myself.

that is prthvi tattva. So prthvi tattva moved, because that was in akasa tattva. Contraction is akasa. What is the quality of akasa? Contraction and expansion.

He contracted that part so akasa tattva collapsed. It colors the other elements. Open the akasa [and] see what other things come. That is observation. And then we have to react. Now for example, if you observe what he’s doing on the right side. The left chest is protruding. Right side—akasa tattva is compressed, can you see now? Now, make the shoulder blade as active as the left one. Right shoulder blade. Now what happened? You call it a stretch or you call it balance, the element of balance?

Now what do you say? You all say, “I stretch! I stretch the feeling! I feel the stretch!” So that’s why you’re lost. Stretch cannot come without the other elements’ actions. So that is why Patanjali says first conquer the bhutas.

The five elements have to be properly balanced. Then the other things [can open], the other channels. See again it became dull [looking again at the unidentified person in Trikonasana], but this top side has not become dull at all because the prthvi tattva is strong on the top. Prthvi tattva is oscillating at the bottom. [Make] each and every rib as strong as the top back ribs. Now, can you see now? So the alertness does not disappear; that alertness stretches tattva. In that alertness you have to study— which rib is moving, which rib is not moving. Now even today [in class] Abhi said, bring the collarbone forward. Is it going backward or forward—the armpit?

Unidentified person: Back of the armpit is going back.

Guruji: Now, can you see now?

Same unidentified person: It’s hiding.

Guruji: So vayu tattva is oscillated. Vayu is oscillated. Ah, now floating rib firmness, and armpit firmness, are they [the] same?

Same unidentified person: No.

Guruji: Now bring the same firmness in the armpit. Can you see what happened? That is a balance of element. It’s not going forward or backward or turning, but see the adjustment of the element. The element had collapsed there so I brought the element to life. That is aloneness. (group laughter)

Manouso: Wrapped it up into a bow. Guruji: Ahah? That is lonely, when he did, it was lonely that part. Fullness I brought, so fullness is aloneness; emptiness is a loneliness in other language. (chuckle)

What’s the difference between yogic art and other arts? A musician does not play for himself. He says how [I wish] the audience was here. When you do asana you don’t say, “How [I wish] the audience is here. Am I doing well or [not]?” (laughter) See the language changes in yogic presentation. And we don’t study like this at all.

Manouso: The observer and the observed obviously are both working, but you can never satisfy that—the burning zeal doesn’t come.

Guruji: No, Patanjali—what does he say? Citta cannot do two things at the same time.

Patricia: Right.

Guruji: Fourth chapter. Observation is from the purusha. Action is from the small self. Small self acts; big self is just seeing.

Manouso: And it gets that glimpse that you talked about, in the second you have to pick it up—

Patricia: The flash—

Manouso: The flash—or you don’t get it at all.

Guruji: No. It comes as a flash. And you are very slow to catch that, that correct flash. So instinct throws light. But we are very poor in instincts—God has given that quality to the animals. But for us, we’ve got a special quality: discrimination.

Animals cannot discriminate; we can discriminate. That’s why it comes in a flash, but you are too slow. So you have no chance to discriminate.

Manouso: Closer to our animal nature. (laughter)

Guruji: So learn like that, then you’ll know.

Manouso: Enough for now.

Guruji: Thank you.

Patricia: Thank you so much Guruji.

Guruji: God bless you.