6 week course (29 Oct – 3 Dec 2019), Tuesdays, 8 – 9:15pm

Vanessa Shribman is a certified Iyengar teacher with 30 years of experience. She is the Director of the Coast Yoga Centre in South Australia where she continues to teach. She now lives part of the week in Melbourne and is excited to have the opportunity to teach at Yarraville Yoga Centre. She suffered a serious back injury in 2000 resulting in surgery and from that experience has developed a special interest in how yoga can help to rehabilitate a person with back pain. She is also a holistic physiotherapist working in private practice in South Australia and Victoria.

The course will include:

• First aid poses to help with acute pain.
• Gaining the confidence to move again
• Individual poses to assist with many types and causes of back pain such as disc prolapse, facet joint inflammation, ankalosing spondilytis, spondilolythesis, osteoarthritis, poor posture.
• Learn what not to do when you have back pain
• Build core strength
• Build strength in the muscles that support the spine
• Build length in the muscles that put load on the spine such as short hamstrings and hip muscles
• Learn skills to help with the fear and anxiety of back pain

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An Indian Diocesan Catholic Priest, born in Mumbai, Father Joe Pereira attributes much of his worldly inspiration to his two mentors, Mother Teresa and B. K. S. Iyengar, the founder of Iyengar Yoga. Father Joe studied directly with B.K. S. Iyengar for 46 years from 1968 until Iyengar’s death in 2014, aged 95 years.  Father Joe is now considered one of the world’s leading certified Iyengar Yoga instructors, a style of Yoga that instills confidence and a desire for self-study and precision in the student, within a safe and healing practice. Father Joe received direct authority from BKS Iyengar to teach and certify Iyengar yoga students in a specific set of restorative postures designed to suit people in addiction recovery.

Father Joe is the Founder and Managing Trustee of the Kripa Foundation, which works across 12 states in India, through its 26 residential locations and 75 projects treating both addictions and HIV/AIDS. Kripa is unique with the addiction recovery field in providing daily yoga and meditation to people in recovery within a holistic 12 step peer support and professionally managed and guided program.

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In September YYC were pleased to host Lulu Bull from the Blue Mountains NSW, for a 2 day yoga workshop, exploring the realm of human existence between Earth and Sky. Starting literally, from the ground up, Lulu instructed our hearts, our bodies, our minds in asana and pranayama practise, towards pratyahara, dharana, dhyana.

Faithful to the teachings of BKS Iyengar, we began our study at the skin on the soles of the feet and the architecture of the ankle bones, in standing poses. Lulu guided our awareness from the lift of arches of the feet and pressure through the heels, to draw up through the legs, stabilising the pelvis and extending the spine, awakening the mind.

Afternoon restorative practise took us from the skeletal frame into subtle musculature of the diaphragm and intercostals for the exploration of Ujayi breathing and Brahmari, “Bumble Bee” pranayama.

Respiration = Purification, Sauca.

Pratyahara, Sensory withdrawal, was experienced by the gentle placing of fingers across the eyes, “as softly as one holds a chick”. Images of Nature inspired exploration of our own true nature. Inhalation breaths entering the body to merge with the vast ocean that lies within each of us. A blending of the cosmic universal energy with individual spirit, for an experience of profound contentment, Santosa.

Empty head, Full heart.

Sunday began with abdominal poses, stoking the “agni” fire, building our strength and courage for backbends to follow. These were done pressing up away from the earths gravitational pull and by dropping back from above, in headstand, to the ground.

This humbling and ennobling practice was made available to all levels of student by Lulu’s gracious generosity and clarity of purpose, with a final quote about Dharma, from The Mahabharata, to encourage us all on our yogic path through practice – ‘dharma is that which uplifts, sustains, upholds those who have fallen, are in the process of falling or they have fallen. So dharma is that which uplifts people.’

On the weekend 17 and 18 Nov over 75 teachers and students of yoga from all over Australia travelled to Yarraville Yoga Centre to attend a weekend workshop delivered by the much loved Indian Iyengar yoga teacher Father Joe Pereira.

Father Joe who is one of the world’s most highly qualified Iyengar Yoga teachers having studied with BK S Iyengar for 45 years is also an ordained catholic priest of the Archdiocese of Mumbai.

Father Joe’s main work is as the founder and Director of the Kripa Foundation, a charitable organisation dedicated to the treatment of those with alcohol and substance addiction and those suffering from HIV/AIDS.

Most of the Kripa Foundation’s clients are drawn from the slum areas of India’s cities and include children who have been making their way from a very young age by joining with tribes of their peers and living in extreme poverty without the loving support of family. Prior to the workshop classes we viewed a film on Friday evening documenting this work.  The film “The Circle” by British filmmaker and yoga teacher Phillipa Frisby was recently awarded Best Documentary prize at the Delhi International Film Festival.  It was a moving testament to the wonderful work of the Kripa Foundation.

Inspired by the dedicated lives and works of both Mother Theresa and BKS Iyengar, Father Joe shares his faith and the practice of yoga to help his patients recover a sense of ‘wholeness’ and ‘holiness’ in their lives. By reaching out and making himself available to children and adults afflicted with HIV and Hep C, and drug and alcohol addictions, he guides them on a path to wellness.

Through the practice of asana and pranayama, Father Joe shared his learned knowledge and spiritual wisdom, guiding us through a sequence of poses, to restore the homeostasis of the physical and physiological body. Strengthening the Immune system, soothing the Nervous system, nourishing the Endocrine system, nurturing the Cardio-respiratory system, cleansing gastrointestinal and urinary systems.

Sharing his humanity and humility, Father Joe showed us that by holding the poses for 3, 5 or 10 minutes, and maintaining a sense of quiet, a sense of restfulness, with alignment and balance, we can tap into the cellular level and a ‘remembered wellness’. By making our maximum our minimum, we can learn to surrender effort to grace, and an inner awakening.

Father Joe evokes the spirit of BKS Iyengar. He traverses effortlessly the fields of science, philosophy and faith, reconnecting us to our bodies, to our breath, and then beyond the body and the breath to the deeper sense of self that lies within each of us, the anandamaya kosa, or ‘original bliss’. He reminded us that without awareness and attention the practice becomes ritual, but with attention it becomes a spiritual journey where each asana is as a contemplative prayer.

It was a truly enriching weekend. Thank you Father Joe.