By Marlene (Matrikaa) Gast, Yogaratna

Every time I do Downward Facing Dog pose (Adho Mukha Svanasana), I savor the experience.

To prepare, I lengthen my arms out on the floor, and feel a soft knot unravel between my shoulder blades. It’s like a looped scarf simply smoothing out. Nearly effortlessly, I back into the pose.

I feel supported and protected by my leg bones. Miraculously stable, they take my body’s weight. My torso feels fluid and light. I feel enlivened and timeless. A pure, blissful awareness of being expands from within and envelopes me.

In my 30’s, I found I could do yoga, though I’d nearly flunked high school physical education. Down Dog has been a loyal friend. In Down Dog, I proudly sunk my heels into the floor while others had to lift theirs. True, the teacher suggested I seek a chiropractor for my visibly tight upper spine. But my heels landed! I was good (or so I thought)! For decades, I continued with yoga classes in different styles. Down Dog was always my favorite pose. I stayed in delusion.

Finding Svaroopa^® yoga, I first felt the bliss of spinal opening and then learned the truth. Overstretched ligaments are a big problem. I could press my Down Dog feet into the floor and go into all kinds of pretzel poses. But this deceptive flexibility kept my spine tight.

Fortunately, I enrolled in Foundations. That “iceberg” hiding in the depths came to light. After YTT 1, I vowed to practice Svaroopa^® yoga poses exclusively. No more Down Dog — not until YTT 3 a few years later.

Being trained to teach Downward Facing Dog as a Svaroopa^® yoga pose was a breakthrough. I felt my spine and whole body come alive. It’s a lifetime Marker Pose for me. Down Dog shows me, in no uncertain terms, the miraculous power of Svaroopa^® yoga’s spinal decompression.

I now do Down Dog with reverence. It reveals the sanctity of my human body and sends me into bliss.

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By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

Embodied spirituality is built into all our Svaroopa^® Sciences.  It’s there from the yoga poses, through your subtle internal processes and especially including your meditative practices.  Svaroopa^® yoga is a modern-day expression of the very ancient tradition of tantra. 

Tantra means loom, like a weaver’s loom that interweaves the warp and the woof threads.  It means that you find the infinite in this finite reality.  You discover the Divine which is already present within the mundane.  The tantric sages say that the One Reality, which has always existed, decided to manifest the entire world and everyone in it.  Everything is Shiva being the world as well as being beyond the world. 

The doorway into this tantric tradition is through initiation — Shaktipat.  It is a transmission of energy that awakens your own dormant energy, hidden within.  Your awakened energy then climbs your spine from the tip of your tailbone to the top of your head.  The purpose of all Svaroopa^® practices is to awaken and support the blossoming of this spiritual energy in you. 

During meditation, signs of this inner awakening include little swaying movements, even small little jerks that deepen your meditation.  You may feel an inner heat climbing up your spine and spreading through your body.  You can be drawn into a deep and profound meditative state, so deep that it feels like sleep.  It is a deep meditative immersion into Consciousness. 

In your inner explorations, you may see lights, colors and visions, or you may hear divine inner sounds.  Or sudden and profound insights may be revealed.  These are all the results of Shaktipat — the inner awakening.  This is the beginning of embodied spirituality. 

Once you have received Shaktipat, the end goal is guaranteed — enlightenment in this lifetime.  I describe it like this: Once a baby is born, puberty is guaranteed.  Once you receive Shaktipat, realization is guaranteed.  As cosmic energy moves through your spine, it vitalizes your body.  I can’t say revitalize because that would imply you were getting energy you’d previously had.  Rather, this is a vitality you never knew.  Your body undergoes energetic and cellular changes, profoundly beneficial. 

Yet the most important effect is that a profound inner state opens up for you.  Your new inner stability and depth provide additional physical benefits.  Your inner essence is expressed through your body and is experienced in your body, even while there is so much more. 

Svaroopa^® yoga poses create and support this process.  Our sequencing always starts at the tip of your tailbone, followed by poses that mirror the inner opening of Shaktipat.  These practices support your inner upliftment, helping to dissolve blockages along the way.  Yet, as powerful, beautiful, wonderful and blissful as the poses are, they are only the starting point. 

Ultimately, the real work is accomplished in meditation.  Meditation is where you let your Divine inner energy move through your spine.  This energy restructures your body and opens up your mind.  Your most powerful practices are mantra and meditation.  They will fulfill the promise of the sages, embodied spirituality:

to know without thought

to BE without effort

to experience without fear or desire

to abide in the Bliss of Consciousness

to live in the multidimensionality of your

own being

to know your own Self as the Divine

Incarnation that you already are.

— Excerpt from Embodied Spirituality, pages 7‒10