You + Me, India

Driving on the right side of the road is awkward.  Brushing my teeth with tap water still makes me nervous.  I get confused looks when my response to a question is to nod my head from side to side.

“Now all my facebook friends have profile pictures in some stupid yoga pose, and I just get recommendations going ‘You might be friends with this super bendy person.” —Tom, on the effects of social networking in Mysore. 

“Today, the yoga body has become the centerpiece of a transnational tableau of personalized well-being and quotidian redemption, relentlessly embellished on the pages of glossy publications like Yoga Journal.  The locus of yoga is no longer at the center of an invisible ground of being, hiddnen from the gaze of all but the elite initiate or the mystic; instead, the lucent skin of the yoga model becomes the ubiquitous signifier of spiritual possibiliy, the specular projection screen of  characterisitically modern and democratic religious aspirations.  In the yoga body—sold back to a million consumer-practitioners as an irresistible commodity of the holistic, perfectible self—the surface and anatomical structure promise ineffable depth and the dream of incarnate transcendence.”

—Mark Singleton in Yoga Body: The Origins of Modern Posture Practice

“EAT MORE CHAPATIS” was the print on Sharath’s shirt the first time I met him at a workshop in New York.  I didn’t even know what a chapati was at that time.  Fast forward to when I first arrived in India, where I was surrounded by all sorts of Indian breads and still not really knowing the significance.  Naan, kulcha, rotis, chapatis…  What’s the difference?!  After a month or so, I finally decided to ask a local Indian woman what the difference was and what was the big deal about yogis and chapatis.  Here’s what I learned: 

Naan is made with white flour and fried in heavy oil, it’s what we usually find in the Indian restaurants in the States.  Kulcha, also made with white flour, is often mixed with mashed potatoes, onion and lots of spices, then rolled into a flat round shape and baked in an earthen clay oven.  But if you’re practicing yoga, none of these matter to you.  The king of all these breads is the chapati, aka roti.  Chapatis are made simply of whole wheat flour and water, rolled thinly then baked in a clay oven or on  a hot skillet.  Tina explained to me, “Back in the day, every town had one large tandoor (clay over).  In the mornings, the grandmothers and their daughters and their granddaughters would begin making the dough, rolling by hand all the little balls that would then be rolled out into a flat pancake.  The women would all go with their big plates of rolled chapati dough to the town center and make their families chapatis for the day.  The women would trade beads and clothes and gossip.  It was the social gathering then, but also it was just a normal part of our day.  Nowadays, everyone is so obsessed with this idea of liberty and privacy, everything is autonomous and separate; we make our chapatis at home and the town tandoor is just an abandoned landmark.  But the tradition of learning to make and roll the dough for the day is still passed down through generations.”  

“But why is it important for yoga practitioners?” is the question I still had.  Normally, I avoid wheat like the plague.  In the States, wheat makes me sick and I couldn’t imagine it possibly being good for you in any way.  Yet every time I went to eat at the Three Sisters, a small home where this wonderful woman has been cooking sattvic food for yoga students for over 25 years.  “Best yoga students eat 6 chapatis! You eat more chapatis today,” Akka would instruct me as she put one and after another on my plate.  “Chapatis very good for yoga student. Make yoga student strong.”  This could have been Akka’s mantra, as each time she would say this to me when I would shake my head, holding one hand on my full belly to explain I couldn’t eat another chapati.  After a month or so, a day without a chapati felt incomplete, and I came to understand how the chapati was an important part to a yogis diet because of its sattvic qualities.  The idea behind a Sattvic diet is to eat simple foods that are rich in prana (life-force) and balanced in energetic qualities.  These energetic qualities are also known as the Gunas,  there are three: Sattva (purity); Rajas (activity/process of change); Tamas (darkness).  By eating a balance of these energies from foods that are of higher vibrational level, it is said that a Sattvic diet can help raise our own vibrational levels and aid us down the path towards spiritual enlightenment and higher consciousness.  So in the simplicity of the chapati’s ingredients and preparation, it has become an intrinsic part of a yogis diet…

Chapati Recipe (yields 6-12 chapatis)

1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup water
1 teaspoon sea salt
extra flour for dusting
*small portion butter/ghee

In a large bowl, first add in the flour and salt.  In your hand, pour half of the water.  Begin mixing the flour and water by hand, adding in more water as needed.  Keep working the mixture with your hand until you begin to form a dough.  If it is too wet or sticky, add more flour.  You want the dough to be firm but not too dry.  Dough can be wrapped up and stored in the fridge up to 3 days.  When ready to use, remove from fridge and allow dough to thaw before rolling.

Preheat your skillet to med-high heat. Prepare your cutting board with a bit of flour.  Begin to tear off small balls from the larger ball of dough, rolling them into 1 1/2 to 2-inch balls.  Press the ball into the cutting board, roll evenly with a rolling pin to create a thin pancake-like patty.  Take the chapati and place on a hot, non-oiled skillet.  Keep your eye on these because they cook fast! When you see the corners begin to crack and curl up, flip over.  Small air pockets will begin to form and bubble up, use a cloth to push them down, then remove from skillet and top with a bit of ghee.  

“I was disappointed to find that so many novice students have taken Ashtanga yoga and have turned it into a circus for their own fame and profit (Power Yoga, Jan/Feb 1995). The title “Power Yoga” itself degrades the depth, purpose and method of the system that I received from my guru, Sri. T. Krishnamacharya. Power is the property of God. It is not something to be collected for one’s ego. Partial yoga methods out of line with their internal purpose can build up the “six enemies” (desire, anger, greed, illusion, infatuation and envy) around the heart. The full ashtanga system practiced with devotion leads to freedom within one’s heart. The Yoga Sutra II.28 confirms this “Yogaanganusthanat asuddiksaye jnanadiptih avivekakhyateh”, which means “practicing all the aspects of yoga destroys the impurities so that the light of knowledge and discrimination shines”. It is unfortunate that students who have not yet matured in their own practice have changed the method and have cut out the essence of an ancient lineage to accommodate their own limitations.

The Ashtanga yoga system should never be confused with “power yoga” or any whimsical creation which goes against the tradition of the many types of yoga shastras (scriptures). It would be a shame to lose the precious jewel of liberation in the mud of ignorant body building.

K. Pattabhi Jois, Ashtanga Yoga Research Institute, Mysore, South India