Anonymous said...
'I attended the Confluence. It was a profound experience. I was in a haze for a week following.
The lobby and vendor booths made me uncomfortable and claustrophobic. But stuffing yourself sardine-style into the Mysore room was liberating on a different level - I felt like I was wholly anonymous. Perhaps 2% of the people in that room would recognize me, and only one of the teachers would. So in a sense, it was more pure than practicing alone, where I am focusing very much on my self. A huge crowd let me slip into something a little more detached from myself and that iteration of my practice'.
from my previous post
Kind of a positive deindividuation?
Anyone else experience something similar, fascinated by this idea
'...So in a sense, it was more pure than practicing alone, where I am focusing very much on myself. A huge crowd let me slip into something a little more detached from myself and that iteration of my practice'.
11 comments:
Yeah, of course. That's a really good way of putting it :)
Yup, that's why I love Mysore rooms!
Susan, Karen, : ) HI!
Hi! I've been thinking about this concept since I posted my comment. The feeling of a Mysore room is quite like the anonymity of a city -- a feeling that I miss very much now that I love in the suburbs. The anonymity of the 'burbs is more dispersed and disconnected than in a city. I love that feeling of being part of the energy and bustle of a city, without it being at all personal to me as an individual. Strikingly similar to the feeling in a Mysore room!
I have one yoga-related trip coming up this year, and am so looking forward to the Mysore room! Such a pleasure to lose myself.
yes, a city, i mentioned the same after reading Anon's comment when it came in on the previous post.
This of course is something new though surely in relation to Ashtanga. Classes back in the day were small in the old Shala and attention constant. In a sense what we have now is the complete opposite, good that despite such a complete turn around something extremely valuable in the experience can still be found.
I'm thinking about Boulder a lot at the moment , lived in Switzerland and the Rocky's for quite some time and crave mountains, real ones. if I were to go anywhere for a month of practice it would be there.
Yes, that was my feeling in the Mysore room at the Confluence, too - anonymity, and a quiet detachment from myself. Almost a feeling of being alone. Sweet, really.
Well, the city analogy may blur the point: I don't think it's about numbers in the room so much as the intimate and yet impersonal atmosphere of a Mysore room. That's the heart of the matter, and numbers can be large or small. You are there as an individual, but your personality and the burden of your "I-ness" can be put down. That's where the feeling comes from. Much like at a zazen retreat. Or -- as we said -- time in the city.
My feeling of course is that you don't need to go to a room in India to " put down the burden of your "I-ness" but it's nice that despite how it's evolved it's still felt to be conducive, retreats as Sharath suggested recently have their place.
Agreed. I wasn't actually thinking of Mysore when I wrote that. Still, the travel thing also kicks I-ness in the ass. So Mysore room in Mysore is kind of a double whammy!
I'm curious, does this quote make you more or less inclined to go to Mysore? Do you plan on going this winter now after all?
Sorry for the late reply Anon. Feel perhaps I understand the attraction a little more, that something can still be found in that current situation but not more or less inclined to go. Mysore just doesn't feel relevant to me at the present time.
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