Inspiration : The Body Electric

American yogi Walt Whitman, in his poem I Sing the Body Electric, sings the praises of the body as not separate from or the house of the soul, but as the very expression of the soul. "And if the body were not the soul," he asks, "what is the soul?"

What we call “embodiment” in modern language - this notion of the body as the expression of the soul, or energy, or the divine, or whatever you like to call the source of life - is at the heart of the yoga tradition in which we do the physical practice. We practice yoga with the body as a way of accessing what is beyond the body but expressed by the body. Whitman says, “If any thing is sacred the human body is sacred.” Another “Whit,” modern teacher Mark Whitwell, calls the physical yoga practice “a whole body prayer to life”.

The poem is long… but beautiful. The last verse (9) is a kind of prayer to the whole body, one that recalls the tour of the body that we practice in Yoga Nidra. Find the whole text below.

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I Sing the Body Electric

BY WALT WHITMAN

1
I sing the body electric,
The armies of those I love engirth me and I engirth them,
They will not let me off till I go with them, respond to them,
And discorrupt them, and charge them full with the charge of the soul.

Was it doubted that those who corrupt their own bodies conceal themselves?
And if those who defile the living are as bad as they who defile the dead?
And if the body does not do fully as much as the soul?
And if the body were not the soul, what is the soul?

2
The love of the body of man or woman balks account, the body itself balks account,
That of the male is perfect, and that of the female is perfect.

The expression of the face balks account,
But the expression of a well-made man appears not only in his face,
It is in his limbs and joints also, it is curiously in the joints of his hips and wrists,
It is in his walk, the carriage of his neck, the flex of his waist and knees, dress does not hide him,
The strong sweet quality he has strikes through the cotton and broadcloth,
To see him pass conveys as much as the best poem, perhaps more,
You linger to see his back, and the back of his neck and shoulder-side.

The sprawl and fulness of babes, the bosoms and heads of women, the folds of their dress, their style as we pass in the street, the contour of their shape downwards,
The swimmer naked in the swimming-bath, seen as he swims through the transparent green-shine, or lies with his face up and rolls silently to and fro in the heave of the water,
The bending forward and backward of rowers in row-boats, the horseman in his saddle,
Girls, mothers, house-keepers, in all their performances,
The group of laborers seated at noon-time with their open dinner-kettles, and their wives waiting,
The female soothing a child, the farmer’s daughter in the garden or cow-yard,
The young fellow hoeing corn, the sleigh-driver driving his six horses through the crowd,
The wrestle of wrestlers, two apprentice-boys, quite grown, lusty, good-natured, native-born, out on the vacant lot at sun-down after work,
The coats and caps thrown down, the embrace of love and resistance,
The upper-hold and under-hold, the hair rumpled over and blinding the eyes;
The march of firemen in their own costumes, the play of masculine muscle through clean-setting trowsers and waist-straps,
The slow return from the fire, the pause when the bell strikes suddenly again, and the listening on the alert,
The natural, perfect, varied attitudes, the bent head, the curv’d neck and the counting;
Such-like I love—I loosen myself, pass freely, am at the mother’s breast with the little child,
Swim with the swimmers, wrestle with wrestlers, march in line with the firemen, and pause, listen, count.

3
I knew a man, a common farmer, the father of five sons,
And in them the fathers of sons, and in them the fathers of sons.
This man was of wonderful vigor, calmness, beauty of person,
The shape of his head, the pale yellow and white of his hair and beard, the immeasurable meaning of his black eyes, the richness and breadth of his manners,
These I used to go and visit him to see, he was wise also,
He was six feet tall, he was over eighty years old, his sons were massive, clean, bearded, tan-faced, handsome,
They and his daughters loved him, all who saw him loved him,
They did not love him by allowance, they loved him with personal love,
He drank water only, the blood show’d like scarlet through the clear-brown skin of his face,
He was a frequent gunner and fisher, he sail’d his boat himself, he had a fine one presented to him by a ship-joiner, he had fowling-pieces presented to him by men that loved him,
When he went with his five sons and many grand-sons to hunt or fish, you would pick him out as the most beautiful and vigorous of the gang,
You would wish long and long to be with him, you would wish to sit by him in the boat that you and he might touch each other.

4
I have perceiv’d that to be with those I like is enough,
To stop in company with the rest at evening is enough,
To be surrounded by beautiful, curious, breathing, laughing flesh is enough,
To pass among them or touch any one, or rest my arm ever so lightly round his or her neck for a moment, what is this then?
I do not ask any more delight, I swim in it as in a sea.

There is something in staying close to men and women and looking on them, and in the contact and odor of them, that pleases the soul well,
All things please the soul, but these please the soul well.

5
This is the female form,
A divine nimbus exhales from it from head to foot,
It attracts with fierce undeniable attraction,
I am drawn by its breath as if I were no more than a helpless vapor, all falls aside but myself and it,
Books, art, religion, time, the visible and solid earth, and what was expected of heaven or fear’d of hell, are now consumed,
Mad filaments, ungovernable shoots play out of it, the response likewise ungovernable,
Hair, bosom, hips, bend of legs, negligent falling hands all diffused, mine too diffused,
Ebb stung by the flow and flow stung by the ebb, love-flesh swelling and deliciously aching,
Limitless limpid jets of love hot and enormous, quivering jelly of love, white-blow and delirious juice,
Bridegroom night of love working surely and softly into the prostrate dawn,
Undulating into the willing and yielding day,
Lost in the cleave of the clasping and sweet-flesh’d day.

This the nucleus—after the child is born of woman, man is born of woman,
This the bath of birth, this the merge of small and large, and the outlet again.

Be not ashamed women, your privilege encloses the rest, and is the exit of the rest,
You are the gates of the body, and you are the gates of the soul.

The female contains all qualities and tempers them,
She is in her place and moves with perfect balance,
She is all things duly veil’d, she is both passive and active,
She is to conceive daughters as well as sons, and sons as well as daughters.

As I see my soul reflected in Nature,
As I see through a mist, One with inexpressible completeness, sanity, beauty,
See the bent head and arms folded over the breast, the Female I see.

6
The male is not less the soul nor more, he too is in his place,
He too is all qualities, he is action and power,
The flush of the known universe is in him,
Scorn becomes him well, and appetite and defiance become him well,
The wildest largest passions, bliss that is utmost, sorrow that is utmost become him well, pride is for him,
The full-spread pride of man is calming and excellent to the soul,
Knowledge becomes him, he likes it always, he brings every thing to the test of himself,
Whatever the survey, whatever the sea and the sail he strikes soundings at last only here,
(Where else does he strike soundings except here?)

The man’s body is sacred and the woman’s body is sacred,
No matter who it is, it is sacred—is it the meanest one in the laborers’ gang?
Is it one of the dull-faced immigrants just landed on the wharf?
Each belongs here or anywhere just as much as the well-off, just as much as you,
Each has his or her place in the procession.

(All is a procession,
The universe is a procession with measured and perfect motion.)

Do you know so much yourself that you call the meanest ignorant?
Do you suppose you have a right to a good sight, and he or she has no right to a sight?
Do you think matter has cohered together from its diffuse float, and the soil is on the surface, and water runs and vegetation sprouts,
For you only, and not for him and her?

7
A man’s body at auction,
(For before the war I often go to the slave-mart and watch the sale,)
I help the auctioneer, the sloven does not half know his business.
Gentlemen look on this wonder,
Whatever the bids of the bidders they cannot be high enough for it,
For it the globe lay preparing quintillions of years without one animal or plant,
For it the revolving cycles truly and steadily roll’d.

In this head the all-baffling brain,
In it and below it the makings of heroes.
Examine these limbs, red, black, or white, they are cunning in tendon and nerve,
They shall be stript that you may see them.

Exquisite senses, life-lit eyes, pluck, volition,
Flakes of breast-muscle, pliant backbone and neck, flesh not flabby, good-sized arms and legs,
And wonders within there yet.
Within there runs blood,
The same old blood! the same red-running blood!
There swells and jets a heart, there all passions, desires, reachings, aspirations,
(Do you think they are not there because they are not express’d in parlors and lecture-rooms?)

This is not only one man, this the father of those who shall be fathers in their turns,
In him the start of populous states and rich republics,
Of him countless immortal lives with countless embodiments and enjoyments.
How do you know who shall come from the offspring of his offspring through the centuries?

(Who might you find you have come from yourself, if you could trace back through the centuries?)

8
A woman’s body at auction,
She too is not only herself, she is the teeming mother of mothers,
She is the bearer of them that shall grow and be mates to the mothers.
Have you ever loved the body of a woman?
Have you ever loved the body of a man?
Do you not see that these are exactly the same to all in all nations and times all over the earth?

If any thing is sacred the human body is sacred,
And the glory and sweet of a man is the token of manhood untainted,

And in man or woman a clean, strong, firm-fibred body, is more beautiful than the most beautiful face.
Have you seen the fool that corrupted his own live body? or the fool that corrupted her own live body?
For they do not conceal themselves, and cannot conceal themselves.

9
O my body! I dare not desert the likes of you in other men and women, nor the likes of the parts of you,
I believe the likes of you are to stand or fall with the likes of the soul, (and that they are the soul,)
I believe the likes of you shall stand or fall with my poems, and that they are my poems,
Man’s, woman’s, child’s, youth’s, wife’s, husband’s, mother’s, father’s, young man’s, young woman’s poems,
Head, neck, hair, ears, drop and tympan of the ears,
Eyes, eye-fringes, iris of the eye, eyebrows, and the waking or sleeping of the lids,
Mouth, tongue, lips, teeth, roof of the mouth, jaws, and the jaw-hinges,
Nose, nostrils of the nose, and the partition,
Cheeks, temples, forehead, chin, throat, back of the neck, neck-slue,
Strong shoulders, manly beard, scapula, hind-shoulders, and the ample side-round of the chest,
Upper-arm, armpit, elbow-socket, lower-arm, arm-sinews, arm-bones,
Wrist and wrist-joints, hand, palm, knuckles, thumb, forefinger, finger-joints, finger-nails,
Broad breast-front, curling hair of the breast, breast-bone, breast-side,
Ribs, belly, backbone, joints of the backbone,
Hips, hip-sockets, hip-strength, inward and outward round, man-balls, man-root,
Strong set of thighs, well carrying the trunk above,
Leg fibres, knee, knee-pan, upper-leg, under-leg,
Ankles, instep, foot-ball, toes, toe-joints, the heel;
All attitudes, all the shapeliness, all the belongings of my or your body or of any one’s body, male or female,
The lung-sponges, the stomach-sac, the bowels sweet and clean,
The brain in its folds inside the skull-frame,
Sympathies, heart-valves, palate-valves, sexuality, maternity,
Womanhood, and all that is a woman, and the man that comes from woman,
The womb, the teats, nipples, breast-milk, tears, laughter, weeping, love-looks, love-perturbations and risings,
The voice, articulation, language, whispering, shouting aloud,
Food, drink, pulse, digestion, sweat, sleep, walking, swimming,
Poise on the hips, leaping, reclining, embracing, arm-curving and tightening,
The continual changes of the flex of the mouth, and around the eyes,
The skin, the sunburnt shade, freckles, hair,
The curious sympathy one feels when feeling with the hand the naked meat of the body,
The circling rivers the breath, and breathing it in and out,
The beauty of the waist, and thence of the hips, and thence downward toward the knees,
The thin red jellies within you or within me, the bones and the marrow in the bones,
The exquisite realization of health;
O I say these are not the parts and poems of the body only, but of the soul,
O I say now these are the soul!

Courtesy of The Poetry Foundation

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MASTERCLASSES avec MIKA DE BRITO >> SAMEDI 24 OCTOBRE à EYGALIÈRES

Mika de Brito @nastyyogi nous rejoins pour deux masterclasses exceptionnelles samedi 24 octobre aux Sentiers de l’Abondance à Eygalières

MASTERCLASS 1 : 10-12h : Vinyasa Elemental High Tempo - yoga dynamique
MASTERCLASS 2 : 14h-16h : Géométrie Naturel Low Tempo - yoga alignement et relaxation

…suivi d’une dégustation de boissons aromatiques, bio, et locales
produites aux Sentiers

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MASTERCLASS 1 / 10H-12H : VINYASA ELEMENTAL - HIGH TEMPO : yoga dynamique et séquentiel

Ce cours s’adresse à tout le monde. Malgré le rythme soutenu, Mika donnera, pour chaque posture, des options pour les rendre plus accessibles si besoin. Il prendra par exemple le temps d’expliquer aux participant.es comment suivre la salutation sans s’essouffler tandis que d'autres, plus avancés, seront peut-être en train de sauter. Tout le monde y trouvera son compte. L’idée n’est pas de devenir un héros sur  son tapis mais bel et bien de construire, à travers une pratique adaptée, une communauté de yogis, bienveillants avec eux-mêmes et avec les autres. 

Nous commençerons le cours par un exercice de respiration sur un son métronomique. Nous faisons ainsi entrer l’élément AIR. Assis, nous nous occupons de mettre « la respiration sur des rails ». Le rythme ainsi donné, nous pourrons alors faire rentrer  le souffle dans le mouvement. L’oxygène étant l’aliment du FEU, celui-ci sera mobilisé à travers la salutation au soleil. Le FEU brûle et purifie, sous l’effet de la chaleur interne. Les pores de la peau s’ouvrent et laissent s’écouler le troisième élément:  L’EAU. Ces trois éléments se stabilisent grâce au quatrième : la TERRE, à travers l’asana qui passe par une recherche permanente de contact avec le sol. Dans chacune des postures, nous chercherons l’assise , l’assiette, « the ass on the ground ». Lorsque ces  quatre éléments sont réunis le cinquième élément apparait et viens à vous : L’ETHER … C’est le temps de la méditation . "Tout ça pour ça » comme le dit Mika ; la seule et unique raison de traverser toute cette gymnastique étant de trouver cet état méditatif,  ce lieu en soi…stable et confortable.

MASTERCLASS 2 / 14H-16H : GÉOMÉTRIE NATURELLE - LOW TEMPO : placement , lenteur, concentration  & détente profonde
 
 Dans cette seconde Masterclass, nous allons apprendre à nous corriger nous-même grâce à notre environnement physique. D’abord grâce aux murs autour de nous que nous utiliserons comme des équerres, un peu comme le niveau du maçon. Ensuite grâce au sol que nous  utiliserons comme un « spirit level » en nous appuyant sur la gravité à laquelle personne ne peut échapper. 

Chacun des cours ou ateliers commencent par un exercice de respiration. Puis Mika vous proposera une séquence que vous pourrez répéter chez vous, contre le mur. Tout le monde à la maison dispose en effet d'un sol plat, d'un mur, ou d'une porte fermée  dans un couloir. Quant à la gravité elle est partout ; mieux vaut l’avoir avec soi que contre soi. Nous apprendrons à nous asseoir, la colonne étirée entre ciel et terre sans effort. 

La plupart des exercices sont abordables et traités avec patience et humilité, précisions et lenteur. Pour bien enchainer les postures il faut bien les comprendre. Mika nous montrera comment chercher à créer de l’espace plutôt que de chercher à  s’étirer.  

Nous terminerons cet atelier par une belle séance méditation et une relaxation où Mika jouera du hangdrum et de son tambour ramené d’un récent voyage en Sibérie.

30€ par classe // 2 credits forfait pour les adhérents de Yoga Saint-Rémy

{{ les deux masterclasses sont ouvert à tous et à toutes }}

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Le vrai but du yoga est l'état naturel

L’état ultime du Yoga, samadhi, est parfois traduit par “l’état naturel.”

Le concept revient encore est encore dans la pratique, dans l’enseignement, dans la vie quotidienne : l’envie, l’invitation, le besoin de se relier avec les rythmes de la nature, de retrouver une resonance, une coherence entre intérieur et extérieur, soi et l’autre, l’individuel et l’universel. Par moment c’est même pas un recherche mais une revelation : que tous les rythmes de la nature, des éléments, et de l’évolution sont déjà dans nous. Mais ce n’est pas du blabla mystique… la science a de quoi dire sur le sujet.

Il y a quelques années déjà que j’ai croisé l’article suivant sur les réseaux sociaux, et j'ai trouvé tellement bien que je n'ai pas pu m'empêcher de le traduire pour partager avec les amis yogis francophones. Si vous vous êtes déjà posé la question, Quel est le vrai but du yoga? cela pourrait vous donner de quoi réfléchir.

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La Science du Vinyasa : Atelier SURYANAMASKAR avec Dr Krzysztof Stec | mercredi 22 juillet 9h-12h à Somapa, Eyragues

À l origine, SURYANAMASKAR (la Salutation au Soleil) est un rituel du matin, en l’honneur du soleil levant qui va apporter son énergie à la terre, bien qu’il soit possible de pratiquer la série à tout moment de la journée.

La Salutation au Soleil est une composition dynamique de mouvements et de positions (appelées asana) effectuées dans un certain ordre et en corrélation avec la respiration. Elle est à la base de ce qu'on appelle aujourd'hui yoga "vinyasa" ou dynamique.

Pratiquée quinze à vingt minutes par jour, la Salutation au Soleil est parfois considérée comme équivalente à une séance de yoga complète.

La séquence se déroule de telle manière que le dos s’incline alternativement en avant et en arrière. La concentration et la participation active de la conscience sont également mises en avant.

La Salutation au Soleil est pratiquée avec des intentions différentes, depuis un simple exercice de gymnastique, purement physique, jusqu’à une pratique méditative complète.

Krzysztof Stec, chercheur en éducation physique, physiothérapie et bioméchanique, physiologie et psychologie à Jan Dlugosz University (Pologne), est expert mondialement reconnu en la tradition et la pratique de SURYANAMASKAR et ses multiples bienfaits sur l’organisme. Son livre : La salutation au soleil traditionnelle : Ses effets sur la santé du corps et de l'esprit à été traduit en plusieurs langues et sa recherche sur la technique à été autant intéressant pour les sportifs, les psychologues, et les chercheurs de sens subtil en Inde, en Europe, et aux Etats-Unis.

De passage en France, il nous propose un atelier de 3h par lequel il partagera ses recherches sur la technique, son historique, ses effets et ses modifications et variantes pour s’addresser aux besoins de chacun/e.

L’atelier aura lieu au Centre Somapa, 326 route de Saint-Andiol, Eyragues.
Merci de venir avec votre propre tapis + une serviette.
IN ENGLISH (en anglais avec traduction en français)

Sur réservation : 40€ / 3 crédits forfait

Source: https://www.amazon.fr/salutation-soleil-tr...
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