Sacredsmile Yoga

When regularly practicing a form like Baptiste Power Vinyasa Yoga you will eventually discover how rhythm is intricate to this flow.
Like no other style I have experienced until now the Baptiste flow leans on rhythm in such a way that the expression ‘meditation in motion’ becomes a living experience for most students. Rhythm is used as a key instrument to ‘tune’ people to their experience of ‘now’. When I sync with the proper rhythm when practicing myself or when teaching a class the whole experience is lifted onto another level.

Once we find ourselves in the flow of postures weaving from one form into the other riding the wave of our breath we often discover that the tendency of keeping up with understanding and ‘getting’ our practice falls away. The body is becoming fully awakened, the breath is enlightening the nervous system and our internal heat is freeing us up from stagnant condensed energy. We start to step out of the way of ourselves and let the experience of our yoga practice just be what it is.
The rhythm of our practice combined with an element of repetition induces a natural state of presence where our mind finally finds the key to ease off and become much less dominant. We step out of the door of our mind and go out for a walk treading into new territories of existence.
Hence the blissful feelings we have after practice.

One of the reasons that I find makes us feel so good after practicing this kind of yoga is that we are attuning ourselves to the speed of life. I use the word speed because nowadays for most of us life is all about speed. Everything is moving so fast and our lives are so rich in constant streams of impressions that it actually is starting to push many of us in a state of sustained overwhelm. This has in my view a very positive side-effect, we have been overtaken by the speed of Life in such a way that most of us have no choice but to start to become aware of an underlying hum, an underlying beat, an underlying rhythm. That is one of the reasons why a lifestyle including yoga is taking off in the world. People are finding out that practices like meditation, introspection and stepping onto our yoga mat help us to synchronize in a natural way with the flow of existence. It takes us home. It is slowing us down on the inside and apparently that is what gives us more balance, better health and a general feeling of wellbeing.

Distractions abound to keep us away from practicing I have found that rhythm and discipline feed of each other to help us to keep coming back to that what nourishes us; regular, consistent and skilful practice of techniques that anchor us to our own inherent beat. We somehow function within a certain context of pace and rhythm and we start to become aware of it when we practice yoga.

Once we start to connect with our own unique natural inherent rhythm we start to open up to the experience of ourselves on a very deep and revealing level. We gain insights into our nature. We come face to face with what is driving our behavior and personality. We become aware and awake leading us to find out we have more choice and therefore more responsibility. With this process we start to spiritually mature.
You will find all this when practicing a strong and challenging yoga flow like Baptiste’s Power Vinyasa Yoga. You’ll experience it when meditating and you will discover this simply engaging in a mindful fashion with daily life. Once you attune to rhythm of life the winds of freedom simply come to you.