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Volume CXXXIII, Number 1 |
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Yoga introduced to students
PRIYA SRIDHAR
STAFF WRITER
While other Bowdoin students traveled, worked, studied, and relaxed this past summer, Laurel Jones '06 worked at Shoshoni Yoga Retreat in Rollinsville, Colorado earning her yoga teaching certification. Laurel has been going to week-long spring break camps at Shoshoni with her mother since she was thirteen. After learning more about yoga, Laurel found Shoshoni's commitment to the specific field of Hatha yoga particularly interesting. Unlike other forms of yoga, which emphasize endurance and strength, Hatha is more of a self-focused practice. Upon completion of her 200-hour teaching certification program at Shoshoni, Laurel became certified by the National Yoga Alliance.
In comparison to the week-long retreats Laurel participated in as a child, her month-long stay at Shoshoni this summer was extremely rigorous. On a typical day, she would wake up at 4:15 to meditate for an hour. She would then go to the temple to chant, followed by study, and philosophy or yoga classes depending on the day. In the afternoon she took classes dealing with anatomy, Sanskrit, and herbal healing. Generally, Laurel spent four to six hours a day on yoga.
Laurel has found that Hatha yoga has made her a better person and believes the doctrines of selfless service and a desire to find one's inner self, as promoted by her swami (teacher) at Shoshoni, hold life-long value. Although some people consider yoga an activity, Shoshoni believes that yoga is a unity of mind, body, and spirit. Recently yoga has become a trendy form of exercise, but Shoshoni reminds its visitors that yoga positions were first brought about through personal meditation. Although its resurgence in today's culture is relatively new, the practice itself is ancient. Meditating originated as a way of separating one's self from the world and finding inner self. The goal is to eventually attain enlightenment.
Laurel wishes to use what she learned at Shoshoni this summer at Bowdoin
and throughout her life. As a psychology major, she aims to ultimately
do an independent project relating meditation or yoga to some aspect of
psychology. She has started offering yoga classes Mondays from 7:30 to
8:45 p.m. the Outdoor Leadership Center. Her first class was this past
Monday and had a great turnout with approximately thirty-five people in
attendance. The class concentrates on yoga as an activity and doesn't
push any philosophy or meditation practices. The classes are somewhat
cumulative, but are flexible about attendance. In the future, Laurel would
love to travel to India, but doesn't find the trip necessary to maintain
her yoga, saying, "Yoga is something I do; it's how I live. I don't
need to go somewhere to experience it."
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