Yoga – Page 18 – Matthew Remski

August 11, 2013

Deepak Chopra muddles words like “consciousness” and “quantum”, but that doesn’t make him a charlatan

If we're going to critique Chopra as an interloper into science, let's keep it clean of the ad hominem, and not feed this projection beast. Critique the material only; force ever greater transparency about the distinctions between science, spirituality, and poetry. Don't allow him to perpetuate a transcultural and transhistorical language error that confuses scientific terms with religious terms. Allow for the possibility that like everyone he is less a manipulator than one manipulated by history.

August 8, 2013

Transparency Papers: introduction, and growing up Catholic (part one)

By being clear about our subjectivities, we can begin to dialogue openly with the subjectivities of others, fostering â€œintersubjectivityâ€. If we donâ€™t allow ourselves to be transparent, both writers and readers of yoga philosophy can get sucked into the quagmire of projecting and assessing objective authority, rather than sharing experience. And yoga philosophy is nothing if not the language we use to share the ineffable experiences of practice, regardless of who we are, who weâ€™ve studied with, or what our goals may be.

July 28, 2013

śruti and smṛti: intertextu-orality, phenomenology, and the so-ham behind the swan

Sensation is given, something we discover ourselves within, something we have been thrown-into: it is Å›ruti. Thought follows, in language that extends through time backwards into memory, and forward into expectations built upon memory. Thought is smá¹›ti.

July 21, 2013

Between the academic rock and the traditionalist hard place: finding the open source for yoga philosophy today

The feeling that yoga philosophy is an inaccessible practice is not only fostered by the current structural limitations of Modern Postural Yoga trainings (max. 20 hrs. within 200!), but by two deeper forces: the abstract academic study of yoga that seems to turn it into a lifeless artifact, and traditionalist teaching structures that demand faithful allegiance as the price of transmission.