Yoga in the Kashmir Tradition

Book excerpt: In Yoga in the Kashmir Tradition, Billy Doyle gives a simple yet profound guide to a yoga that is far removed from the “glorified gymnastics” and almost competitive nature of yoga that some of us are familiar with. Jean Klein, Billy’s own teacher taught this approach, based on awareness through body sensation. “If we have first understood, or have the deep conviction, that in our real nature there is nothing to become, nothing to attain, then we can explore the body and its movements without end-gaining. We can practise yoga to free us from what we are not, and perhaps more profoundly, simply for the joy of it. “Jean also had reservations about certain dualistic tendencies in yoga: yoga means to join, but to join what? We are one from the beginning; we only have to see it. The emphasis here is not on achieving something but on listening and exploring without will or effort. In the progressive approach one evolves through various levels of spiritual attainment. But there is always a someone, an ego, still evolving. In the direct approach there is simply recognising the false as false, that you can never be something objective. The personal has no role to play.” Jean Klein was a master of Advaita (non-dualism) and yoga. He taught yoga in the Kashmir Tradition, an approach based on awareness through body sensation, which is here presented by Billy Doyle, a long term student of Jean Klein. This teaching was grounded in the non-dualistic perspective. Yoga in the Kashmir Tradition: The Art of Listening therefore covers all facets of Jean Klein’s teaching.