We feel very happy to welcome James Boag back in Ganesha with his new Workshop:
The Bhagavad Gītā and the battle to be fully human
Reclaiming human intelligence and cultivating harmony in grounded reality
Have you ever thought how it would be helpful to have a user’s guide on how to be fully human?
With the Bhagavad Gītā, the yoga tradition offers us a robust and time-proven manual for life.
Highly pragmatic, the Gītā’s timeless teachings show us how to work with the reality of our nature so we can recover ourselves and become fully human.
The Gītā describes the broad, inclusive path of yoga, working with all parts of ourselves to cultivate vibrant and deepening harmony right here in the thick of life.
What does the Gītā have to do with me and my life?
Often misunderstood and misrepresented through translations that convey only a fraction of the inclusive practicality of the original Sanskṛt, the Gītā is really about each of us, and gives us a manual for being human.
The setting of the Gītā on the battlefield can at first glance seem archaic or strange, but as we look more closely we can see that the battlefield is really our own psyche. The warriors, sages, goddesses and kings are really different parts of ourselves, parts that often through a human upbringing become estranged and discordant, yet which always have the possibility of coming together in a magnificent harmony. The Gītā shows us the practical path of yoga, to reclaim our sovereignty and access more of our real, human intelligence.
A practical and inspiring weekend immersion
Whether you are brand new to yoga, this is your first contact with a Sanskrit yoga text, or you’ve been studying the yoga tradition for decades, James’ approach brings the rich practicality of the Bhagavad Gita to vivid life and invites us to deepen our appreciation of its timeless teaching and its real-life application.
Schedule:
Friday 18:30 - 21:00 - Introduction
Saturday 10:00 - 12:30 - - Yogic movement/āsana based exploration:
The setting of the Gītā - The field of practice and the battle to be fully human 14:00 - 16:30 - Presentation/Discussion with movement and practical exercises along the way: The conversation of the Gītā: What’s it all for? How does it work? How can we work with it? Saturday evening Kirtan 17:30 - 19:00
Open to all!
The Gītā means song, the yoga tradition encodes so many of its teachings and principles in mantra, hymns and stories. Join James and Boris for an uplifting kirtan. Along the way, learn a little more about Kṛṣṇa, the teacher in the Bhagavad Gītā, whose energy we will invoke during the kirtan.
Sunday 10:00 - 12:30 - Yogic movement/āsana based exploration
Definitions of yoga, the story of human history and the established yogin 14:00 - 16:30 - Paths of Practice, cultivating sustainable evolution and becoming more established in yoga
Costs: 240€ / 55€ per session when spots available!
James Boag has been studying and practising the yoga sūtra and Bhagavad Gītā texts for over twenty years and works direct from the original Sanskṛt. He is renowned for his capacity to bring the ancient scriptural teachings of yoga to vivid life so we can make them our own and work with them skilfully and authentically in our own lives and practices.
For questions: info@ashtanga.at • 0664/4027358
Weekend overview
(Session descriptions are a general guide only. James prepares to be spontaneous and his workshops are all unique, responding to the needs of the particular group.)
Friday 18:30 - 21:00, Introduction: The Bhagavad Gītā - what’s it all about? What’s it got to do with me and my life? What’s it got to do with yoga?
Itihāsa - so it happened, so it happens: once upon a time… Background to the Bhagavad Gītā and the Mahābhārata epic it is part of
This introductory talk, which may include some simple exercises along the way, will invite us into the heart of the most treasured text of the yoga tradition. We’ll explore the rich flavour and practical symbolism of the amazing story the Gītā is part of and situate its timeless teachings in relation to our own lives and experience. As we do so, we’ll see how the Gītā invites us to work skilfully and pragmatically with the reality of the human condition.
Saturday 10:00 - 12:30, Presentation/Discussion: The setting of the Gītā - The field of practice and the battle to be fully human
In this session, we’ll do deeper into the practical significance of the setting of the Gītā and some of its key teachings. This will address some of the questions that often come up when first encountering this text:
If yoga is all about peace, why is the teaching given on a battlefield? What does it mean to fight against our gurus?
If yoga is all about serenity, why do we find the protagonist in sorrow and despondency?
Saturday 14:00 - 16:30, Presentation/Discussion with movement and practical exercises along the way: The conversation of the Gītā: What’s it all for? How does it work? How can we work with it?
As we go further into the teachings, we’ll explore who yoga is for, when and where it happens, how it works and why it’s worth practising. This will include the yogic vision of our essence, key attitudes for practice and why it’s worth the effort!
Saturday evening kirtan 17:30-19:00 (Open to all! Feel free to invite friends :-) )
The Gītā means song, the yoga tradition encodes so many of its teachings and principles in mantra, hymns and stories. Join James and Boris for an uplifting kirtan. Along the way, learn a little more about Kṛṣṇa, the teacher in the Bhagavad Gītā, whose energy we will invoke during the kirtan.
Sunday 10:00 - 12.30, Yogic movement/āsana based exploration
Definitions of yoga, the story of human history and the established yogin
The teachings of yoga are always practical and empowering. As we consider the Gītā’s descriptions of yoga and the established yogin, we’ll see how it offers us an inviting ‘prescription’ for all aspects of yoga practice.
Here, we’ll explore this prescription as it relates to movement, embodiment and āsana practices, and how it invites us to cultivate our broader human capacities and rehabilitate our understanding of who we really are.
We will explore how we can harness a yogic movement or āsana practice to help us create more space, affirm more steadiness, let go of unnecessary tensions and inhibitions, see more clearly where we may be unnecessarily limiting ourselves and invite more grace, beauty and connectivity.
This will include work to mobilise the joints and spine, attune and awaken the body’s different instrumental powers so we can more readily function as a unit and move through life as more of a dance and less of a battle.
We’ll also consider how we can use practice to foster deeper awareness of our fears, desires and partialities and how we can transmute the power of these seeming ‘enemies’ to help invite greater clarity and steadiness.
Sunday 14:00 – 16:30, Paths of Practice, cultivating sustainable evolution and becoming more established in yoga
Sometimes people suggest that the Gītā offers us many different ‘paths’ of yoga. Here, we’ll consider how these can all be seen as streams in the same mighty river, part of a holistic, adaptable and very practical yoga that invites us into greater human wholeness through all the stages and cycles of life.
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