Yogini : Reclaiming My Inner Wisdom.

A Balinese Offering

I've always wondered what the big deal with names are. Whether you call me a yogi or a yogini, i remain the same person. My essence does not change, neither does my sense of self. It doesn't add anything to me, neither does it take away anything from the person I am. Then why the need to label me a yogini, I was happy being called a yogi. Until now.

Here's a story - I promise it fits the post & isn't a rambling!

When I was working at a corporate, a couple of years back, there was a movement to change the title of my job role to make it sound more fancier. It went from what the role has always been called in the market for many many years - in no way disrespectful or rude or harsh or demeaning - to a fancy three word "title". Before this change happened, there were emails sent to global HR, petitions, panel discussions on how to approach the "problem" and what could help achieve this goal. It would irritate me to no end. There were many other issues that we as a team needed to solve, in our respective locations & globally - issues that would make a genuine change to our work lives, the quality of work we churn out & our mental health as well. Instead, this group of 300 people (men & women) had decided to put their might behind this name change business. I felt like a rebel almost, I did not attend these sessions, because I called them a waste of my time, I didn't sign any petition, I did not attend any HR meetings. I just did not see the point. No one can make me do something that I do not believe in. Period.

Eventually, the team won, HR agreed and we were all given new designations. Everyone took to the internal person finder page we had at the company to start changing their tittles to these fancy three word ones. What changed? Nothing. The work didn't change, the way people viewed us internally & externally did not change (they respected us as much or as less depending on who you were working for/with), there was no concrete change in the quality of work we were delivering, and definitely no real change in work-life balance or mental health.

Why did people attach such importance to this name thing, why was there this sense of achievement at having won this "battle"? I believed then, and now, that we attached too much of ourselves to that title, we derived too much of who we were, what work we did & what work we did not do, to it. Somehow with a new name, there was a new sense of dignity attached to who we were all of a sudden? Why? Because we derived our self-respect from that designation. I was stubborn as hell. For the longest time I did not change my title on that page, no name was adding anything to me or my work, and no name could take away all that i did. I eventually did have to change it though, when HR complained that the title on my page was "archaic".

Now, just because I opposed this change, does not mean I am against all kinds of socially positive name changes that genuinely ward off negative connotations, or that do so much to uplift a historically disadvantaged group or seeks to undo years of discrimination against a certain section of people. I support all of that and I totally get it. But my team was not undergoing any kind of social stigma within the company because of our designation. In fact, if there were people who were being mistreated because of the title of their job, then i wonder how much the name change would have done to alleviate that injustice - I am sure there would have been better ways of educating folks within the company on the importance of the work we did & the need to treat us better.

This attitude of "how what I am called bring a change to who I am?" is what comes up when i thought of the yogi vs yogini debate. In fact additionally, here my feminist side kicked in to say - why do we need a specific term for a female yogi - why can't we all just be yogis? I had heard an actor (female) comment in an interview - "doctors or teachers are not called special things because they were female then why do female actors need to be called actresses?". That was my argument too. Why should I be called a yogini, how dare you treat me different than a man? I was young & naive :)

I held this stance until I read something on why it matters. The book is Yoni Shakti and I urge all yoginis (ha! I said it!)  to read it. In fact I urge anyone who does yoga ~ men and women to read it. The book talks about the patriarchal misogyny that has for all these years prevented women from experiencing yoga (and life) in their own terms.

In a training I did recently we spoke about how women tried very hard, and against their natural rhythms and cycles, to fit into a practice that was controlled by men. Practices that did not have any knowledge or respect for a woman's body. Even today, we hear of women who having practiced yoga for many years, have lost track of their menstrual cycle, simply because their practices were so antagonistic towards their bodies. Because we as women, thought it was important to compete with men and be at par with them or a few steps ahead even. That attitude is good, but not when you are going against the wisdom of your own bodies.

I was sitting in a cafe in Canggu, Bali when I heard two people discussing yoga. One was a yogini, the other was a guy friend of hers, who hadn't practiced yoga but had heard about yoga and certain aspects of it. So he asked her why women aren't encouraged to do inversions (headstands in particular) during menstruation. She jumped on that question, with obvious passion & disgust and narrated an incident from earlier in the day. Her teacher while instructing folks into a sirsasana or headstand advised women who were menstruating to not get upside down - but to take the time to rest in balasana or child's pose instead.

As a yoga teacher, and a practitioner who bleeds every month, i am wise enough to know that this is good advise. Emotionally, mentally and physically my body is not prepared for a headstand during this time of the month and there are many other asanas that will help me instead - balasana was a brilliant option - what better than surrendering your practice at the end of the class to mother earth?

This advise however was not taken well by the yogini. She was livid that the teacher should specifically pick on menstruating women, and consider them not strong enough  for a sirsasana practice. She went onto say that she was menstruating at the moment and did not think anything of the teachers words and went upside down anyway.

I was so interested in eavesdropping that my coffee was cold by now. But I was also appalled.

I wanted to butt in and say, but no - this is why we don't do inversions when we menstruate, or medically this is how it affects a woman's body or cite numerous examples of what else is not good to do when menstruating! But I kept quiet. Now I wish I hadn't.

This, is exactly what I mean by wanting to fit into a practice designed for and by men. This is where the practice of yoga excludes women, by not honouring our deep inner wisdom of menstruation and by disrespecting the cycles of our body & emotions. In fact we don't even need men to enforce this on us anymore, it is so deeply ingrained, that in an almost reverse-feminist way, we do this to ourselves, harming our own bodies.

Many women of menstruating age, have stopped getting their periods in the world of yoga, because of this need to prove to men and everyone around them, that all practices can be done by women equally and in as brilliant a way possible if not better, irrespective of where we are in our cycles. This attitude is harming our bodies, our minds and our ideas of what it is to be a woman. and hence it is also harming the gorgeous practice that yoga is and how beautifully it can help heal us.

For those who know Tantra know the concept of two energies - Shiva (consciousness) and Shakti (pure energy/power). Without the Shakti, Shiva can not act. Similarly, without Shiva, Shakti does not know where and how to manifest her power and energy. All of us have Shiva and Shakti within us, even though we attribute masculinity to Shiva and femininity to Shakti - we all embody those two opposites within us. However as women, we are naturally blessed with the energy of Shakti in abundance - the energy of movement, creativity, fertility and inner cycles that are in tune with Shakti's other manifestations - nature and the moon. Although all of Tantra honours women and our powers, Sakta Tantra is a school of Tantra that honours the goddesses specifically.

To quote Uma Dinsmore-Tuli in Yoni Shakti "The full aim and intention of sakta tantra is the awakening of awareness to recognise and honour the living presence of the goddess as an everyday reality".

Ancient texts on Tantra, on yoga and learned teachers - BKS Iyengar, T Krishnamacharya - have always respected women, have shared their teachings with women and have always mentioned asanas that we are not supposed to do as women when menstruating. One of the best books written on yoga for women is Yoga a Gem for Women by Geeta S Iyengar, originally published in 1984! Where and how this practice got twisted into harming women's bodies - I do not know.

One part of the feminist movement was amazing for self confidence and self respect and to understand our own abilities and capacities as women and that men and the worlds created by them need not limit us, the other aspect of feminism forgot to nurture the goddess within us. As if acknowledging that we are female and have specific needs (physical and emotional) would in some way make us less. So we show up, in a hot yoga vinyasa class even when our lower bellies are aching and our pelvis region is throbbing with pain during menstruation - we show up and flow through 60 suryanamaskars and chaturangas because "hey we can't be seen as being weak just because we bleed every month". This attitude is not only harmful to the women practitioner, it is harmful to the entire yoga community and it is disrespectful to the one of the greatest powers we have as women - that of being in tune with the cycle of the moon and connected to mother nature via menstruation.

Uma, in Yoni Tantra, goes as far as stating that what's happening to the environment around us and the "unsustainable abuse of mother earth, is a part and parcel of the exploitation of women". And we as women are as much a part of this abuse as the society we inhabit. Even though, the ancient respected teachers did tell us what not to do, no one told us what to do to nurture ourselves at different points in our cycle. We are not going to be less of a yogi(ni) if we skip our sirsasana practice for a week in a month - but what can we substitute that practice with to nourish our womb, and pay respects to all that is happening inside of us during this time? Again, i urge you to read Yoni Shakti.

How does all this connect to my post of a yogi vs yogini?

Traditionally yoginis,  are not just women who do yoga, but they were powerful goddesses  who inspired fear but also devotion in those who worshipped them. They embodied the energies of Shakti - powerful, creative, feminine, nurturing but also ferocious, terrifying, one whose wrath you definitely shouldn't invite. She is both a goddess and a demon-ness, as Uma says "a protectress but also someone you should protect yourself from".  There are many individual yoginis, different goddesses to pray to at different times.

Very close to where I live there is a temple devoted to a goddess called Mariamma. Earlier, this area used to be very rural. With development the city limits have extended all the way here today. This temple, was at the side of the road and very popular, people would come to pray to her, especially with respect to any children related help they needed. She is beautiful to look at, shining black body, her tongue out, and gorgeous glittery jewelled eyes - all her power seems to rest in her eyes - very arresting those eyes.

When the area started to develop, a flyover was planned. This flyover was to be constructed at the exact spot of where the temple stood. The builders demolished the temple, built the flyover, and constructed a crossroads of sorts under the flyover. The displaced goddess was not re-installed or as we say in India "given a space". She decided to teach everyone a lesson. It started with a small accident at the crossroad, followed by another, then another, and then many more. It is said, many people died - men, women, children. Some village elder said, it was Mariamma letting the villagers know she was angry. To appease her, they built her a temple right next to the crossroad - and the accidents stopped.

That is the power of a yogini, goddesss - both protectress and ferocious.

One will find many such stories strewn all across India in cities & villages, in the plains and in the hills. By herself, the goddess is powerful, but collectively all the goddess evoke a sense of awe, and create a field of energy that one has to sit up and take notice of.

This is the power that resides in each and every woman. This is the power, that expresses itself in one way through the power of menstruation - to honour the cycles we go through is to honour this power. And to treat her with contempt, disrespect and a sense of disappointment and to render her invisible by choosing to not acknowledge her presence (by continuing to go upside down while bleeding in a yoga class for eg), is to invite the goddess's wrath. This is what many female yoga practitioners are seeing playing out in their bodies - through a disruption of cycles.

Connecting to this power instead, will infuse us with a deep inner wisdom, taking us back to the source, back to what Uma calls "the wisdom of the womb". To call yourself a yogini, is to invoke all these goddess within you, to respect them - because with them travels all this history of yoga, these stories found in India, and also true feminism.

I have chosen to use menstruation as an example here because it's one Uma talks about with so much passion, and I truly believe that it is our biggest powers as women. But there are many other powers we have, that are hidden or afraid to express themselves because of the fear of being judged in a system that has constantly asked us to hide or ignore them.

I am a slice of this goddess i speak of, this shakti. I am a yogini.

namasté