What is yoga? Yoga is a special condition of the mind. There are four conditions or states of mind according to yoga - the wide-awake state, the dreaming state, the deep sleep state and yoga, also known as samadhi. Samadhi is a natural state, as natural as the other three.

"All creatures are born from food, are sustained by food, and in the end get consumed as food. Food was born before all creatures and is therefore called the medicine for all." - Taittirya Upanisad

The first limb of Ashtanga Yoga is Yama - ahimsa, satya, asteya, brahmacharya and aparigraha - or not causing harm, truthfulness, non-theft, sexual continence and non-greed.

prakāśakriyāsthitiśīlaṃ bhūtendriyātmakaṃ bhogāpavargārthaṃ dṛśyam - YS 2.18

Awareness of the material nature is there both for the purpose of experience - bhoga - and for the purpose of liberation - yoga.

In 1998 I started a project of interviewing KPJ’s senior students and family and over a period of 12 years collected over 40 interviews, a selection of which were later published as the book: Guruji: A Portrait of Sri K Pattabhi Jois through the Eyes of His Students.

This book focused on all the positive aspects of Pattabhi Jois’ teachings and became an influential handbook for those practicing Ashtanga Yoga. But over the years I had many misgivings about Pattabhi Jois and the way he taught and in 2018, in the wake of the Metoo movement, started to write and speak about this publicly. These writings were originally published on the blog “mindmedicine” and a selection of these have been preserved here.