Strong Foundations
The phrase "Yoga in Daily Life" is well-known today, but do you have any idea (other than being nice to everyone and staying relaxed) what this actually means?
Well, Agama workshops enable students to experience short-duration, high-intensity, in-depth immersion studies covering a variety of esoteric topics, all crafted to leave students a set of practical tools to implement in their lives outside the Yoga hall.
Being a school that follows the Tantric teachings of India and Tibet (read "Introduction" and "More about Agama Yoga" to find out what this means and perhaps dispel some myths) it is necessary to give all students the necessary foundation teachings on which more advanced practices are based. In this way everyone will always know what they are doing, why they are doing it, and what the effects will be. And as you go deeper into this system, you'll find the information you learned on your first few days with us absolutely invaluable, and many students repeat courses several times.
Results - the tree is known by the fruits
Of course, it's unreasonable to claim that a 1, or even 2-day course will give you endless vitality, emotional stability, Zen-like calm, perfect humility and compassion, control over time and space, paranormal powers, and make you one with the Universe, however students often see real, tangible effects in such time periods and are inspired to continue. Students often note that they never really understood what Yoga was until now, or that many things have now fallen into place.
This is, no doubt, due to the depth, and the importance Agama puts on the academic side of the process, a fact that distinguishes us from many other systems. Of the 16 hours of a 2-day workshop, about 50% will be spent listening to lectures and asking questions. Of course, as you progress to more advanced levels, this balance will shift and practice will dominate, but it is essential to today's Western, critical, analytical mind to be fed in the beginning.
It's also important to realise that the way we learn Yoga today is radically different to days gone by: most of us are unable or not willing to sit at a Master's feet as he meditates for hours, allowing ourselves to be "pulled up" by him, until such time as we are able to acheive these levels by ourselves.
