Akhil Palanivelu

Mr. Akhil Palanivelu, 3rd Dan

Internationally Certified Instructor

Martial Arts, Yoga, and Chi Kung

Instructor Certification in the arts of Tang Soo Do, Yoga, and Chi-Kung

Starting this yoga class (October 2023 to March 2024), I had the idea of challenging the body and focusing the mind through different poses. The idea was that the challenge of the pose would be the thing that brought me to a better place. But from the very first class, I was shown a different way of approaching Yoga.

The Way of a Yogi

Everything we did in class emphasized carrying myself as a true Yogi. Just standing and breathing while being conscious of relaxing the whole body brought a higher level of focus on the body. Small things like stepping on and off the mat, and placing our blocks down, were brought to our attention because every movement in that class was done by way of Yoga. Deep breathing was a part of every exercise, and Master Bell would frequently ask us how we were feeling. The entire focus of the class was not geared towards doing more, but finding out more about what we were already doing.

From there, we went to the head-to-toe. It wasn’t the same experience as doing it in Tang Soo Do class, because we slowed the movement down to deliberately feel every muscle. One of the first lessons I learned was to pay attention to the smaller muscles, the ones closer to the bones of my body. I hadn’t done anything like that before, because big muscles were the ones I used for major movement, so that’s what I was used to focusing on. But by focusing on the smaller muscles, I was forced to quieten down to my body and slow the movement down, giving me a different experience of the same exercise. Again, I was learning to not look for more but to go deeper into what I already had.

Starting the stretches, we didn’t learn them too fast, or too many at one time. We had 2 or three stretches we would do throughout the entire class, but the process of the stretch would make up for how many of them we did in total. I learned that I was used to impulsively and aggressively moving to get to the end of the movement, to “get to the pose”. But, being precise with the movement, being slow and controlled, would allow me to experience every part of the process, not just the end result. Seeing that habit as an egoistic habit allowed me to change it. The perception of the final result is what I was chasing, not the balance from doing a Yoga pose correctly. I needed to let go of that physical idea and look for more in my Yoga. Taking things slow allowed me to do this.

Emotions Churned, Lessons Learned

One of the first lessons I learned from the class was the idea of preserving youth. My usual way of doing a yoga pose was to get to the end of the stretch and hold it there. My stretch only started when I got to the pose. But because of that, I was aggressive getting into the stretch. The types of movements I was doing were relying more on the strength and flexibility I had being young, rather than the result of following a way of stretching and incorporating breathing into it. But by being more technical and slowing down the stretch, I could ensure that I would have a way of doing the pose that I could come back to at any age, meaning I could keep the same level of strength and flexibility for a longer period of time. That way, even as I got older, I would be able to go through the same stretches. This was the idea of preserving my youth.

In the beginning few weeks, I remember thinking about why we spent so much time doing forward bending poses that stretched the back of the legs, and not the same amount of time stretching out the front of the thighs. Master Bell noticed this one class. I was thinking about it instead of focusing on the pose at hand, and he immediately noticed it and pointed it out to me. Yoga was not about only the physical stretch. By thinking about the front of the legs while we were doing a pose that was something different, I was taking away from the mental and spiritual part of that stretch. My thinking patterns were centered around the physical part of Yoga, and I was missing out on the mental and spiritual connection. After realizing this, I had to learn to let go of my physical expectations for the class. That meant, for whatever pose or movement we were doing, from something as simple as stepping off the mat to something like a forward bend to get our blocks, I had to accept that pose for what it was and give my attention to it. By accepting more than just the physicality of Yoga, I pulled myself back a lot and slowed my approach to the class.

A little later into the classes, I brought the issue of tightness in my lower back. This was causing me more pain than just regular soreness of a muscle, resulting in me being fearful of doing the stretches during that class. I didn’t want to make the pain worse. Yoga, however, did everything in accordance with the body’s mechanics. I accepted that I wasn’t really injured; all my spinal disks were intact, and no bones were broken. Therefore, doing any poses wouldn’t injure me. Master Bell reminded me of his story of being introduced to Yoga. When he had a pulled muscle years ago, a student recommended Yoga for him. He went looking for the pain, stretched it out, and then became free from it after. If he had not stretched out because he was scared of the pain, most likely, the pain would’ve stayed with him longer. After accepting that, and letting go of my opinions, I committed to the stretch. Even though I didn’t believe in it at the beginning of class, and I did experience pain while going through the stretch, my back felt better at the end of class. It felt better than it did when I stopped myself from stretching it the days before. I had heard that story from Master Bell before, but that experience in class solidified my experience with the realness of Yoga. After controlling my emotional state and accepting the pose, doing it with focus on how to do it brought me to a better state of being at the end of class. Worrying about pain kept me in the bad place I was in, but accepting the way of the art brought me to a better place.

That experience also gave me a strong reminder about doing things in an imbalanced way. My back was like that in the first place because I was moving with physical aggression. If I had taken an approach more similar to Yoga, where I was aware of all my movements, I would’ve been in control of my body and not overworked it to the point where it started to hurt.

Becoming Certain of My Certification: Myself

This certification class not only emphasized what I was going to teach, but the person who was teaching it as well. There were some behaviors of mine that I corrected as part of this class, and doing so made me feel more mature and aware of my actions.

When having a conversation with Master Bell about the source of disappointment in my life, I told him it was because I saw my potential at basketball being wasted. I was holding onto the idea of playing basketball professionally somewhere, someday. He told me that realistically, I did not grow up with the investment needed to play basketball professionally. So the idea of playing wasn’t realistic. Furthermore, I was using my parents as a reason to blame for my wasted potential, because I thought that if they let me play when I was younger, I could’ve taken my passion to another level. Master Bell helped me see that I was using my parents as a convenient place to dump my emotions because they had given me nothing but their best in raising me. Instead of blaming my emotional state on them, I needed to see the immense commitment they had towards my well-being growing up, which was the reasoning behind anything they did for me. Throughout my childhood, every part of my life was structured. My parents made sure I was eating healthy three times a day, there was an emphasis on education, I had strong moral values, and my wellbeing was prioritized because there were no factors that induced stress into our living. My childhood set me up to get a college education, take care of myself, and allowed me to understand the clear distinction between my logical and emotional state. Everything I have today was because of them, and I needed to stop letting my emotional state blind me from that fact. Even though I didn’t agree with what Master Bell was saying at first, I was honest with my behavior because I did in fact realize that I blamed my parents for a lot of things. It was pretty much a habit. Subconsciously, I saw them as people who kept me in a box, and that caused an emotional buildup towards them anytime I interacted with them. Eventually, it was my honesty that made me accept that fact. A lot of pent-up anger towards my parents was released because of this, and even though the process was not pleasant to my emotional state, I got a sense of peace at the end because I accepted a truth I was long hiding from.

Along with my parents, my brother and I were experiencing something in our relationship that was holding us back from where we could’ve been. I wasn’t allowed to drive my brother around alone, because our impulsive behavior at home didn’t give our parents a sense of confidence that we would display safe behavior in a car together by ourselves. This problem was deeper than just our impulsive behavior; it had to do with living life lower than how we knew it to be lived. The possibilities that arose when me and my brother could take responsibility for our actions and live life together were too much to still be acting like children, to where our parents had to limit our actions. I understood that there were a lot of things that I could’ve been sharing with Akshay from my experiences, which were still fresh, about school, social skills, e.t.c. Instead of taking that role, I was behaving immaturely and being impulsive with him. Master Bell pointed out that accepting an impulsive way of living was holding us behind in the realm of development. I agreed that our lifestyle was far behind what it could’ve been, and sometimes even behind the norm of society. For me, I needed to accept that I didn’t want to be flip-flopping back and forth between acting like a child at home and stepping up to be an adult during other times. I could carry myself the way I know to be, and my brother would be able to benefit from that. Throughout Spring Break, which happened right after this talk, my brother and I rode around by ourselves, as deliberate practice to live how we knew to live. The experience was good because I could feel the step up, or rather the unwillingness to step down, while we were together during that time. This is something I can be consistent with going forward because I see the usefulness in it for me and for my brother.

Becoming Certain of My Certification: The Art

We had a way of practicing all three arts we knew, Tang Soo Do, Yoga, and Chi Kung, but how were we to ensure that we could teach those arts effectively? The answer was in a question Master Bell asked more recently during our classes. Where was our mind during a specific pose? Was it on the instructions he gave throughout each pose, or was it on our personal experiences of the pose itself?

As written in the Sip Sam Seh, “Beginners are guided by oral teaching”. Beginners have no experience of the art, so their focus during class would be on the instructor’s instructions, to understand what they were supposed to be doing and how to do it. For me, as a more advanced student, it was not the same. At this level, most of my attention needed to be on my personal experience with the arts, whichever one I was practicing. That truthful connection to my own experience, our struggles, shortcomings, benefits, and moments of clarity, would allow me to see the same things in other students that I would take on in the future. I would be able to parallel my experiences with those of my future students. Teaching this way, by way of personal experiences, would allow the students to see the teacher as more human, and therefore get them to listen and connect with their messages better. Teaching by way of experience would also allow the teacher to understand their students on a more personal level. Teachings from teacher to student would be through the path of highest relevancy, meaning whatever the student needed, the teacher would be able to give it to them in a way where they would receive it and be able to use it.

The good thing about using personal experiences as teaching points is that growth never stops for anyone. The teacher is still a student, as they always will be, because they would still be practicing and perfecting their art. For them, teaching wouldn’t have to be separate from learning, both would be based on the same thing.

Conclusion

This class exposed a lot of things about me, and I understood myself more through these six months. Being honest with myself allowed me to change my behaviors, and even though it wasn’t comfortable, it brought me to a peaceful place in the end. I’m appreciative of having an art like this that shows me my life and behavior this clearly, that I can use to create a well-balanced life for myself. With a more wholesome approach to the arts and a more mature vision for my own life and existence, I’m certain that I am ready to accept everything that being an instructor has to offer me.