Eight Questions for Matt Huish

I first learned about Matt Huish from my good friend and fellow Tejas teacher Dianna Oles, who has studied with him for years and was instrumental in bringing him into the city for his first Chicago workshop in 2012. During my initial exposure to the Nadi Yoga system he teaches I was struck by the depth of Matt’s knowledge and his willingness to experiment, to challenge, and to engage with the yoga tradition.

Tejas Yoga is hosting Matt for a weekend of Nadi Yoga workshops in March of 2015. I thought it might be useful to ask Matt a few questions in advance of his workshop to help shed some light onto his skill and creativity as a yoga teacher. He graciously agreed to participate. Here are the results:

For someone who is totally new to your teaching, the forms of the practice may be strikingly different than what they’re used to from the typical hatha yoga class. Can you explain some of the origins of these forms — where you learned them, or if they are of your own invention, how you arrived at them?

The present forms and postures in modern day yoga classes have been influenced a lot by certain lineages that have brought yoga to the west. This has acted to fix yoga in many ways in people’s minds about what is yoga and what is not. In truth, yoga has borrowed from many disciplines over the centuries, including martial arts and dance.

The work I teach utilizes ancient techniques of viyayama, preparatory techniques discussed in texts such as Hathatatvakaumudi, martial and dance activities. It also utilizes techniques from tantra. What makes it yoga is not so much the techniques in themselves but rather the mental focus and internal orientation. This has to be learned over years with a qualified teacher. The form itself can be deceiving.

I learned this way of working from my teacher Zhander Remete. Much of it also came to me spontaneously, based on 25 years of practice at the time.

If I remember correctly, part of the motivation for moving in your own direction and away from the boundaries of the tradition you were practicing within was a need to create more space for softness and subtlety. Can you talk about the relationship between vigor and sensitivity, and perhaps elaborate on what was lacking within the methodology you were practicing? How does Nadi Yoga create more space for subtle work?

I hesitate to say that the previous paradigm that I was working in was lacking in any way. I owe a lot to it. However, there was a certain direction that it was moving towards which I eventually rejected after much consideration. I don’t believe so much in discovery or attainment but rather see motivation as a direction towards answering the question, “what do I want to create?”

The first principle of yoga is ahimsa. This is non-violation of the life force principle. If there is any violation or violence in the practice, then we sever, or disconnect ourselves from our wholeness. This is the major problem of vigorous work: disconnection. I practiced for many years like this in my early days, seeking to get, to attain, to master. In many ways, it was wasted time and energy.

When one dives deep inside during practice and makes the connections, there is union, yoga.

There is a saying in the Yoga Sutras, “sthiram sukham asanam”. The pose must be firm and yet at ease. We have to know through intelligence, what must be firm and strong, and what at the same time needs to be relaxed. If we follow in this way, then we discover a third quality arise, what I like to call “juice” or nectar.

My impression is that breath-synchronized movement is less crucial to the Nadi Yoga method than many other popular forms of hatha yoga. It seems that breath and movement are both essential, but their deliberate linking is not. Is that accurate? And if so, why?

I consider the breath having many layers. The movement is always synced with the breath, however it may not be linked with the physical breath. When the subtle and gross breath are linked, we have sahita pranayama. When they are separated in a conscious way, we have kevala pranayama, or isolated. And then there are times when we “let the dog off the leash,” in other words, we let the movement fall as it will naturally without attempting to control it with the breathing.

There is much discussion of physics in Nadi Yoga. I particularly remember the emphasis you placed on using the strength of the legs grounding into the floor to receive a contact force from the floor to create more length in the spine and less effort in the process. How did you arrive at reading the postural practice through the interplay of forces? Do you have a background in physics?

Yes, I studied physics for over 3 years in my late twenties. I had this crazy idea of being an astrophysicist! Then I found I could make a living being a yoga teacher and the rest is history… Especially given that I realized I didn’t want to spend the rest of my life in what I call ‘math space.’ I love physics, though, and find the relationship of the body and surface in the gravitational field fascinating. I had been introduced to the working with the body and Newton’s Third Law by one of my old teachers Dona Holleman. With my understanding of physics, vectors, and forces, I took it much farther with my work.

You seem to have a very dynamic integration of intellectual study and physical practice. Could you explain your approach to making connections between philosophy and instruction of ancient texts and the work you do within your body? How do the intellect and the body meet each other within the larger process of your study and evolution?

I have always appreciated the ancient texts. I also sometimes get angry at them and throw them across the room! Its all part of the process of making the ancient knowledge your own. You have to get inside of it, question it inside and out. Take it apart, put it back together for yourself. My teacher Zhander Remete did this, and I watched how he studied. I always would look at what he was reading, studying. And I made it a point to study and read the same things very intensely. When we are travelling, a roadmap is very useful, not so much to enjoy the sights but rather to understand the landmarks. Otherwise you may miss them. There is much to say about intellect and will. However, at the end of the day, the intellect is just energy. Understanding the relationship between energy and its form and being able to co-exist in the two aspects of that at the same time is true skill. It is discussed by Patanjali in the first chapter of the Yoga Sutras.

During a very insightful discussion of Patanjali’s yoga sutra, you made reference to the patriarchal inflection of the text, and that this influence is something we might want to be aware of as we interpret its meaning. It was refreshing to hear that someone is both actively engaging with the Yoga Sutra while also applying a critical lens to it — often people seem capable of only one or the other. In what sense does a male-centric approach affect the Yoga Sutra, and how do we augment our study?

As I stated before, I take everything apart. I trust nothing I read until I apply it in my own life and practice. Too often people just swallow stuff down because some guy in a white robe who looked like a guru said it. This leads to all sorts of problems. There is a major problem in society, religion, and culture which has infected us for thousands of years. It is the male biased, patriarchal stain. Robert Jordan talks about this in his massive fantasy epic, The Wheel of Time, where he calls it something to the effect of the ‘taint on the male half of the one power.’ This stain at its root in spiritual culture has acted to separate spirit from matter, make the material world something to be rejected and despised, and the spirit to be sought after. There are many ways to talk about this and this attitude has subtly or not so subtly infected everything from religion (both East and West), society, gender roles, culture, and much more. In the context of the yoga it has created this attitude of a preference towards Laya, or absorption back into the primal cause, wherein we can finally isolate our spirit from matter. Its all talked about quite clearly in the Yoga Sutras and the Samkhya. I don’t buy it one bit. However, I also don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater, and recognize that there is a lot of gold in the Sutras and Samkhya. Understood in the right context, we can take these teachings and apply them in different ways. Some would call this blasphemous. I just call it acting independently, with a critical mind and spirit.

It takes a lot of reflection to do this. To recognize the ‘good’ with the ‘bad’ and carefully learn to extract what is truly useful and reject that which masquerades as spiritual but is really just cultural/societal bias.

When I’ve studied with you I was struck by the repeated emphasis on “the instrument body.” You have various techniques, some of which are very subtle, for bringing awareness back into the feedback we receive from our instrument — the body’s sensory fields. How do you do this, and why do you feel it is so important?

Oh wow, this is a big question. An important one for sure… What you are talking about is what is called in the yoga, mudra. Mudra is a powerful technique for bringing us into that ‘instrument body,’ the body of the nadis or sensory corridors. Mudra is oftentimes misunderstood or simplified in modern day yoga, relegated to physical techniques like pulling in the abdomen or squeezing your pelvic floor. You have to look deeper at the teachings of the Shaivites to really get inside of what it is. It is magnetic in nature and when it is triggered, it instantly affects the mind and causes attention to drop down into what the yogis call the sparsa, or the felt body. There are techniques that work with sight as well, like Shambhavi Mudra, where we pull back from the objects we are looking at into the sight itself, and let the sight ‘clarify’. This is akin to focusing the eye, but doesn’t rely on what is seen, instead emphasizing the clarifying or ‘focusing’ of the sight itself. When we pay attention to the sensory corridors like this and let attention rest there, we ‘enter’ a whole other world, outside of name and form. This is the instrument body. And it is vast. There are many doors available here.

You’re one of the only people I’ve attended a workshop with who encouraged integration of their method with my own practice. Many yoga teachers are adamant about the precision and veracity of their system to the exclusion of all else. I was happy to hear you acknowledge the possibility that what you’re teaching is flexible, and possibly applicable in ways specific to the people who are learning from you. What is your opinion of systems of physical practice, and how do you define and build Nadi Yoga so that it’s practicable without being too rigid? Or to simplify: when should a student do what they’re told, and when should they listen to their instincts?*

Nadi Yoga is a template for practice and for learning the one pose. My teacher told me often, “know the one and you will know the many.” In truth there is only one pose and that is connection. Without connection there is nothing. This connection is itself union which is yoga. Learn this and then you can apply it in any way you like, relationship, communication, writing, learning a new art, or applying it within the field of your current yoga ‘system’.