Rod Stryker’s Marma Training: Tantra, Yoga, and Ayurveda by Corina Bernstein
Stopping in to the Sunday morning session of Rod Stryker’s Marma Training was as soul nourishing as I remember it being last spring. Rod maintains a beautiful energetic equilibrium in his trainings, managing to diffuse anxiety and create a safe space to be brought back to yourself. The training was held at the Braemer Golf Course, on a sunny and bitterly cold week. I felt temporarily lifted out of the polar vortex weather by the warmth in the room, however, and grateful to be present in the beautiful love and support that I always feel from the Devanadi community. In the session I attended Rod addressed the trifecta of the yoga experience in the Tantric tradition: Tantra, Yoga, and Ayurveda.
Tantra: Per Rod, Tantra’s two primary principles are: Life is inherently sacred; and the sacred touches everything. He went on to explain that Tantric practice is connecting with the fabric that weaves everything in existence together. It is acknowledging the cause and effect nature of life. It is the science of energy management.
Yoga: Yoga is the cultivation of self-knowledge. God is knowledge. And if we become powerful without matching our power with self-knowledge, we put ourselves in a potentially dangerous imbalance. We can have fundamental misunderstandings because we are still ego-attached. Without the subtle dismantling of ego that occurs through Yoga practice, we can’t balance knowledge.
Ayurveda: Ayurveda is fundamentally about balance. Life is always changing. How can we make accommodations in order to remain in balance? Rod noted that if spiritual fulfillment is something you are after, meditation time is necessary. Observing the quality of our meditation experience is a useful gauge of our doshic state of balance.
Rod’s message is pretty simple and straightforward, in the end. Perhaps that’s why it’s so compelling. You are inherently sacred. Everything you do and that happens to you is also sacred.
It is our work to worship our bodies, the altars of life, by living to our fullest potential.
about corina bernstein photography
corina has been looking at the world through a camera lens since the tender age of six, when she received her first brownie camera. her love affair with photography has been going strong for 24 years, though she graduated from her brownie a number of years ago. corina has photographed extensively nationally and internationally, from the red river valley to tel aviv, documenting events and travels through images that capture an essence of the people, places, and stories she encounters. her studies in literature and photography at the university of minnesota, morris strengthened her skills in the art of storytelling through images. corina currently resides in minneapolis, minnesota, and specializes in yoga, music, and editorial photography.