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Around the world - YIDL at he Sziget Festival Budapest 2011

A promotional video about a yoga program at a major European music festival.

"For eleven years now, yoga has been our daily practice and system for showing young festival-goers how wonderful it is to relax deeply through yoga, without any side effects."

"We feel that the door of āśrama must not only be opened by the system of rites... but we must also go out to various community spaces and events."

A representative describes the 11-year-old Yogasātar tent at the Sziget Festival, which offers short, tailored yoga sessions to introduce festival-goers to practice, relaxation, and meditation. He explains the program's adaptability, its emphasis on authentic tradition over commercialized "power yoga," and its role as a spiritual outreach that has led some visitors to become disciples. He notes the surprising ability of practitioners to achieve deep relaxation and sensory withdrawal despite the loud festival environment.

Filming location: Budapest, Hungary

Central Europe hosts one of the largest music festivals in Europe, and here we stand before the Yogasātar. For eleven years now, yoga has been our daily practice and system for showing young festival-goers how wonderful it is to relax deeply through yoga, without any side effects. We assure those interested that they are welcome to try the practice. Many people come new to the yoga tent who have not yet practiced but have heard about yoga and would like to try it. We always explain that in everyday, normal life, a two-hour yoga session is something quite different. Practicing yoga at home also requires dedicating more time. But here on the Island, experience shows that inhabitants are always rushing from one place to another. Therefore, we offer a 20-25 minute capsule of yoga. We always ask what you would like—whether you wish to rest a little, to relax, or if you prefer to practice āsanas, or perhaps you need a bit of meditation or breathing exercises. Based on this, our prepared yoga instructors tailor the session accordingly. We conduct the sessions in the language, thus shaping the programs. For most young people, their first encounter with yoga is seeing āsanas. Perhaps you are not trying it right now, but you see people practicing Aṣṭāṅga, and that captures the imagination more. Then they come under the tent, where we have an information booth. We look at the books together; they can see both the easier and, of course, the more difficult practices. We always explain that naturally, we do not begin without grounding—not with an advanced lotus pose, but with simple, serene practices. The experience of 11 years is that the transformation of the visitors to the island has been profound. Eleven years ago, the audience at the earliest Yogasātra was perhaps half Hungarian and half foreign visitors. Recently, however, the number of visitors from abroad has been steadily increasing. Our somewhat isolated experience is that in the West, in Western Europe, so-called power yoga—a strength-based yoga that often resembles aerobics more—is popular. Many are surprised by the alternative we present. There is something else in this as well, namely meditation. When you see the book, you will notice that pictures of our masters are displayed, or an image of Gaṇeśa, or pictures of the cakras are displayed by Yoga-sārtha. We always place great emphasis on preserving the purity of this from the Yoga-sārtha, so that it is not just a simple meeting point, but that we truly represent the tradition and its various systems in a worthy manner. So when you encounter the Yoga-sārtha, you can see that we truly place emphasis on spirituality as well. Every year there are surprises. Supposedly, one or two disciples find their way to us here. But there were those who first encountered their path right here, and from here they became disciples, you could say. Of course, many people, just as in everyday life, see our tent and come over to ask when they can practice. We say we are open from morning, from 9 a.m. until 8 or 9 p.m., and they say they will come tomorrow. Somehow they still may get lost and not show up, because they find their way back to other activities. Yet many, many do come and practice. We feel that the door of āśrama must not only be opened by the system of rites and the days of rites to welcome those who enter, but we must also go out to various community spaces and events. It is necessary to be present in these places because many people would not come from the countryside to a yoga center on Parancs Street or elsewhere, wanting to practice yoga. But if they encounter yoga here under such circumstances, then perhaps more easily, they see what it is truly about. Yoga may then find us more easily and sooner. Well, now you can surely hear that the music is coming from at least two places. An interesting experience was when we first came to the Sziget in 2001; we thought it couldn't be that we would just hand out flyers and practice yoga only when there is silence. But even when the music is thundering from the main stage, people still come and want to try yoga. A yoga teacher can see that if the students, the practitioners there, lie down for relaxation, how the relaxations emerge and unfold. The astonishing experience we have is that at most they achieve pratyāhāra, the withdrawal of the senses, so that they are absolutely undisturbed by what is happening outside on another stage or in another tent. Indeed, even under such circumstances, they are able to relax. So I would like to encourage everyone among the disciples and long-time practitioners who have difficulties with pratyāhāra practice to come to Sziget for a while to practice yoga. We will experience that it can be done this way as well.

This text is transcribed and grammar corrected by AI. If in doubt what was actually said in the recording, use the transcript to double click the desired cue. This will position the recording in most cases just before the sentence is uttered.

The text contains hyperlinks in bold to three authoritative books on yoga, written by humans, to clarify the context of the lecture:

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