The Complete Yoga Community

5 Minutes with Ted Lafferty

On his recent trip out to South Africa to conduct Tibetan Heart Yoga workshops and teachers’ training courses, Canadian born Ted Lafferty caught up with Complete Yoga on some Q&A…

Q: What is Tibetan Heart yoga and where does it originate?
A: Tibetan Heart Yoga is a practice dating back to the Indian Yogi Naropa, 1 000AD. It is based on bringing the eight limbed path (Ashtanga) onto the mat. We don’t simply do physical asana but rather include the yamas (things not to do) and niyamas (things to do) - basically our morals and moral natures – into our practice.

Q: What does the practice involve?
A: One way we bring morality to our practice is by keeping our mind on a virtuous object. This involves developing deeper, smoother breathing and, through our breath, we are then able to shift the mind and change the quality of the thoughts that inhabit our minds. We leave a yoga class and feel calmer in the car during traffic or more patient with our families, and in time we slowly notice how we become happier people. The basis for Tibetan Heart Yoga is to work from the inside out - by developing compassionate thoughts as we practice, we notice we are able to cultivate compassion much more deeply in our daily lives.

Q: What does this Buddhist ideal of compassion mean to you?
A: There is a Buddhist view that states that in order to be happy one must make other people happy i.e. treat other people as you would have them treat you. This is why His Holiness the Dalai Lama is always teaching kindness, the root teaching of many spiritual traditions. It is not some ploy to create a society that is easier to control – it is rather the secret to happiness.

Q: What do the Tibetan Heart Yoga courses and workshops offer?
A: These trainings are geared to give students and teachers an in-depth knowledge of the topic in an effective adult learning format. The student does not just learn a practice or philosophical concept, they learn the historical, scriptural, yet modern application of yoga. They learn counter-indications, proper pronunciation and the meaning behind the various parts of the Sanskrit words. I believe a teacher should have 100 things in their back pocket for every ten things they say in a yoga class. Therefore, the intense study in the 20 hour workshops offered by Yoga Studies Institute are geared to give a teacher a deep foundation in order to better serve the students or give the student a deeper knowledge of what they are practicing.

Q: What Buddhist teaching touches at the heart of this practice?
A: Tibetan Buddhists would say that life is like a mirror. There are no inherent qualities that come from the mirror itself, but rather the reflection that we see. What we see in this reflection is based on habits from our past, our likes and dislikes. The more you see yourself doing good and helping people, the more you see people helping you. The truth of something is in its efficacy. I am not only getting happier from expanding my level of kindness, I am seeing the world that I project as a more joyous, compassionate place. This is an incredible truth to offer people. Is it worth our time to go to class simply for a “yoga butt”; or would you like to see every aspect of your life starting to shift; our mind and spirits transforming? With Tibetan Heart yoga, you still get the “yoga butt”, although you find it pales in comparison to your yoga mind.