History of APY
The collection of many is stronger than one.
Many martial arts practices are designed to help the student adapt, evolve and progress with time. Probably the most famous martial arts practice is Bruce Lee’s, Jit Kun Do. After mastering several and exploring many more, Bruce Lee put together what he considered to be the strengths of several styles. Yoga practices have evolved as well. Bikram, Power Yoga, and others are taken from a collection of sources. American Power Yoga (APY) is a collection of all that I have learned from my teachers and a thoughtful collaboration with my sister, Jennifer.
Many of the principles and practices, as well as the philosophy of APY, come from my training in the Tibetan Lightning Fire Mountain (LFM) system of health and kung fu. The system includes yoga, kung fu, tai chi, meditations, acupuncture, herbology, chi gung, weapons training, and more. It also contains energy. It is hard to explain. However, with practice it becomes more apparent. It is the energy of many people and hundreds of years of people working hard to help others with the practices found within LFM, and now APY. The purpose of the system is Tibetan Buddhist in nature – to assist all sentient beings.
In APY, I may have taken out the strikes and kicks. But know that calmness is a strong defense, as is flexibility, awareness, and the power of perception. Multi-angled strength, both physically and mentally, is also borrowed from the kung fu side.
The traditional yoga practices found within the Lightning Fire Mountain System arose from the Vajrayana teachings of Tibetan Buddhism called the Diamond Vehicle. The breath work is actually yoga that comes from these teachings. The famous Six Yogas of Naropa come from these same teachings. It is based on the principle of attaining enlightenment not just for ourselves, but for the benefit of all sentient beings.
The Lightning Fire Mountain System began with Khangsar Tserong M’ing (1826-1924). He was born in the Amdo Region just north of Kham at the Tibetan border. At the age of eight, he was given to a monastery to train to become a monk. There he received many thousands of hours of training in all aspects of spiritual training used by Tibetan priests, including many yoga practices. By 1865, he was a full priest and was one of the leaders in charge of the most famous Tibetan monasteries, Litang. After another invasion of Kham by the Chinese, Khangsar M’ing became a traveling priest until he found an abandoned monastery in the mountains. During that time a distant relative sent a young boy to him to learn the ways of a monk or priest. His name was Chou Dhieh Hsiang. Together they spent eleven years training and assisting others.Chou Dhieh Hsiang (1893-1977) took all that he had learned during his eleven years with Khangsar M’ing and added to it during his travel around Tibet, China, and India. Besides his training as a monk, he also became a doctor and healer. In 1968, after the loss of his family in the clash between Mao Tse-Tung and Chiang Kai-Shek, he came to San Francisco. Seeking a quieter setting, he quickly found his way to Northern Mexico. There he beckoned Robert K Markorre Cooper and spent thousands of hours sharing the wisdom and tools he had picked up and developed during his lifetime. Robert K Cooper went on to train only one class of students in the Lightning Fire Mountain System of health given to him by Chou Hsiang, before going on to be a very successful author and speaker.
In that group was Roger Stainbrook. After completing his training with Cooper, Roger Stainbrook continued his training and study while traveling the world, including long periods in Egypt, India, and the Middle East. In 1991 Roger affiliated himself with Goswami Sunyata Saraswati of the Sunyata sect of Kriya Yoga, a tantric yoga derived from the teachings of master Babaji. In the mid 90′s, Roger studied with Kensur Rinpoche, the head Lama at the Namgyal Monastery North American Branch of his Holiness the Dalai Lama in Ithica, NY, in what is termed Highest Tantric Yoga in Vajrayana Buddhism, specifically advanced studies with the Medicine Buddha Yoga from the Gelugpa sect of Tibetan Buddhism yoga, meditation, and medicine. He currently is our resident acupuncturist at The American Power Yoga studio in Dallas and is a Grand Master of the Lightning Fire Mountain System. The combination of these great men’s efforts is the current Lightning Fire Mountain System and the yoga practices found within.
This, along with what I have learned from the other great teachers in my life, has both directly and indirectly come together to form American Power Yoga. ~ Kurt Johnsen
