Yoga, Scoliosis, Practice by Rita Lewis-Manos
 
Rita Lewis-Manos draws on her four decades of study with B.K.S. Iyengar and Dr. Geeta S. Iyengar to create a book that enables willing students to tailor a practice to their specific spinal curvatures. Step-by-step, yoga practitioners can pursue their process of discovery, from understanding their own shapes to developing stability, to learning asymmetric work, to integrating actions toward evenness. The author uses clear instructions so that students may experience and adapt the poses and the sequences for themselves.
 
About Rita
Around the age of 14, I could sense that my spine was growing a bit crookedly.  At that time they were not checking students for scoliosis, as they usually do now.  I also discovered I was dyslexic.  I never spoke up about either of these problems.  The ring on my right hand, which I could touch, helped me tell right from left.  At 16, I discovered Yoga from a book and did some poses without any real guidance.
 
Fast forward to college.  I came home with monoucleosis and was sent to the doctor.  He took an X-ray of my lungs, only to discover I had scoliosis.  I asked him what could be done, and he replied: You could have an operation, or be fitted for a brace, or learn to live with it.  I chose the latter.
 
Two years out of college, I was taken to a Yoga class and at the same time introduced to the book, Light on Yoga, BKS Iyengar.  Maybe a year later, I got to meet Iyengar in person and awkwardly asked him to sign my book.  I asked him how I should work with my scoliosis.  He said, "Come to India"  And I did.  My first trip to Pune was February of 1977.  This changed my life.  I continued to go and study with BKS Iyengar and his brilliant daughter Geeta Iyenagar until their deaths, his in 2014 and hers in 2018.
 
Guruji always said to pass on your knowledge before you die, so this is my attempt at fulfilling his request.  Any mistakes are mine.  All this knowledge came to me at the feet of these two remarkable individuals.