Book Description
Eyes of Innocence is the title of the book accompanying the documentary film, "A Fish in Search of Water" on the yoga and philosophy of Dona Holleman. It contains ten of the interviews taken in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, against the dramatic backdrop of the Grand Tetons at the end of October, 2000 with Diana Eichner as director and Kate Rabinowitz as producer. These interviews were taken while hiking, canoeing, or lounging at the rented house in Teton Village. The leitmotif of both the documentary film and the manuscript is that life itself is the mystical experience, that no explanation can ever explain it, and that each human being by nature has a one-to-one relationship with the life force. The deeply mysterious experiences of both birth and death are intensely personal experiences, which each human being goes through alone even though there may be others around. Life can be lived in the same personal way with, on the one hand, our daily relationships with the surroundings and on the other hand, our own deeply experienced relationship with the universal life force. This relationship can only be experienced if we put our judging, cataloging and choosing minds in their proper perspective and allow the other side of us, the perceiving mind, the eye of the heart, to interact with life and with the life force. Our cataloging minds are the reality tunnels that each one of us lives in and are on the one hand unavoidable, but on the other hand create division between human beings and cultures. Thus to put these reality tunnels in their proper perspective and to give more room to our humanness can help us live life from a wider vision, a more innocent vision.
From the Publisher
Eyes of Innocence follows closely upon the publication of Dona Holleman's very well received yoga book "Dancing the Body of Light" In Eyes of Innocence Dona shares the experiences which she has integrated from a lifetime of yogic discipline. In her own words this senior teacher speaks of such topics as nature, intellectual systems and transformation of mind and body.
This book explores our way of perceiving the world through our own cultural and personal history and how we can change this perception to a more encompassing and compassionate way.
From the Author
"We never look with eyes of innocence, we always look through our hopes, fears, thoughts and experiences. These form a wall in front of our eyes; a troubling like the ripples on a lake that distort our reflection of reality. Seldom do we look into the eyes of our fellow men and women and when we do, we find ourselves stopped by this wall. On a rare occasion we may meet someone and look into the eyes and to our surprise do not find ourselves stopped, but rather invited to enter into endless rolling fields and routes, vistas of innocent beauty."
From the Inside Flap
"We never look with eyes of innocence, we always look through our hopes, fears, thoughts and experiences. These form a wall in front of our eyes; a troubling like the ripples on a lake that distort our reflection of reality. Seldom do we look into the eyes of our fellow men and women, and when we do, we find ourselves stopped by this wall; but on a rare occasion we may meet someone and look into the eyes and to our surprise do not find ourselves stopped, but rather invited to enter into endless rolling fields and routes, vistas of innocent beauty."
About the Author
Dona Holleman started studying Oriental philosophy at the age of twelve while living on the island of Java. Her main focus was Buddhism and Taoism, but her real interest has been, since a very early age, the mystery of the body. Thus when she came in contact with yoga in the fifties, it became immediately her main path.
In the mid sixties she met and studied with B.K.S. Iyengar in India, but has since then spent the last thirty years exploring the various aspects of yoga in her own practice and teaching, learning only from her own body.
Her belief is that the final answer lies within the body and that each human being has to find this for her/himself alone, guided only by the inner light, the inner teacher which is in each of us.
Though being one of the leading pioneer women teachers of yoga in the world, Dona has retained her privacy. Her aim is to help people find the courage to look for their own inner lilght and to present yoga in a form that will give people this courage.
