Saturday, May 22, 2010

What is Yoga?

I graduated from the Integral Yoga Institutes NYC ten years ago this June. I remember that day so well. I remember finding an entirely white outfit to wear to the ceremony and I remember how my classmates knew exactly who was there to support me. I was like 15 years younger than almost everyone in my class. My thoughts and feelings and experience have grown, changed, deepened, and in some way remained very steady over this period of time. I am still trying to figure out, "what is yoga" and have invited so many students to do the same. I will be reflecting over the next month on some definitions and experiences that have stayed with me.

For my 26th birthday a student who I still work with made me a t-shirt that said, "yoga is hard." This was a big turning point for me when I started to uncover that a practice of yoga is not all hearts and sunshine that yoga helps you feel how you are...really and sometimes it is tender, or in grief, so yes April yoga is still hard and nobody says why better than this author. I have been sitting with her definition of yoga for a good while now.


" is a complex method involving a radical change in the way we experience the world and conceive the process of knowing ourselves. It gives us techniques with which to analyze our own thought processes and finally to lay bare our true human identity."


Barbara Stoler Miller

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