In response to some of the comments, articles and books out there that extol the virtues of "yoga" and some that find joy in pointing out the pitfalls, I would like to throw my hat into the ring as it were and tell it like it is from down here in the trenches. Some of these writings (ok most) will be like random thoughts falling from the sky, some of this writing will be a little ranty, most will be reflections of my own journey which is going on more than 30 years now. And all will come from a place of love and full of heart.
That's another one of the things that I will be talking about:
When you are a yogi and a yogini, you don't have to be "nice" all the time. Please don't project that need on to me. It is a New Age construct and limitation that I don't necessarily think is productive at all.
The process and journey of Yoga is not hard and fast. It doesn't happen over night ("it" may not happen at all). Those of us who pursue it rigorously are not special in the way that we "should be" a certain way just because we decided to take this path; work on it as a vocation and not a past time. Everyone can choose this path. It really shouldn't interfere that much with your everyday life. The only thing it interferes with is the ego's idea of what your life is about, expectation of what you can do to achieve that, and the attachment to outcome. It really plays with all of that. It is not easily detectible either when it's playing and that's what gets us into trouble.
And that brings me to one other thing that I will be talking about:
Our misconception of what 'yoga' is.... "Yoga is a sport. An activity. An exercise." That's only a part of it (a very small part). And to think of it only in this way is a trap. But it is thought of this way and has been appropriated into the milieu of our society as just that. Why? Well because...it's easy. Yes. You don't' have to work hard at understanding it. You don't have to "believe" in anything. It's safe and nonthreatening when you only think of it as a sport. And because it is a "sport" well then it's accessible to everyone - isn't it? And that's another trap. We've watered down our lives so much into a free-for-all that there can be no aspiring to greatness!... Oh right, if you want to be a "Star", that's reserved for those talented or not-so talented lucky few who were sited or got on some sort of show where they can finally show what they're made of. That's what we've reduced ourselves to; that greatness is only represented by those who have celebrity. But I digress. The other stuff of Yoga is also accessible to everyone, it's just much more difficult and takes years of dedicated practice to even get an inkling of it's worth. Even the true physical aspect of yoga takes years of study, not only to become a teacher because that's easy... but years spent on your own practice. A lot of people take weekend courses, or month long trainings to become teachers and they do not know how they do not know. This is dangerous and what has happened is the process and journey of yoga has been reduced to a simplistic version of itself, and a few sound bytes, taught only to make you "feel good" and nothing more. I can go on...
I need to go and practice. But I'll be back to continue this...
