I began my yoga practice to transform myself, though I didn’t fully understand my motivation at that time. I have watched hundreds of people begin to practice yoga and I believe that we all turn to the practice of yoga because we feel so different as a result. The sense of peacefulness and connectedness leads us back to ourselves in profound ways. Yoga practice, chosen wisely, is transformational.
As I began to study yoga therapy I learned that this transformation is the main purpose of yoga practice. Traditionally, yoga is taught one to one, the practice is as personal as psychotherapy or a doctor’s visit. In the philosophy of yoga, we are born with seeds for tendencies. These seeds will sprout in the right circumstances and they can be for things that we might view as positive or negative; a gift for music or science, or a problem with weight, or drugs, or truthfulness. All of the tendencies are undesirable, because they pull our attention in directions that we do not freely choose. The purpose of yoga practices is to burn off these seeds so that we can be free.
An analogy can be seen in achieving the Lotus position. For a culture that spends a lot of time sitting in chairs, there is a lot of muscular tension and restriction that must be carefully worked through before our bodies can safely and comfortably adopt this cross legged position. When a body is free enough, sitting in Lotus position is effortless, you can literally forget your body and drop into a meditative state. This freedom from effort and tension allows the practitioner to focus solely on their mind and awareness; they have reached a freedom from bodily tension. When I first experienced a comfortable seated position, it was a revelation, a feeling so light and free and well, comfortable. My whole physical being breathed a sigh of relief and joy.
I’ll be talking more about the concept of becoming free from destructive tendencies and give some specific tips about yoga practice tomorrow night in a free teleseminar, you can sign up here: http://sunriseranch.org/wellness-week/
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