Beyond Asana Blog

Now that Valentine’s Day is over...   What about love?

In our course on Bhakti Yoga – the path of love and devotion – an insightful student noted that despite considering love her most closely held core value, the routines and preoccupations of her daily life seem designed to make her forget this.

If you’re nodding your head in agreement, you’re not alone.

I think most of us would agree that when all is said and done, love is what will remain. It’s what brings sweetness and joy to life, making everything else we do more edifying. Yet, it's remarkably easy to lose sight of in the busyness of daily life.

Therefore, one of the most valuable...

A wise teacher once told me that a key to deepening yoga practice is learning to go at the speed of the body. The mind wants to go fast, she explained, but the body craves slowness.

In the Yoga tradition, the material world is viewed through the lens of the three gunas, qualities that are constantly interacting to form everything we perceive. Tamas is the quality of heaviness and stability. Rajas is the quality of dynamism and activity. Sattva is the quality of lucidity and clarity.

From the perspective of the gunas, the mind leans toward being more rajasic, characterized by volatility and airiness. Left unchecked, it tends to wander everywhere.

Conversely, the body tends to be more...

Love is strong and resilient. It springs from the truth of our interconnectedness.

- Sharon Salzberg

I’ve been thinking a lot about interconnectedness since I’ve been practicing and sharing The Work That Reconnects over the past two years. It seems clear to me that waking up to the truth of our interconnectedness isn’t just a nice idea - it’s the most important spiritual work of our time.

The evolution from seeing ourselves as separate, isolated individuals to realizing our fundamental interexistence with all of life is the pivotal identity shift that’s essential to foster a life-sustaining, just, and peaceful future for generations to come.

In my...

It started when a student at a primary school in rural Maine decided to start wearing suits to school. The idea took off and it became a weekly occurrence. The children say that they stand up a little taller and feel a little bit better about themselves when they get dressed up for school every Wednesday.

With all that’s going on in the world, we need stories that celebrate goodness and affirm the inherent dignity of the human spirit. This isn’t to dismiss or minimize the myriad stories of hardship and suffering, but to fortify us so we can face them unflinchingly. 

Dapper Wednesday is a heartening reminder that amid the tumult and adversity, there are also triumphs,...

If the world is to be healed through human efforts, I am convinced it will be by ordinary people whose love for this life is even greater than their fear.

- Joanna Macy

A recent workshop participant beautifully characterized love as the central hub of the wheel of her life - the core value she relies on to align her actions with her deepest intentions.

What a useful way of reframing love - not as an abstract, woo-woo concept, but as the organizing principle around which decisions are made, priorities set, and actions taken.

In committing to love as a guiding value, my experience is that it becomes a clarifying force - a steady ground where you can find sure footing when the disarray...

A long-time student graciously reached out last week to thank me for something I wrote years ago that continues to support her:

Through body, breath, sound, symbol, and awareness itself, yoga offers us pathways to experience the stillness and equanimity of our inner being.

Like a swan on a hot summer’s day, we dip into the clear waters of our own consciousness and emerge renewed, restored, rejuvenated.

Is there anything more refreshing than taking a break from the chatter of your mind?

It can be easy to get caught up in the external aspects of postural practice and lose sight of yoga’s fundamental purpose: stilling the mind.

Traditionally, asana was intended to prepare the...

I recently discovered ikigai, a Japanese concept that refers to your purpose in life. It’s the driving force that motivates you to get up in the morning, your raison d’être.

It’s considered the cornerstone of a fulfilling life and an important part of health and longevity. Once your ikigai is clear, life feels more meaningful and day-to-day decisions become easier.

Ikigai shares some common elements with the Vedic concept of dharma, sacred purpose or duty, and the later notion of svadharma, one’s individual purpose or duties in life.

How does yoga help?

Whatever form your practice takes, yoga is meant to impact positively the way you navigate life and how...

It’s the point at which something begins or shifts; the cusp, the verge, and the boundary that marks the entry point.

I recently learned that in medieval times, the threshold was a plank strategically placed across the front door that prevented barnyard debris from entering the house. It’s related to the verb thresh, the act of separating the seeds of a grain from the rest of the plant.

For us as yogis, the notion of extracting what is most valuable and setting aside the rest has clear resonance.

The first thing you do when you come to your mat or cushion is the threshold of your practice. It marks the moment of separating your attention from the activity of the day and...

One of my teachers often led us out of Savasana by describing those final resting moments as “after the end and before the beginning.”

What a gorgeous way of articulating the liminal space, that in-between time when one thing has ended and another has yet to begin.

This is where we’ve arrived in the cycle of the year. The solstice, derived from a root meaning “standing still,” marks a turning point. It’s when the sun’s movement appears to stop ever so briefly - like the pause in the swing a pendulum – before reversing course.

Yoga prepares us well to capture this tiny space of stillness and embrace the opportunity it presents.

We...

Surveying the fields around my house, the newly fallen snow strikes me as poignant metaphor for the gift - and relief – of new beginnings.

Just a few months ago, they were lush and vibrant, hosting stalks of corn, bales of hay, and grazing cows. Today, they're blanketed in white, pristine and seemingly as full of possibility as blank sheets of paper.

That’s the thing about life – it’s always new. With each sunrise, every breath, and shift of the seasons, we witness the cyclical nature of existence and the ever-unfolding intelligence that gives rise to it.

It’s easy to lose touch with these natural rhythms, which are, in fact, also our own. How reassuring,...