Yoga For Life is a collection of essays focused on one regular life as seen through the lens of yoga. In them, yoga's deepest gifts are discovered in the mundane activities of daily life - laundry, grocery shopping, raising children, going to work, friendships, gardening - you name it! These personal, insightful meditations bring yoga's ancient spirituality, wisdom, and mindfulness sharply into modern focus.
Yoga is a practice designed to help us find contentment, happiness and faith in every aspect of our lives. Yoga For Life is written to help you as the reader – no matter the level of your practice – embrace the positive thinking, mental resilience, and transformation that develops by taking yoga beyond the mat and into your life.
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Vulnerability is the magic ingredient in every relationship. It invites kindness, generosity, compassion, and love. Being vulnerable or “real” allows others to love us. When we pour less energy into appearing fine and more energy into being our true selves with one another, love blossoms.
Unhappiness can be a season of growth and change, but we must engage with it. While unhappiness is uncomfortable, unexamined unhappiness is frightening. Sadness that is investigated, considered, and processed is something we can learn from. When we give our sadness the space to become a known thing, we can simply be with it, and, eventually, we can work with it.
The pandemic has left some feeling awash in time and wandering a bit aimlessly as a result, not getting as much accomplished as expected. Others are scrambling to keep up with seemingly relentless demands on each waking minute – and some minutes when they really ought to be sleeping. (Working and parenting from home? I’m talking to you.) In short, whether you feel time-abundant or time-poor, time is a precious resource that, invested mindfully, can help us live meaningful, happy lives.
This shared point in our history is uncomfortable. We can choose hope and optimism by seeing life (and ourselves) as a work in progress. Ignatian spirituality and yoga philosophy offer guidance in choosing hope. It’s easy to start practicing on our yoga mats.
Without some type of contemplative practice, when life bites most of us will bite back. Our knee-jerk reaction is to get defensive. We allow the initial, totally natural, wave of feelings to dictate our response to whatever is upsetting us. This doesn’t make us bad people. It makes us human people. In other words, this is simply the way we are hard-wired. Regular contemplation re-wires us.
Instead of thinking in terms of typical resolutions as we welcome this new year, why not consider maintaining a way of living that you may not even realize 2020 taught you? Living with Beginner’s Mind has the power to make every day (even every experience in every day) as brand-new as January 1. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could discover and celebrate the joy, energy, and freedom of being a beginner at this thing called life all year long?
While I never (ever) would have chosen any of what’s happened during this year that will certainly go down in infamy, I am able, with open heart and open hands, to say thank you 2020 for all of your ambiguous gifts. Happy holidays to you and cheers to a bright new year!
You and I can take a hopeful stance whenever life offers us challenges. We can take a breath and actively (acceptingly, mindfully, and hopefully) WAIT. Trusting as we wait that, one day, we will feel a little quiver of inspiration to once again begin to stretch and grow.
Within the darkness of my grief I have begun to sense some light. I feel certain that this journey will be fruitful; that meaning and purpose will return to my life in entirely new ways. My certainty is anchored in my practice. Yoga draws me back (again and again) to my center where I connect with the light within. It is the glow of this light that softly illuminates this dark, uncharted path so that I can walk on into my life.