Holiday Yoga

This is the season. Snow is falling. Holiday social commitments are filling up the calendar and somehow, in the tiny cracks of time between them and work, there is gift shopping to do and a life to run. Whatever holidays you’re celebrating, there is likely to be an element of stress utterly contrary to the spirit of the season. A lot…

I’m Starting the Rewrite

When I first wrote Yoga for Every Room in Your House, it was the best I could make it at the time. I’ve learned a few things since then. Some of it stands up as-is, some of it needs refining, and some additional things need to be included. The variation on the sun salutation using…

Asteya: Stealing from Self

we try to differentiate between petty and grand theft, but stealing a dollar is as harmful to our souls as stealing the Mona Lisa would be.

Breath and Spirit

I first became aware of the connection between breath and spirit in my studies of yoga because the word Pranayama means breath control. Prana literally means breath in Sanskrit. It also means spirit. In English, the words spirit and respiration come from the same root, the Latin word spiritus. In other languages the pattern is the same.…

A Cautionary Batik

This batik hangs over my bed. Shiva & Parvati with the ghost of Kali. Shiva, the destroyer, leans on his trident supported by his white bull as Parvati, the perfect wife, shows him her necklace of skulls reminding him that she has another aspect. That of mad, ravening, Kali, the black one, who can do…

Satya: Lies and Self-destruction

The second yama is Satya. Satya corresponds directly to the biblical commandment, “You shall not lie.” Lies chip away bits and pieces of the self and leave us hollow and disconnected. If we lie often we begin to live life in fantasy and can forget what the truth is. We are diverted away from authentic living.…

A Question of Balance

There is a misconception, I think, about the idea of balance. That somehow if we can achieve the right combination of, say, work, family and time for one’s self, we can then remain in that state indefinitely. We think of balance as something we can get to and then just stay there. But even something as…

Reminder for Yoga Beginners

We start from where we are. We do the best we can today.

Habits of Body

We have habits of body that develop over time. We all have them. Some of them are due to ideas about how we should be. For instance, a girl who is taller than her classmates slouches in order to seem shorter. Some of them arise out of a physical constraint: a boy whose left leg…