Y is for Yoga

 

 As always, a huge shout out to Ninja Minion Master Captain Alex and his army of ninja minions! 

My Theme: Yoga.  For those of you who don't know, I've been working on obtaining my yoga teacher's certification for the past year and am just a little over a month from graduating with my RYT200.  As such, I figure there's no better way to spend this month than teaching you folks some of what I've learned.

I've spent the bulk of the past month talking about what yoga isn't so today it's finally time to speak to what it is.

As you can probably guess, there are many different definitions depending upon where you look.  However, there is one single definition that we ascribe to in my school and which resonates deepest with me personally.  (Drum roll, please)....

Yoga is a process for seeking out and removing obstacles to freedom.

There, is your mind blown?  Mine certainly was when I first heard it.  Hopefully that definition puts a lot of the rest of what I've discussed this month in some context.  Like, for example, why I would rally so hard against the idea of yoga as simply a form of exercise.  Why understanding the health benefits, nonetheless, is so vital.  Why it's so important to understand that asana are just one of the eight limbs on the eight-limbed path of yogic development.  And why I personally am so extremely devoted to this life-changing way of living.

Yoga is the single greatest method I have found to study, better understand and ultimately embrace this crazy, wild, wonderful soul that is me.  (And I've tried a lot of different methods towards that end over the years, trust me.)  And I am not in any way, shape or form saying that it is the ONLY way, simply that for me, it is the best.  And would it be what it is for me without everything else that I do that supports my overall well-being?  Of course not- those are also integral aspects of who I am.  But they were all there before I started this crazy journey almost a year ago.  

So how else to explain how drastically, completely, revolutionary different I am in the course of a year?  You guessed it, yoga.