Yoga Every Day! (Part One)

Being in the habit of a regular Yoga practice brings fantastic side effects to the practitioner. As soon as I discovered it, I started practicing semi- regularly about 3 days a week, with some seasonal breaks between 2005-2016. The yoga I practiced then was a westernized, studio- Yoga such as Vinyasa Flow. The classes I went to would consist of an aerobic and usually sweaty asana (posture) practice and lots of Ujjai breathing (specific pranayama/breath practice involving a constriction in the throat which has a heating as well as engaging effect on the core to support the rapid changes of flexion and extension). There’s nothing wrong with that! Especially when your 20- something brain and body have lots of extra energy to burn. 

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Now I’m almost 40, I am currently a three- time, Aspen Shakti, 30- Day- challenger and I have done my own practice every day since 2016. “How?” you might ask. Well, there is absolutely no way I could have done it “studio challenge style.” I’m pretty sure that, that wouldn’t even be healthy, unless you’ve got your own ego in complete check. ​
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The trick is to incorporate Yoga into your life as a holistic practice, rather than just an exercise routine. In fact, those thousands- of- years old scriptures that us Yogis love to brag about, say almost nothing about the Asana practice typical to westernized yoga. When Asana is mentioned, it is usually a seated posture and is almost always in the context of preparing for Breathwork (Pranayama) and/or meditation. 
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Breathwork is the practice and exercise of breathing. As a western Yoga teacher, I like to reference the circulatory system and how  the breath is directly responsible for facilitating the cellular processes of the body. “Nutrition in/inhale and waste out/exhale,” is a simplified way to understanding the benefits of breathwork. 
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The traditional philosophy, which has been practiced and documented for thousands of years, allows us to go even deeper. Pranayama which directly translates to “life- force control” is the practice and work of creating, exploring, growing, following, and directing your life- force (Prana in sanskrit). And,  guess what! If you practice dedicated and focused control of your life force i.e. breath, you’re practicing Yoga!
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The Bhagavad Gita, meaning "The Song Divine" is one of the most important Yogic scriptures. It's composed of poetic verses entailing the practices of Yoga and is believed to have come straight from the ultimate divinity (God). 

Pranayama is generally done sitting (exceptions exist) and similarly to how an asana is a preparation for pranayama, pranayama precedes meditation, and meditation is BLISS! I’m tempted to tell you about all of the steps within meditation, but really, meditation deserves it’s own blog. What I can say is this; there are 4 levels leading to the complete, meditative Yogic state. The Patanjali Yoga Sutra along with other scriptures, refer to these steps and yogic states and make it clear that achieving them is an extremely difficult task!
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The Yoga Sutras where written by the sage Maharishi Patanjali and is an evolution and very well organized compilation of Yogic truths and insights including the 8 limbs of Yoga (8 fold path towards balance and ultimate truth).

So, if aerobic yoga everyday may be unhealthy, breathing happens all by itself making it hard for many to motivate themselves to practice it, and meditation can be abstract and difficult to do, how the heck does one practice Yoga every damn day?
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Well, so far in this blog we’ve touched on the final 6 of the 8 limbs of Yoga, (asana-3, pranayama- 4, meditation- 5,6,7,8). We have not yet talked about the first two limbs of Yoga which are Yama and Niyama. Yama and Niyama consist of 10 guiding principles concerning morals and codes of conduct, that are proven to help one live better. They are things you can and should incorporate into  life (yours and others) as much as possible. They are: not harming, not stealing, moderation, truth, not hoarding, cleanliness, discipline, contentment, self- study, and surrender! 

Including the Yamas and Niyamas isn't only a clever and practical way to get your practice on a more frequent track, it’s also the prerequisite for the yogic limbs that follow (asana- pranayama- meditation). It is the initial balancing of your being and environment so that you can safely engage in all of the other steps that lead you to connect with your true and blissful self and the collective consciousness.

Do good for yourself! Set yourself up for a sustainable, everyday, year- round Yoga. Include all of the holistic goodies beyond the physical practice and find joy in the invitation to creatively customize Yoga to find your own balance. Finding your own balance will make you feel better, become more productive, more focused and more flexible. It will all begin to take shape for you which will inevitably train you to want more of it! That is what I strive to do, and that is how you can create that good habit loop which continuously sustains YOU.