Five Things That Make Your Yoga Practice Stronger

This talk goes through five attitudes that help make your physical yoga practice stronger. These include intention, focus, knowledge, experimentation, and effortless effort. Practical suggestions are given throughout.

Transcript

This is a talk,

A teaching,

Not really a meditation,

Maybe a reflection.

I'll talk slowly so if you want to turn this into a meditation you certainly could.

The topic is the five things that strengthen your practice,

Your yoga practice.

Mostly talking about the physical practice here,

But not entirely.

So if your practice is pranayama or meditation,

You will find things here I hope that resonate.

And I want to give credit to my teachers who passed this to me,

Panditji Rajmani Tukanayet and Luke Ketterhagen.

I'm not exactly sure where I got these,

But I have had them written down on an index card for many years and I refer to them all the time in my classes.

I'll often recite them when people are in a very demanding or a very easy pose.

I feel like these are the best times for reflection and self-awareness.

So these five things are kind of in order,

Or let me say at least that the first three go together and the second two go together.

The first thing that will strengthen your practice is to have a sense of intention.

So you often hear yoga teachers open class by asking people to set an intention.

That's because yoga is different than other kinds of exercise.

A good yoga class includes a meditation and some breathing,

But that's not the end.

These are means to an end.

We practice for a reason and the reason can be varied or very individual.

Your intention could be a motivating word or a phrase,

An affirmation,

Something you want to embody or call into your life.

It can be a hope or a wish.

When I'm teaching kids,

I ask them to think of their most personal wish,

Something that is theirs and theirs alone,

Something they never have to tell anyone,

But of course they can if they want to.

Or you can make your practice a dedication,

Almost a form of prayer if you know someone who is suffering in some way and you want to reach them.

If you do that,

It's a good idea to tell the person that you devoted your practice to them today,

If that feels good and comfortable for you.

The second of these is focus.

So this is similar to intention,

But different.

Focus is continual through the practice and it shifts again and again and again.

Focus on this body part or this kind of breathing,

Focus on the alignment in the pose or the quality of your attention.

Pretty soon if your focus is sustained,

You'll notice that whatever problems you might have been preoccupied with before class kind of dissipate.

You might not even think of them during the entire class because you've been focusing and concentrating,

Which is another kind of focus,

So much during class.

So focus is a way of centering the mind during practice.

The idea is that with practice over time,

Your focus will improve in all areas of your life.

So in this way,

An asana,

Which is a pose,

An asana practice is not just for the body,

But also for the mind.

Knowledge is the third one.

So I love this one because it's really so very broad.

It can mean knowledge of your body,

Your mood even,

Anatomy,

Philosophy,

Mythology,

Yogic literature,

Physics.

You see,

Yoga is a very broad term that includes all of these.

Quite often when we're going through class,

We might invoke several of these at once.

For example,

I will often emphasize the Western science of pathophysiology when I explain why breathing into the belly is so calming.

It stimulates the vagus nerve,

Which triggers our parasympathetic nervous system,

Which is sometimes referred to as our rest and digest system.

At the same time,

There is an ancient tradition of agnya or fire.

It's associated with the belly.

And maybe I'll mention how the Kundalini tradition envisioned a serpent at the base of our spine that with practice energetically lifts and distributes Shakti,

A sort of life force throughout the body.

So all of these kinds of knowledge can kind of coalesce into a yogic knowledge that draws from many,

Many sources.

And I love that about yoga.

You can be thinking about different parts of your body and how your body works at the same time you're envisioning some ancient myth or deity.

The next is experimentation.

So I really believe you must engage with this one to have a meaningful practice that grows over time.

Honestly,

You have to play a little.

When a teacher says,

Try something or suggests an alternate way of being in the pose,

Check it out.

Even if that might seem too easy or too hard,

Just break your pattern a little bit and try,

Play,

Experiment.

For example,

In standing splits pose,

Which is urdhva prasarita ekapada asana,

If you want the Sanskrit name,

Standing splits,

I'll encourage people to experiment with balance by first taking one hand behind the ankle and maybe both hands behind the ankle,

Just playing with the balance.

I feel like every pose has wide potential for meaningful experiments.

And you know,

We sometimes say that yoga is a science.

And if yoga is a science,

Then your body is the lab.

And so what do we do in laboratories of science?

We run experiments,

We form little hypotheses,

And run the experiment and see how it goes.

And then we adapt and adjust the experiment and adjust the hypothesis.

And pretty soon we've created a science of yoga that is uniquely ours,

But is drawing on some very rich traditions and knowledge that has been passed down through many generations.

And the last of these five is effortless effort.

Sometimes I'll say this phrase,

Effortless effort.

And then I'll say,

This just means going to your edge,

Looking over the edge,

And then backing away from the edge.

So we want to find that sweet spot in every pose.

And this one,

Effortless effort,

Can be combined with some of the others too,

Of course.

For example,

If you're in a forward bend like Janushirasana,

Which is a seated pose with one foot on the upper inner thigh of the opposite leg,

One foot is extended,

The other leg is bent,

You might be focusing hard with an intention,

Remember,

That's one,

Of staying in your breath and the full knowledge,

Again,

That's one,

Of how if you flex your quadriceps,

Your hamstring will release a little,

And then try an experiment by using a strap.

And then with awareness,

And if you're feeling good,

You might go a little further than you usually go in the pose,

But then you would back off immediately when sensation turns into pain.

So that means that you would settle into that spot that is an effortless effort expression of the pose.

So thinking back on these five practices,

And again,

Those are intention,

Focus,

Knowledge,

Experimentation,

And effortless effort.

Can you see how they're not only good for your yoga,

But might be applied to your life as well?

Yoga is like that.

Thank you for listening.

Let me know what you think.

Namaste.

Reviews

That was great! These five probably all occur during my practices but I will aim at being more aware of them, from their arising to my response. Effortless effort is tricky and so is the boundary of pain. When is sensation pain? It does require wisdom indeed. Thank you for sharing your knowledge.

This was fantastic - simply stated. I feel uplifted, inspired and motivated. Thank you!

Love that, thank you. Will defintely build those into my practice more mindfully 🙏

Great insights thankyou ☺️🙏

Very inspiring for my prächtige.

Will listen to it again. Thank you ❣

So inspiring! I feel much better equipped for my meeting with myself on the mat. Thank you 🙏🏼💫

thank you for this well spoken package of provoking information

Thank you for an extended explaination of intention, but all 5 points are valuable.