What is Yoga?

I get this question all of the time. People from all walks of life, even those who have practiced for a while ask me this question a lot. Because in the West, the term has been mislabeled for so long that it seems like no one knows anymore.

Here is what I can say yoga is not.

First and foremost, yoga is not an exercise, a strength training, nor is it a flexibility class. Yes, you can experience those benefits as an indirect effect of practicing yoga, but that is not what it is about at its core. I caution students against expecting any kind of weight loss transformation from their physical practice because, again, it was not designed as an exercise in the modern sense.

Sad to say, but as much as social media has helped spread yoga, it has also caused major damage. There are plenty of disingenuous photos and videos going around from teachers and athletic/wellness brands alike that promote extremely difficult yet impressive poses achieved.

What they don’t promote is the fact that many of those teachers started out in physically flexible backgrounds such as dance, ballet, or gymnastics and can achieve those poses because they are already more flexible than the average person. What they don’t promote is the fact that you can practice a pose for years and maybe never achieve it. What they don’t promote is that achieving yoga poses is not some competition to show off how physically strong a person is. What they don’t promote is body inclusivity and people of color from whom yoga was appropriated for capitalist gains. What they don’t promote is that able-bodied or not, anyone can “do yoga”.

And what they don’t promote is the fact that the goal of yoga is not to achieve the pose but the journey of overcoming all of the negative thought patterns and self-limitations that tried to stop that person from achieving the pose. That in order to overcome those things, one can utilize the yogic tools of meditation and introspection.

Second, yoga is not just a physical practice. I can’t tell you how many times I have gone into a studio and watched the instructors demonstrate physical pose after pose (maybe throwing in some Sanskrit terms, maybe not) and then end the class in savasana. This sets dangerously inaccurate expectations for new students because it contributes to this misconception that it is a primarily physical practice. Not to mention, it screams cultural appropriation by only focusing on 1or 2 parts of the totality of yoga.

In honoring yoga’s roots, instructors do their students a grave disservice by picking and choosing specific parts to include in order to make it more palatable to Western tastes. I believe that it is important for us as teachers to express our deep appreciation for the practice in its entirety. Because what yoga does offer, I believe, is what most people are searching for in one way or another.

So what is yoga? In one word: unity. Yoga seeks to unite the mind and body using our breath as the link.

The great Indian sage, Patanjali, codified yoga from its original oral tradition as a science of physical, mental, and spiritual disciplines into written verses sometime between the 2nd Century BCE and 4th Century AD. It’s original use was for meditation and spirituality to integrate one’s entire being: body, mind, and soul. In verses 1.2, he says “the restraint of the mind-stuff is yoga”. I think Susanna Barkataki, yoga instructor and best selling author, explains it in laymen’s terms well when she says. “Yoga is the calming of the fluctuations of the mind in order to find unity within”. *

In essence, yoga is a scientific methodology for enlightenment that teaches a student to calm the mind so that he or she can obtain samadhi, or blissful union with God, Source, or Cosmic Consciousness, or the Unmanifested. The methodology is likened to a tree with 8 different limbs. Those 8 limbs in total encompass the practice of yoga and they are:

• yamas (5 ethical standards for right behavior toward others)

• niyamas (5 moral standards for right behavior towards one’s self)

• asana (posturing of the body that facilitates conscious awareness)

• pranayama (breath work or life force control)

• pratyahara (withdrawal of the 5 physical senses inward)

• dharana (concentration)

• dhyana (meditation)

• samadhi (a culmination of self realization, liberation, ecstatic consciousness, enlightenment)

By living in accordance with each of the first 7 limbs, one can achieve the final limb, or the state of samadhi. This is a path for enlightenment. For self-realization. For the practitioner to see through the maya (delusion) that is the human experience. So that he or she comes to know that we are all divine beings in a temporary human experience. To identify with his or her true or higher self and to stop identifying with his or her physical experiences only.

Yoga is not religion. It is a spiritual experience. And when you leave the mat, it is my hope as your instructor that you walk away with more than just a physical experience or physical sensations. It is my goal to truly help you cultivate the spiritual tools needed to help you remember who you really are outside of your thoughts and experiences. That each class leaves you feeling safe, united with all in the shared state of “just being”.

*Embrace Yoga’s Roots: Courageous Ways to Deepen Your Yoga Practice, Susanna Barkataki