Off the Mat: Writing Yoga
Many are familiar with yoga as a physical practice, or asana. The power of yoga, however, is in how we walk with it when we’re off the mat. Actually, many of the practices occur wholly away from a yoga mat.
I use writing as a form of practice. It’s a means of processing, discovering, reinforcing, reminding, and crystallizing. It has become a primary focus of my work and the evolution of Humanitou.
Sharing the writing also is a practice. It is a practice of the yogic yama (restraint) of aparigraha, or non-greed/non-attachment.
The yogic text the Bhagavad Gita speaks to aparigraha when Krishna says, “Let your concern be with action alone and never with the fruits of action. Do not let the results of action be your motive, and do not be attached to inaction.”
I consider aparigraha’s practice of greedlessness or taking only enough and extend it to one of giving.
Rather than hold tightly to my learnings through experiencing yoga off the mat, I offer it up for the potential of others to connect with it. And, in truth, the letting go of how its received is yet another practice. My ego cares if and how it is received. My better Self works to let that go.
And like that, all yoga practice is imperfectly perfect.
So rather than proselytize what I consider to be answers to yoga and life, each having been experienced and contemplated by thousands of years’ of humanity, I write about the personal but relatable connections I make between Self-study and life lived.
We all have the wisdom of experience to offer up for connection.
If you’d like to write your yoga and share it, you can send me an email: adam at humanitou.com. You also can add comments/thoughts in writing via Humanitou’s social pages (@humanitou): Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
Photo credit: Calum MacAulay, via Unsplash
