What IS yoga after all?

I’ve been teaching something for 40+ years.

I’ve been teaching some form of yoga for 25+ of those 40+ years.

If I didn’t/hadn’t changed my yoga practice over time,

with each injury,

with each interruption/decline of ability

to do the poses as they’d been taught to me;

If I didn’t/hadn’t wondered about

or wandered into variations of a pose

whose original version had been strictly imposed upon

this body—by tradition or by me;

If I didn’t/hadn’t intended to grow in my capacity

to be aware of what I was doing

while I was doing it

of how this body, my body

was responding…

I wonder:

Would I really have been doing yoga?

Or would I have been doing calisthenics?

or stretching?

or…?

I take all of this awareness

and human frailty

into my Teaching.

When I teach yoga,

I am very mindful

of our similarities

and our differences.

I am keenly aware

that we are—each of us—

in our unique place along the spectrums

of awareness,

of inclination,

of desire,

of physical ability,

of sensitivity,

of presence in the right-here-right-now.

When I teach,

I listen,

I watch,

I respond,

I offer,

I invite,

I discern.

And I lead the people who come to yoga

in practices that open their physical body

so that they can embody what their spirit and mind seek.

I lead the people who come to do yoga

to poses that manifest them

rather than they trying to fit themselves into poses

that never were designed for their bodies right here right now.

When I teach,

I hold a safe space for all who come

so that you  may acquire and deepen your ability

to hold a safe and sacred space for you

in your life on and away from the mat

in and away from yoga.

And this is what yoga is—

a safe space for body-mind-spirit

to practice on the mat

what you would like to have and live and be and do

off the mat,

away from yoga.

“All of you” is welcome in yoga.

Blessings,

Paula.