If you think that yoga is going to solve all of your problems, don’t get your hopes up. Yoga is not something that creates magic possibilities, it is a practice that helps us understand that simply anything is possible. Learning about energy on a subtle level, smaller than cellular, allows the human body and consciousness to connect with the world at a universal level. This connection is a union which may be described as harmony, peace, serenity, or in Sanskrit, samadhi. The Sanskrit root of the word yoga means “to yoke”, to join together, or to unite. How can we live our lives to be the most easeful, pleasant and happy?

A wise yogi once said, “People don’t like to do yoga because people don’t like to deal with their shit.” The premise being that yoga, and meditation, demand steadiness of the heart and mind. When stress, preoccupation and anxiety are present the harmony can’t take place. So yoga asks us to pay attention and do the work. We all have our shit, and the more shit we deal with and move forward from the easier it gets. Life is all just one big yoga practice. I have learned that life is only full of problems if that’s what you call them. I like to think of them as directions, things that remind me of where I want my mind to be and what direction my heart is facing.

As you continue to practice yoga in 2018, or begin the practice for the first time, you will develop a super ability to listen. And the quieter the bullshit, the easier it will be to find the important stuff. We all need a different tool box of enlightenment. For some of us we find bliss in three feet of powder, other times it may be a good book in a hammock by the beach, or perhaps five sun salutations at sunrise… In making the effort to listen, we are admitting that we have more work to do, the practice must continue.