It all boils down to this

We tend to get very complicated. We live in the era of specialization. We think in terms of expertise. This kind of thinking tempts us to hope that there’s a special, expert, complicated magic bullet that will bring us what we want. And there are a lot of people who offer to sell us such a magic bullet. Almost always, the sales job emphasizes impossible things: eternal youth, great success, unheard-of prosperity, flawless health, better looks, waif-like weight, control.

IMG_7457Yoga proposes an alternative to all that.

It claims that you need to be less complicated. In fact, it proposes a unity in place of the complex. That we take the emphasis on thinking up solutions, and replace it with concentrating on one thing. That concentration, on a movement, then a breath, then a sound, then a concept, then an experience of light, then nothing, steeps you in who and what you really are. When you have that experience, your perspective shifts, and the myriad things that appeared to matter are “put in perspective,” where you can see their true value — or lack thereof.

I could say what you will know then, that it all boils down to “this _______.” But until you practice having your mind make the journey to unity — yoga — it’s just poetry, meme, or another promise. Instead, follow the advice of Pattabi Jois, spoken with his quaint Indian-English grammar: “Practice yoga, and all is coming.”