12/12/2021
“I have been a seeker and I still am, but I stopped asking the books and the stars. I started listening to the teachings of my soul.” -Rumi
I can’t tell you why you came to yoga. I can only tell you why I did. I wanted to heal.
Throughout my yoga practice I thought getting more entrenched in the ✨woo-woo ✨ that surrounds yoga would allow me more healing.
I took it very seriously. I did the crazy stuff. I sun-gazed in the morning (literally staring directly at the sun). I tried to decalcify my pineal gland by avoiding fluoride, going vegan, drinking only distilled water. I paid for psychics. I obsessed over astrology, life path numbers, law of attraction, synchronicity, etc etc etc.
I thought that going deeper into these alternative ideologies would bring me more peace and healing and ultimate closer to spiritual clarity and oneness with the universe.
This week, we are talking about Svadhyaya. The 5th of the Niyamas. It means self-study. It means put down the fu***ng books (the secret). Turn off the fu***ng YouTube videos (infinite waters). Stop looking OUTSIDE of you for answers. Stop waiting for the universe to give you signs. Stop waiting for God to slap you in the face with signs. Stop with Dr. Z and Medical Medium. Stop obsessively looking for someone ELSE to give you the answers and the permission you’re seeking.
Only you have the power to change your life. Only you can do that.
Self-study, is about sitting down, shutting up, and listening to your own thoughts, to your own feelings, observing your own experiences. To work through them, to understand them. Not for someone else to tell you what it means. Not for someone else to tell you what you should do.
Through yoga, we get into our bodies, we listen to our breath. We repeatedly hear “this is YOUR practice.”
You have the power. Have the discipline to do what you need to do to get what you want.
Have the courage to go for it, without the approval and permission of others.
Trust yourself. Love yourself. Set your life on fire.
