So, what does it all mean, when you start doing yoga?
I was at class today with a fresh beginner. He was charged from amazement at what he was learning about his body, and that is where it starts. Spending that time with your focus turned inward for a change, away from the mayhem that surrounds you and into your own being. Often it is quite an introduction.
So when you have been doing the physical yoga for a while, you start to notice very significant improvements. If you manage to do daily practice, you notice immediately how poor you feel if you skip it. You realize this is what you always felt like, you were just too out of tune to notice the difference. Wise men spent thousands of years perfecting the practices, and your regular practice will see your body evolve towards its perfect state. Your posture will improve, your muscles tighten, your head will clear.
What essentially happens, is that as you delve into yoga, your life philosophy revolves around reaching for self-improvement, in every facet of your being and existence. As you become familiar to the practices of mental yoga, you watch every thought and emotion and learn to recognize its true nature, and its effect on your being. And parts of your personality that you thought were intrinsically you, you realize where simply entrenched customs of perception that you are able to break down or remould, with the exercise of will.
And that is what is boils down to. When you start practicing yoga, you start to practice your will. As you practice and strengthen your will, you come to learn that it truly has no limits. Nothing in the universe is too strong for your will to conquer, never mind some demeaning or harmful practice that you currently are stuck in.
Yoga changes your life to a dynamic state. While more in it than you were before, you are able to stand back from your life and evaluate it, and your path through it. Instead of being stagnant, or confused by a multitude of rules and perceptions, your life boils down to one guiding thought: If it advances my state of development, it is good for me. If it retards my development, it is bad for me. And these thoughts lead you to make radical choices about your life.
Because you realize that none of it is what it seems. Everything about our lives is designed for one thing – to be the lessons that we need to learn to advance as a human being. Your specific life, that you are living, is designed so intricately and on such a grand scale that it is beyond comprehension. So have faith in where you are, and who you are, and make the most of this incredible opportunity to live in human form, and grow in awareness of your spirit. That is what life is about, and that is how you should see it.
Otherwise, you are wasting your time here on Earth.