You Are Unique

Welcome. Today I'm going to share with you how you can adapt your yoga practice to be most beneficial to you. And this is through the understanding that each and every single one of us is unique. We know two people are made exactly the same. Our bodies are completely unique. They're different sizes. We may be different ages. We may be experiencing an injury or an illness. Our bodies are constantly changing. And yoga is meant to find ways to begin to adapt our practice to be able to suit our particular needs and to really begin to honor and celebrate our unique nature. So often I hear the question when I talk about yoga or to somebody who's brand new or has never practiced. The first thing I hear out of their mouths, I'm too inflexible. I'm so stiff or I'm so this perfect. So that I can't do yoga or I can't meditate. My mind is too wild. And of course my response is that's exactly why you should do yoga. Yoga is meant to really be able to address our own particular needs. So perhaps we're stiffer in one particular area. There are poses that are going to benefit us in that area. But we may have another set of qualities that we have enough of so we would do less of those. So not only are our bodies completely unique and different at different ages, different times of our life, when we're younger, when we're older, depending again on injuries. But each of us has unique personalities and different mental states. So our practice as well goes to be able to honor our particular nature and to be able to see how we can bring ourselves back into a state of balance. So certain poses are meant to be more calming. Certain poses are meant to be more energizing. There are poses that are really grounding and each of them has their own particular medicinal properties. So when we can begin to use them in this way goes to support who we are. So sometimes we can even again feel like we can't do yoga for one reason or another. And this shouldn't, whatever it is that we have, our imbalance or whatever, shouldn't mean that we should limit our practice, but just adapt our practice to better serve those particular unique needs. Okay, so what I really want to share with you is by taking a couple moments and taking a personal inventory on how you feel. You can begin to see how you can adapt your practice. For instance, if you're feeling sluggish or very tired one day, you would want to do a more energizing practice. We want to be able to move around a little bit and this will begin to energize, stoke the digestive fire. There's so many different qualities and benefits to the practice. If you're feeling stressed that day or overworked, you want to do a more calming practice. In this way, it becomes therapeutic and something that's less just automatic like we do every day and it becomes more conscious. And yoga really calls on us to take personal responsibility for our own well-being. So most of the yoga practices come out of the umbrella of the science of life or what's called Ayurveda. Ayurvedic wisdom is one of the ancient yogic tools, really stemming from the same book of wisdom or Vedas. Ayur means life and Vedas is science or wisdom. It's a way of looking at life and looking at ourselves to be able to really discover our own physical and mental tendencies.

So it's based on the philosophy that everything is made up of the same five elements. We're all made up of the elements of earth, water, fire, air, and ether. Some of us have more of a particular element and some of us have less. And this is what creates what's called our personal constitution or in Sanskrit, dosa. So dosa is what begins to characterize our particular physical and mental, emotional constitutions depending on our elemental makeup. And everything in the universe is made up of these particular qualities or even called gunas, the forces of nature that are made up of in greater or lesser degrees of the same element. So every herb has these particular elements. But it will have a little bit more of air. Some of them have a little bit more of water. And this is how it becomes a science of healing that whatever it is we take in has the power to be a healing medicine, whether it's food and in this case asana. Since we're using each pose to begin to honor its qualities to bring ourselves into a state of balance. So the three main doshas are called vata, which is a combination of air and ether. It's responsible for all the movement in our bodies. A lot of us have a lot of vata. So that's a lot of the thinking process that we have. It can be highly creative and intuitive and energetic because it's all about movement. And it can also lead to a lot of anxiety and a lot of stress and a lot of fear. So this particular element is prevalent probably mostly in our society right now. The other one is called pita, which is a combination of the elements of fire and water. So people who have more pita tendencies tend to be a little bit more fiery and energetic. It's very direct action, focused, concentrated, disciplined, outgoing energy. And it can also, when it goes out of balance or if there's too much pita in a person or in a time of day or in anything in nature, it does begin to burn. So that's when it can become overly aggressive.

Physical tendencies are things like heartburn and stomach ulcers and rashes. So we want to begin to cool that energy down, of course, when there's too much. And then the last one, kappa, is a mixture of earth and water. So that's stable and it's beautiful and it's fertile energy. People who have a lot of this energy are naturally calm and grounded and loving and nurturing. But if there's too much of this quality, it tends to be, can tend to get a little bit sluggish and the experience of inertia. So the basic philosophy is that like increases like. So we're called on doing the opposite, which is going to feel really opposite because generally we're drawn towards what we're most like, which will set us even more out of balance. So we know something sets us out of balance, but we are naturally drawn towards it. So doing the opposite at first feels like the wrong thing, but ultimately it's for our own good and creates the true health and balance that we look for. So the times of day are also ruled by these dosas or these qualities so that they all have their particular, very powerful reason of existence. So for instance, kappa predominates at night. It's when we're meant to sleep, why we want to be able to sleep at night and then not in the morning. But the morning hours are more ruled by vata. So that's where we want to be more energetic. And then the afternoon is when the sun is at its height. So that's when the digestive fire is at its height. That's when we should eat our biggest meal of the day because the fire is at its height. So when we begin to regulate our lives and really adapt our lives to the forces of nature as well as our own nature is when we come into the most balanced state of health and wholeness. So the practices that I outline in this season are based on morning, afternoon and evening practices. The morning practices tend to be more energetic because the kappa hours are around six to nine. That's when we wake up. Sometimes we need a cup of coffee. So it's really suggested that we wake up before six when it's a time of vata. That's when there's natural energy and inspiration. But if you don't, that's okay. But your practice will be, if it's after six, you'll need to have it be a little bit more energizing to wake up. So the morning practices are energetic. The afternoon practices, again, are characterized as being balancing. So we want to begin to bring our energy back into balance. We could get depleted. We can get over fiery or over energetic. So coming back into a state of balance is what's most needed. Like eating a nourishing meal will kind of set us back on track. And then the evening practices are characterized as calming and grounding. This is when the vata dosha is most prevalent before ten o'clock. So your call to go to sleep before ten. If you go to sleep after ten, it's harder to get to sleep. But you can do these practices again any time of day. So if you need a more calming practice in the morning, if you have a very stressful day ahead of you, or you're experiencing more anxiety, or your health is suffering that day, then you are going to want to do a more calming and soothing and grounding practice. And the same thing goes for the evening. If you have a busy evening planned or you're going out to an evening event, you don't want to fall asleep. You want to do something that's going to energize you. Again, based on this notion of like increases like and doing the opposite of what we need. So really begin to tap in. This is the greatest practice of participating in your own life and in your yoga practice. And in that way, you're going to want to return to it again and again and really reap your practices full benefit on every level. So I hope you enjoy the practices that I've outlined in this season for you. And I wish you all the health and well-being that yoga offers. Namaste.