Question

I completely agree that yoga isn’t all about the poses, it’s about feeling and connecting. That’s something I love about Strala. But we’re still doing poses, right? How can I explain this to my yoga friends?

Answer

Something funny happens in yoga. Well actually, let’s be honest, a lot of funny things happen in yoga. When you get a lot of people bending and stretching and acting very serious about it all, there is a lot of material there. Most of the kidding aside . . .

Often people start practicing yoga because they want to feel better, be less stressed, more connected with themselves, healthier, stronger. Then they fall into the trap of really desperately needing to nail a pose.

How we see yoga in the world today is in pictures of poses. Although a nice way to inspire and invite people into the practice of yoga, pictures of extreme contortion-like shapes can be super intimidating. They can turn people away from practicing because they think they can’t do the pose or just plain aren’t interested. They can also sway people to really-really-really-really-really having to do that pose.

There is nothing terribly wrong with attempting fun yoga poses and even being interested in working up to be able to do a crazy pose like a handstand. But don’t fall into the trap of chasing the poses. They are just poses. You might get a feeling of accomplishment if you do nail a pose, but it’s temporary. Soon you’ll start chasing the next pose. It doesn’t do much for your life. They’re just poses. The yoga is in feeling your way into you, and the poses are simply something to do. Now here is the kicker.

You can practice putting yourself into poses for years, and you’ll probably be able to do some of the poses after a while. You can also practice feeling your way into you, and you’ll have achieved something much greater than yoga poses. You’ll have found a path into following your intuition and cultivating a strong, radiant healthy body and calm focused mind.

I’ve got one more surprise for you that you’ll like. With the feeling approach, you’ll also be able to do a lot more poses than the posing approach. With the feeling approach you’ll never get injured or feel tense while practicing. With the feeling approach you’ll be able to accomplish hard things easily.

Let’s start feeling!

xo Tara

About Strala Yoga Training

Strala combines the movement and healing wisdom of tai chi with the form vocabularies of yoga, tai chi, qigong, and Traditional Chinese and Japanese Medicine, to help people release stress, move easily through challenge, and live radiantly inspiring lives.

It begins with a mindset, that says our best way to get where we’re going is to feel good along the way. It also works miracles for whole health, helping us to find ease in our bodies and minds, and create the right conditions both for healing and optimal performance.

In our Strala Training Courses, you learn to shape your destiny on every level that counts, from your psychology, chemistry and neurology, to your chromosomes and even gene expression. The unique set of skills you develop – for connecting with yourself and others, unblocking your energy, healing what needs healing and accomplishing challenge with ease – uncovers your ability to create the life you want, and be an inspiring leader to the people around you.

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