Yoga writings - Yama #1 - Ahimsa (non-violence)

Hello readers, recently in the power yoga teacher training that I am honored to be assisting as coach, I was asked to speak on the yamas and niyamas, being that I feel most natural writing I thought I'd unravel more of my thoughts on the yamas and niyamas here in my little bloggy-blog.

The yamas are first on Patanjali's eight limbed path towards enlightenment. The yamas are the "do's", do practice these five and you will be walking towards a fuller expression of yourself, of unconditional love. Later, I'll get to the Niyamas, which are the 'don't 's", the avoids.

Yama number one, Ahimsa (non - violence)

Avoid causing harm to yourself, to other people, to all beings on the planet. Most obviously this includes physical harm, avoid what hurts. This can include picking at your skin, shoving another person, squishing bugs, plucking plants...etc. Notice the hesitation right before these acts, the recognition that I'm about to hurt myself or someone else, or something else. Trust that feeling, that inner knowing that what I'm about to do isn't right, and refrain. Walk away from the mirror, restrain your 'joking but I'm not joking' shove of your friend, take the bug outside where it belongs. We built our houses on their territory anyway.


Practicing ahimsa, non-violence, also refers to our thoughts, how we perceive ourselves and how we perceive others. Most likely how you see yourself, how you talk to yourself, is rooted in deep habit. Patterns we picked up very young and most of us don't love ourselves, we pretty much come to this planet to learn how to love. Reversing a habit begins with observing the existing habits. Look at yourself in the mirror, how do you think about yourself? I read an article recently where the writer would feel some skin on her belly and her immediate thought was 'gross'... can you relate to this? I can. Lets start noticing this negative self talk, notice the 'gross' and replace it with 'I love you'. Does that feel better? When we love ourselves, these bodies, we feel better and more good comes to us.


Notice how you judge another. When we judge another we're actually judging an aspect of ourselves that we are ashamed of. For example, I might observe someone with road rage (swearing, shaking fists, etc) and think 'woah they are nuts, get a hold of yourself', when really I am judging the part of myself that is just too scared to ever honk at someone on the road. Another example of projecting, I might judge someone for eating fast food and think 'how can they eat that stuff, that's not even food', when really I miss cheeseburgers and I have restricted a part of myself that wants to just eat a damn big mac. See what I mean? Start with non-personal situations, notice when you're judging strangers or tv shows, things that are far away and then get real "what part of me am I really judging here?" If you dare, try implementing this into your relationships, when you're annoyed with your partner, or with your parent, or whoever...and ask yourself, what is this really about? what is being mirrored to me right now? Judgement is an act of violence to the other and to ourselves, when we judge another we are actually judging ourselves, we're all connected.



In the yoga practice:


It is an act of violence to force the body into a posture it is just not ready for. Notice when you are straining to try and get into pose. To practice ahimsa in yoga be gentle, be loving, be with yourself where you are today and the body will be glad and naturally stretch and open on it's own time schedule. Unfortunately we are not walking, talking stretch armstrongs. Most people are not naturally super flexible, the magazine covers are not a good basis for reality. We have these human bodies made of bones, ligaments, fascia, muscle, it is a lot to try on new shapes and forms, be patient, it will come with time.

That's all for now, hope this was helpful, Yama number two Satya (Truthfulness) to come soon.