A Yoga Therapy Refresh
How often to update your Yoga Therapy Practice? It's probably time.
Some people practice the same practice for their whole life: we don't. As you step into Yoga Therapy, we see you frequently. The ideally frequency is six times over a two month period, ensuring you are doing the practice properly, the practice is comfortable and it's working. Thereafter, we taper off to biweekly, then monthly. For most of our regular Yoga Therapy students, it's four times annually, once a season, because each season brings its unique characteristics and needs for each practitioner. For some, twice a year. Please email with any questions regarding this life-affirming practice and where you are on the annual curve.
The one Yoga Sutra aphorism that is chronically misinterpreted to back this up, to the detriment of practitioners worldwide, is YS I. 13: Tatra sthitau yatnaḥ abhyāsaḥ. To many who look upon this, it means stay steady in the same practice, lifelong. Another way to say this is to do the same practice for your whole life. While we may do some things similarly lifelong, most of our daily habits change as we grow from children to adults to elders. How we dress, what we eat, how we talk, move, interpret, our partners, our jobs, our cars. Why would we keep to the same practice as time goes by? We musn’t. Adapting practice to suit our needs is how Yoga supports transformation. As we are changing, practice must change, too.
It took me a few years to transition from Ashtanga Yoga to the Yoga of Krishnamacharya. Once I was over the hump, I was evaluated in order to train teachers in the Yoga of Krishnamacharya. My evaluation question from Sir, TKV Desikachar, who had a solid view on my tendencies, was, “Should you practice the same Yoga practice for your whole life?” I knew he was talking to me. And I knew he trusted me, he knew my students trusted me, and in order to facilitate the best outcome for us all, I dug into the sutra-s for my answer.
Tatra sthitau yatnaḥ abhyāsa translates more relevantly as “the effort required to stay in the goal is practice.” Once we have been consistent with our appropriate practice, it will yield results. These results aren’t permanent, so we’ll have to adapt practice to our new level or state in order for it to function well as a transformative measure. From a multidimensional perspective, our physical and physiological parameters will be altered, as will our mental and cognitive functioning, breath, nervous system, behavioral patterns and emotions. With tools to intervene in all systems, we adapt to foster further progress and/or to address new symptoms and life circumstances that inevitably arise.