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Everyday Yoga for Everyone

by Rebecca Novick

This is the fourth part of a series about an integral aspect of the system of yoga based on the works of the Indian sage Patanjali who lived 2,500 years ago. These are the five yamas and the five niymas. As a reminder, here they are ...

The five yamas:

Ahimsa (non-harming) Asteya (not taking what does not belong to you) Brahmacharya (sexual restraint) Satya (truthfulness) Aparigraha (non-clinging).

The five niyamas:

Saucha (cleanliness) Santosha (contentment) Tapas (self-discipline) Svadhyaya (self-inquiry) Isvara-pranidhana (ego-surrender)

Both the yamas and niyamas are related to our behaviour which, from a yogic perspective, includes verbal as well as mental behaviour along with physical actions. The yamas are related to how we behave towards others, whereas the niyimas are concerned with personal behaviour or attitudes. It is an interesting exercise to examine them in complementary pairs. Last month we looked at the yama brahmacharya (sexual restraint) and the niyama tapas (selfdiscipline). This month we’ll be looking at the yama satya together with the niyama svadhyaya.

Satya is generally translated as ‘truthfulness’ but it is much more than simply not lying, or as the texts put it, not saying what one knows to be false, which demands more considered reflection. Selfhonesty is essential to spiritual progress. If we deceive ourselves, either consciously or unconsciously, then it follows that we will deceive others. In addition, if we inform our lives with falsities, then we will remain trapped in patterns that keep us from developing. As we seek satya within ourselves we come to discover all kinds of belief-systems and ideas that are not actually our own but which we have inherited through conditioning. Since these conditioned views are set in layers of largely subconscious programming, even to access them requires a certain clarity and peace of mind that the yogis would develop through solitude and meditation.

Once identified (no small feat itself), our conditioned thought processes must then undergo unflinching self-reflection or selfinquiry - svadhyaya. It is during this process that the yogi sifts the wheat from the chaff, the sattvic from the un-sattvic - the false from the truth. Most of what we think and believe is second-hand; it is not something we have taken full responsibility for or considered with any depth, and much of it simply falls away under the light of rigorous self-inquiry. This process can be painful as we come to accept some difficult truths about ourselves and others, but the point is to learn, to plunge the deeper truth (with a capital T) - the Truth that sets us free from the bondage of our past and the expectations of the future, the truth of who we really are.

Respect yourself, explore yourself. Rebecca

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