My Teacher would often ask me, ” What’s the rush? “. Then I thought, what does that mean? I didn’t understand what he was really saying. It took me months to figure out the lesson in the question. Impatience is himsa. My impatience with my asana practice was an act of cruelty toward my Self. I now understand. The mat is a mirror. A reflection of our progression on the path. If we are truly to progress we must sincerely want to look into the mirror. We must make a choice and select the act of ahimsa. We must then choose to be kind and gentle with ourselves. This act on the mat will overflow to our life off the mat, which is where yoga is really practiced.
There is just so much we can learn from the practice on the mat, to our lives on this earth. It is such a mistake to finish your practice and say, well that was nice, now let’s go keep on my life forgetting what jut happened. Every time I finish my practice, I think to myself, I want to live my life like this, in a flow, in the company of other good people, with a teacher, sweating and working hard, progressing all the time, and with the full dedication to the Lord. Thank you Yogamaiden for reminding me of this.