How do you know it’s working?

Even if we're yoga teachers, or seasoned students with years of practice under our belts, articulating the benefits of practice might not be something we’re accustomed to doing.

How is yoga serving you in your life right now?

What are the specific practices that you find most useful? Why?

When I completed my book I started speaking to small groups about how to deepen, expand, and integrate the benefits of yoga. I focused on questions like these so people could hone in on the exact ways yoga was serving them in their lives.

Very practical answers often came up, such as:

"A few minutes of  Alternate Nostril Breathing helps me to feel grounded and not nervous before a presentation at work."

"Putting my legs up the wall helps me calm down at the end of a stressful day."

"My daily 20-minute meditation is the cornerstone of my emotional well-being."

It's easy to get so caught up in the outer forms that yoga takes – both in our own communities and in the larger marketplace – that we lose the thread of what it’s really about for us.

The more specific you can be about how yoga changes your experience of life for the better, the more you come to value your practice. The more frequently you do this, the clearer and more concrete it gets. 

You come to see that the gifts of yoga aren’t only in the breakthrough moments, or in the peak experiences you might have again someday when you have more time.

You start to find yoga in the small gains, in the tiny glimpses of the transcendent, and in moments of quiet contentment.

You come to recognize yoga as a practice that’s supporting you, right here and now, in your actual life. You make yoga your own.