Yoga for Life

What does asana practice actually prepare us for?

Unlike a stretching routine, which begins and ends with the body, asana practice in our tradition is preparation. It steadies the physical shell (ANNAMAYA KOSHA) so that the practices for the more subtle shells become possible.

This is why we do not treat the mat as the destination. The body is the doorway. What waits beyond it is the reason we walk through.

Raj

What is spirituality?

The word gets used loosely. Along the path of yoga, asana practice inevitably changes into something deeper, and many call that shift spiritual without ever defining what the word means.

Here is how we define it. The essence of yoga is a sense of merging the individual with the whole. Spirituality is the curiosity and the practice of how I, as an individual self, am equal to and share my individual self with all sentient beings, whether that is plants, animals, people I know and those I don’t.

Which means any path in pursuit of understanding the relationship between the individual and the whole is a spiritual path.

The full teaching lives in Yoga Philosophy Applied. Lecture 1 is our gift to you: https://www.yogaforlifepdx.com/begin

Be curious. Seek knowledge, practice and attain wisdom. 🙏

We study together.

A Sangha is not an audience. It is a community of curious souls seeking a deeper connection with Yoga, asking real questions, side by side, evolving together, since 2010.

Wherever in the world you practice, there is a seat for you here. 🙏

Study the whole system.

In ta***ic tradition and iconography, wisdom is depicted as a sword: it cuts through confusion cleanly, or not at all. Half-knowledge leaves the knot tied.

Yoga Philosophy Applied is the whole blade. Seven lectures, each between 2 and 3 hours, a complete semester of traditional wisdom, from the origins and lineages of yoga to the Yoga Sutras, Karma, Pranayama, and a playbook of happiness.

Lecture 1 is our gift to you: https://www.yogaforlifepdx.com/yoga-philosophy-applied/course-preview

Pursue your seeking. 🙏

In her words, not ours. 🙏

"I felt as if I was well-informed, but I still underestimated how much this training would affect and how much I would learn." , Erika Rae, Yoga practitioner and teacher

Depth surprises even the well-prepared. To every student who has gone deeper with us: thank you for trusting the path.

Some knowledge is studied. Some is remembered.

All week we have spoken about learning the system: the koshas, the lineage, the texts. All of it matters. All of it is the map.

But there is another kind of knowing that no book hands you. Patanjali calls this PRATIBHA, the inner knowing that arrives before the reasoning does.

It is not a replacement for study. It is what study makes room for. We learn the map carefully so that one day we can look up from it and recognize truth.

A question to sit with this weekend: what do I already know, that I have not been listening to?

We are our own healers. And, sometimes we can use some support.

, Kelly

What is pranayama, really?

Unlike breath work, which is an exercise for the lungs. PRANAYAMA is the movement of life force (PRANA), the energy that animates every layer of our being.

This is one of the most common misconceptions in modern yoga, and one we gently work to correct: the breath is the doorway, not the destination. Through the breath we reach what moves beneath it.

, Raj

One Self, seven shells.

In Sanskrit, KOSHA means sheath. The koshas can be imagined as layers, or lenses, of experience. In Hinduism, there are five: matter (ANNAMAYA), life force (PRANAMAYA), mind (MANOMAYA), intellect(VIJNANAMAYA), bliss (ANANDAMAYA); and Vajrayana Buddhism adds two additional layers: consciousness (CHITTAMAYA) and the complex of karmic motivations (ATMAMAYA).

Most modern yoga works with the first shell alone. Universal Yoga works toward strength, balance and unification across all of them to help overcome bias of any shell.

The full map is taught in Yoga Philosophy Applied. Lecture 1 is our gift: https://www.yogaforlifepdx.com/yoga-philosophy-applied/course-preview

Be curious. Seek knowledge, practice, and attain wisdom. 🙏

A community of curious souls seeking a deeper connection with Yoga. That is what Sangha means to us, and what these fifteen years have been.

Our role as teachers isn't to meet you where you are – but to show you where you're going.

Wherever in the world you practice, there is a seat for you here. Follow along, share this with someone who is seeking, and practice with us. 🙏