The Fate of the Unsuccessful Yogi
I found this video and I think it’s hilarious. I also see my arms winging out too wide and low as I fold. And I wonder if my practice is any better or more successful than it was 9 years ago?
Click here to watch on IG with audio
The Fate of the Unsuccessful Yogi
That was the focus for this week and will be all month, and it brought up, as usual, way more questions than answers.
Questions like
Who is a yogi?
Are we only meant to understand unsuccess by believing in success?
What is the measure of success in yoga, in life?
What constitutes a successful life?
Are there moments where success is not occurring a moments when success is occuring? How does that affect the journey of yoga?
Does success only happen when we attach our consciousness to it as a phenomenon or can it occur without our comprehension of it as in noumenon?
What happens when one does achieve the goal/becomes a successful yogi?
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Pranayama and Mantra workshops
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I’ll try not to give you swirly brain.
The Thoughts
Scripture guides us towards thinking that eventual success can occur when practicing yoga with abhyasa and vairagya, regular consistent faithful devotion/practice and a mindset of detachment.
However, that eventual success is mahasamadhi and when that occurs we no longer exist in this life. and moksha is achieved/possbile. Our souls evolve and move out of the cycle of karma-birth-life-death.
When that occurs are we present to it? How could we be as we are transitioning, so present in what way as it can’t be in this form, in this body, so then does it matter at all?
We are also offered that simply being on this path in this life, indicates our evolution from previous lifetimes to get to this point. You are studying because you have studied before and you are simply returning to an existing practice, you are simply returning to what is known, possibly even what feels like home.
So what then is success to a yogi? Where a yogi is considered as a teacher, a student, a meditator. One who is devoted to either a path of karma yoga, janna yoga, or bhakti yoga.
Social Intersections
And finally if we are trying to achieve success in a singular pointed way, are we even truly practicing yoga? When we move forward with a single goal in mind and a singular vision of ourselves in that goal, we are exclusionary to all else that occurs to and around us. In living a life with such a narrowly focused lens we will cause more harm than if we were to take stock of all around us and move forward with measured steps, in consideration of how our mere existence can do harm to others (via caste, color, social status, the list of privileges is long).
This particular path forward is anti-yoga as is it full of himsa.
For me, success isn’t how my physical form shows up in space. Winging arms or not, my success is in the here and now and the confirmation of the lifetimes of practice I’ve experienced and innumerable lifetimes to come.
I leave the question for you, at what point would you say one is a successful yogi?
Looking forward to your reply (or anonymous shares here)!
You’re welcome to be part of the discussion and contemplation in practice. Join us as we move through these ponderings in this month’s slow poses and philosophy practices! Every Wednesday!
Warmly,
Tejal
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