What is Yoga? It certainly is not being the bendiest person in the room!

The Yoga Sutra defines Yoga as an 8 part practice meant to help us settle the mind so we may know our true nature.

How does all that bendy stuff get us there? In the context of the whole practice. It’s not the bending but the alignment the postures provide that drives the benefit.

A healthy, well organized body creates a healthy, well organized psychology. And from there, the training of the mind to be our ally and vehicle for merging with the Divine begins.

But if Yoga is the settling of the mind into stillness, how do we do that? How do we go about seeing our true nature?

Patanjali’s 8-limbed path gives us a roadmap. It begins with a foundation of ethical practices to gather and concentrate our life force, prana.

Once established, we get physical to vivify and align our vehicle, then use it as a container for working with the breath, which directs and strengthens prana.

We then draw our senses away from outside distractions and begin to train the mind to remain fixed on a single point.

Once trained, the mind can become so utterly absorbed in the object on which it has concentrated as to become one with it. Once we learn to do this, we can go beyond consciousness to be in Union with the Source.