The first line of the yoga sutras, the first text in which the principals of yoga were written down from the oral history, is "Now, the exposition of yoga". In Sanskrit Atha Yoga Anusasanam. The word Atha translates to now is the time for auspicious beginnings, but in English we don't have an equivalent word.
Let me back track here for a second. I started today a group where we are slowly digesting over a year the yoga sutras and how we can look at them in our western modern day lives. Today's word was atha. Now. The literal way of looking at this line would be to imagine a teacher getting the attention of their class and gaining their focus. But on deeper levels there is so much more to "now".
One text I read suggested that now is your preparation to start something new with your full effort, prompting to think of a time your "failed" by not committing fully to a new project, or something new you were trying to learn. My response to this was that the times I have started something new that was for in alignment with my path and where I needed to go/be it always felt easy. The things that I "failed" at or dropped/ never completed I usually was doing because I felt it was I "should" be doing. The idea of it being a failure is erroneous. There are NO failures. The feelings of overwhelm, fear, and wanting to stop were signs that it was not the right choice for me. Not some sort to flaw in my effort.
Then as I went for a walk today I was thinking about this more. The work we do in yoga in examining our own lives and patterns takes place in the present moment. It is only our reaction and behaviour in the moment that we have control over. We can't change the past and the future isn't here yet. So literally NOW is the time for yoga. What followed was that this is an invitation to begin again in each moment. We are always able the choose again. We can apologize for mistakes we might have made, right our wrongs, and choose differently in each moment. The way we did things in the past does not have to be the way we do them NOW. In this moment you may choose the auspicious beginning.
Often during the physical practice we focus on our breath when things are challenging. When my anxiety is bad I bring my attention to my inhales and exhales, and quiet the chatter in my mind. Each breath is a new beginning. Yoga is the invitation to choose in the present moment what our reaction and behaviour is. You don't have to do something just because you've always done it that way. NOW you have a choice. When you are present in the moment, and not in the past or future you can try and make the choice to be the best you. And if it doesn't work, if it doesn't go the way you needed, the next breath is another auspicious beginning where you can choose again.
Yoga invites us to be here now, and the most glorious thing is that you can choose again and again until your choices are moving towards the best version of who you are. Each of us has that spark of the divine inside of us, and it is our job to quiet our minds and the world to hear it and choose the actions, thoughts, words and deeds that are most in line with that version of ourselves.
And you can start NOW.
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