(audio version below)
It seems we have a new tradition in yoga. It sounds like this:
You don’t have enough certification to call yourself a yoga teacher.
How can you say you’re a yoga teacher when you drive that car?
You actually eat meat?
You can’t even do sirsasana.
By saying the word “headstand” instead of “sirsasana” you are dumbing yoga down.
Who is leading this new tradition of judgment within modern yoga? It’s often the voices in our own heads.
Judge Not
Modern yoga practitioners are making themselves ill with judgment. We judge ourselves for our body shape, flexibility, Sanskrit pronunciation, depth of knowledge, diet choices, and even clothing. And because these judgments are often unsaid, they have a ricochet effect that is deeply destructive.
Yoga is a spiritual tradition whose aim is to release us from our limited perceptions. So why is it that modern practitioners find themselves accepting more and more weight on what they should or should not do?
Breaking the Habit
I studied for four years under a teacher whose judgment of others was so clear that it shone a light on how prevalent this tradition had become inside my own mind. She huffed when a beginner student asked a beginner’s question. She gnashed her teeth when discussing other teachers whose opinions were different than hers. Her dark magic was saying the things out loud that most of her students thought.
Seeing this pulled me painfully in two directions. On one hand, these ancient teachings were bursting my heart open. But on the other hand, I was finding myself more and more critical of my actions.
I brought my dilemma to my longtime spiritual teacher, Santi Devi.
“There is no room for judgment in any spiritual practice,” she told me a hundred times.
Every time she said this, I knew which direction I needed to turn.
Discerning Action
The direction I chose was to peel back the self-judgment in modern yoga in order to find its wisdom (because every bad habit contains kernels of truth). What I found was discernment.
Viveka is the Sanskrit word for discernment, or the ability to know which option will enrich and which will deflate. In other words, it’s our ability to judge. Only with viveka, we are judging what is universally just, not what we think we should do.
Judgment in the negative sense is what happens when the ego gets in the way of viveka. That pesky fly spins our minds around to think that one person’s wise choice should be mine too. And while there are some universal actions that are dharmic — meaning those aligned with natural Truth — the gray permeates all spaces that seem to be black or white.
How to Stop Criticizing Yourself
Viveka gets us out of judgmental thoughts and words by moving judgment into its holy place. That holy place that I speak of is the cache of your deeply held values.
We only judge – in the negative sense – what we care about deeply. When we act in accordance with our values, viveka is at play.
The more we cultivate discernment — by uncovering what life is asking of us and slowly stepping toward that — the closer we are to what we want and farther from what we don’t want.
The issue is that we are very rarely taught that our negative thoughts and actions reflect our higher desires. Instead, we swim in a murky pool of what we don’t want and criticize ourselves for being dirty.
Case Study: Yoga and Meat
For example: I have been an on-again/off-again vegetarian since I was 12. I care deeply about animals and their welfare. I care deeply about the environment. In my adolescence I heard stories of the meat industry that made the choice clear to me.
But even as I was turning up my nose at family BBQs and eating PB&J every day for 15 years, I was constantly running into obstacles.
I descend from meat-eaters. My ancestors lived where meat saved lives when the grounds were frozen. Though I had the desire to be vegetarian, I had no training on how to cook a balanced vegetarian meal until fairly recently. Even with that knowledge, I became near anemic while pregnant and still struggle to maintain adequate iron levels. I began sneaking meat — my rock bottom was hiding in a playground with a fast food hamburger — and feeling terrible about not being able to cut it as a vegetarian.
I’ve only recently been able to unpack this. I know that I value the lives of all beings, which includes both animals raised for meat and my body’s need for meat. While these might seem at odds, my discernment has led me to a wise decision that unites both – I buy meat from ethical ranchers and butchers, supplement my mainly vegetarian diet when I need it, and say a prayer of gratitude for the life I am taking before my first bite.
It’s a beautiful expression of my values. And because I’m right with myself, I no longer judge or accept judgment when I eat meat.
Do Your Yoga
I’m going to borrow a quote from Dolly Parton and make it work for this discussion: Find the expression of yoga you are and do it on purpose.
If you love using Sanskrit in your practice, do it. Just remember that it takes a very long time to master a second language, especially one that few people speak with authority.
If you adore yoga workshops and advanced certification programs, take them. Just remember that the depth of your practice has no beginning nor end. Yoga existed long before Yoga Alliance mapped out certification levels.
And if a three-hour daily practice fills your heart, do it. Just remember that some mornings the best form of devotion is to turn off your alarm and rest.
Seeing your individual passion for your practice is what lights up everyone who is called to this path. And it will be what carries all of us into a deeper expression.
