Yoga on and off the mat - how to use the practice in everyday life

Every morning, at 8:30, I am downstairs, waiting impatiently for my neighbour, colleague and friend to drive me to our workplace. He is never on time. I try to read the news on my mobile, I watch impatiently at my watch, and even think I might call a cab.

Where does my frustration come from? My neighbour? The delay? 

 Let's look at the facts. My neighbour is a kind soul and a dear friend. He drives me to work every working day. We agreed to meet at 8.30am. I am a very punctual person and expect others to be the same. But let's face it: this has always caused me suffering. Because that is just my expectation and I know for a fact that it is rarely fulfilled in real life! The moment I will cease to have this kind of expectation, I will start my mornings without useless and illogical grudges. 

 Expectations are what we think others should do, or how we think things should go. They do not depend on facts and reality, but on personal perceptions and the storytelling we build to connect the dots in our mind. This is a normal process, it happens to everybody, it's unconscious and there is nothing wrong with it. 

It happens with our yoga practice, too. Our mind creates expectations, based on - let's say - how the teacher is demoing the pose or our idea of the "full expression" of the asana, the one we have seen on Instagram or some magazine. If we took a step away from that mental chattering, and look at the facts, we might be able to acknowledge that our body is not the teacher's body and we can't expect it to move like any other body. And we might even acknowledge that the full expression of an asana is just a chimera. Something that doesn't exist. Or that exist but in many different forms and shapes, as many as the forms and shapes of our bodies. Just acknowledging this simple fact might change the perspective of our practice, bring more fulfillment and joy to it. 

If you think this is a fantastic intuition, I must disappoint you. It is just what the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali says, while defining in not so many words the meaning and aim of Yoga. yogaś citta vṛtti nirodhaḥ means that Yoga aims at quieting the mental chatter, giving the practitioner a tool to stop analyzing, inventing, storytelling. 

In Yoga practice, we go back to the breath when our mind starts wandering. How about off the mat? We can go back to the breath, too. Especially if we get anxious or irritated. Three breaths is a good old trick to quiet any intense sensation or emotion. But also going back to the facts is a good way of making peace with our grudges. 

Let's go back to my neighbour. I say to myself: he is not respecting me by being late! This is not a fact. He is adorable and shows his good feelings for me in multiple ways, and my being attached to that only example of "disrespect" just shows that I have some unresolved material to work with. We will be late at work! The fact is that we are never late at work, even if we don't leave at 8.30. More than that, he does know that he is late and jokes about it because he is unable to make it at 8.30. How about me just acknowledging that his 8.30 reads 8.40 and just adapt to it? Just like I would adapt an asana to my practice. 

 Why being so attached to my 8.30? In Yoga, attachment is one of the five klesha or sufferings. They are the main cause of mysery for people: ignorance, egoism, attachment, aversion, fear of impermanence. And it's incredibly true. Each time I look at a situation in which I am feeling wronged or miserable, I can see that it has something to do with the klesha. I try to acknowledge it and re-start from there. Sometimes it helps, sometimes it doesn't. But it is all part of the process of living yoga on and off the mat.

How about you? Are you living your practice off the mat? Maybe you don't even realize it. Stop for one breath and think about it.