Stuck. Plateau. Bored. Disenchanted. I hear these terms a lot from experienced practitioners. The practice that once felt soul-stirring and life-changing has become ho-hum. It's feeling rote and routine. Not how it used to be. Not how you want or need it to be...

There are reasons for this. One is that modern yoga has not developed rites of passage for practitioners.

Because yoga is a process of deep transformation, the tradition evokes and even worships fire (as Agni). And… yoga is very clear that for transformation to settle into the fabric of your being, you'll need consistent practice over a long period of time (abhyasa).

With online classes, many of you have become much more consistent. The strategies and skill, the grace and guts, cultivates an inner awareness that will carry you through ups and downs, even trials by fire.

Years ago, we had a choice. To teach yoga as a discipline and spiritual practice. Or to make it more “come as you are, do what you can” like a gym exercise class. I think “come as you are, do what you can” felt like the right choice because people who love yoga - like you and me - want everyone to experience its magic.

Unfortunately, in the long run, this has stripped the practice of depth. The price of popularity has been diminishing education, spirituality, sustainability and accessibility.

The magic of yoga begins and ends with your breath. And the muscle of breathing is your respiratory diaphragm.

Sounds simple, right? But the respiratory diaphragm is an exquisite apparatus. Its impact on the body is immense. Its complexity and intricacy makes it hard to understand and explain.

Good news for us, Jill Miller of Yoga Tune-Up made several models (or dioramas) of the respiratory diaphragm. This is brilliant 8-minute video could transform your breathing and your practice.

As yogis, I believe we have a great responsibility, to fight for the greater good, yes, always, absolutely. AND to take up that fight with integrity. Which means maintaining connection to dharma and aligned motives.

You can’t change the world with your yoga practice but you can change yourself. And when you change yourself - how you behave and engage - that just might change the world.

Karma is like a big, tangled, cosmic ball of yarn. You practice yoga to develop awareness and make less of a mess. Maybe even clean up a bit. This is why you need aligned motives, skill in action, and DISCERNMENT. Discernment is the "crown jewel" of spiritual practice.

Yoga wants you to make the most of your free will. This is part of skill in action. Yoga embraces the inconvenient truth that difficult, undesirable things will happen. And because of this, yoga recommends that you train - body, mind, spirit, nervous system - to make the most of whatever comes your way.

Then… rather than reaching, grasping, struggling to control or manipulate the future… or putting your head in the sand, numbing out, or shutting down…. You are centered, steady and spacious with whatever is arising. This take tremendous courage, self-awareness, and clarity.

Even with all the convenience and comfort, there is tremendous suffering. As Gurumayi would say, “we are tortured and killed by things that aren’t even happening…”

Good news. The Gita gives you a way out. Krisna urges: Do your best. Plant your seed. Let it go and grow. Release expectation and the delusion of control. So simple! And outrageously difficult!

There are hundreds of ways, every day, that you go grasping for the fruit, the outcome, the desired results…  rather than focusing on the action. For example:

In the early days of yoga, most of us aren’t aware of our inner world. As your practice matures, your conversation with your inner world evolves and deepens. Hopefully, it also softens and sweetens.

But this is harder than it sounds because we are constantly being bombarded by media and marketing that’s preying on feelings of lack and not-enough, picking at fear and anxiety, poking at insecurities. So we need practice. And not just body practice, but mental-emotional-training practice.

My teacher Claudia often says, “this a chest-to-chest tradition”. You’re intended to be digging through it together. Because exploring yoga, especially applying the teachings to your personal life and experience, can feel like fumbling around in the dark. Yes, sometimes, there are flashes of light and revelation. But most days, it’s more like a dark forest, climbing a mountain, or navigating a raging river. It’s not impossible to do it alone, but it’s definitely harder, lonelier, and often longer.

I believe your practice is resilience training. It's teaching you to find your feet, connect with your center, and engage with integrity. But sometimes things get murky. There's that pesky forgetfulness. You may hit a wall. Encounter a dead end. And rather than collapse, quit, or torment yourself, gentle re-calibration is often the remedy.

sometimes you miss grace or fail to recognize revelation because you expect it to be big. To include fireworks and lightning bolts. But my encounters with grace have been quiet. Revelations come in unexpected and mundane moments. I did a quick recorded describing 3 moments of revelation. listen here:

When you approach yoga myths, metaphors, and teachings, it’s crucial to remember that the yoga tradition comes from a social, cultural and historical context very different from your own. Only when you unpack some of the context, can you truly grasp meaning. Understanding the fertile soil from which yoga grew, is one of the ways you honor its roots.

notice the the implied movement, the dynamism. This is not a buddha sitting serenely. Shiva's dreadlocks are streaming, he's in a ring of fire, he's standing on a single, bent, almost bouncing leg. There is wildness. Rawness. It speaks of unpredictable energy. He's telling you about the nature of reality.

Understanding how I was learning and growing gave me a bit of comfort and a lot of patience. It also gave me a better navigation system. When you know what to expect, you can embrace the process and enjoy the journey (even the awkward, ugly duckling phase) rather than race to the (perceived) destination.