Cultivate Your Connections

Bring classical yoga's lessons off the mat and meditation cushion and into your relationships.

By Judith Lasater

To me, his words capture the essence of saucha: the intention to act from compassion rather than selfishness. When I treat others with compassion, I am practicing saucha, and at those times my relationships are as pure and connected as they can ever be.

Santosa (Contentment)

By including contentment as an active practice rather than a reaction to events around us, Patanjali points out that peace of mind can never finally rely on external circumstances, which are always changing in ways beyond our control. Santosa requires our willingness to enjoy exactly what each day brings, to be happy with whatever we have, whether that is a lot or a little. This second niyama uncovers the hollowness of achievement and acquisition; while material wealth and success aren't evil, they can never in themselves provide contentment.

We can easily practice santosa in the beautiful moments and joyous experiences of our lives. But Patanjali asks us to be equally willing to embrace the difficult moments. Only when we can be content in the midst of difficulty can we be truly free. Only when we can remain open in the midst of pain do we understand what true openness is. In our relationships, when we accept those around us as they truly are, not as we want them to be, we are practicing santosa.

Tapas (Austerity)

Tapas is one of the most powerful concepts in the Yoga Sutra. The word "tapas" comes from the Sanskrit verb "tap" which means "to burn." The traditional interpretation of tapas is "fiery discipline," the fiercely focused, constant, intense commitment necessary to burn off the impediments that keep us from being in the true state of yoga (union with the universe).

Unfortunately, many people mistakenly equate discipline in yoga practice with difficulty. They see another student striving to perfect the most difficult poses and assume she must be more disciplined and therefore more spiritually advanced.

But difficulty does not in itself make a practice transformational. It's true that good things are sometimes difficult, but not all difficult things are automatically good. In fact, difficulty can create its own impediments. The ego is drawn to battle with difficulty: Mastering a challenging yoga pose, for example, can bring pride and an egoistic attachment to being an "advanced" yoga student.

A better way to understand tapas is to think of it as consistency in striving toward your goals: getting on the yoga mat every day, sitting on the meditation cushion every day—or forgiving your mate or your child for the 10,000th time. If you think of tapas in this vein, it becomes a more subtle but more constant practice, a practice concerned with the quality of life and relationships rather than focused on whether you can grit your teeth through another few seconds in a difficult asana.

Svadhyaya (Study of the Self)

In a way, the fourth niyama could be considered a hologram, a microcosm containing the whole of yoga. One day this winter in a beginner class a first-time student asked, "By the way, what is yoga?" A thousand thoughts flooded my mind; how could I answer truthfully and succinctly? Fortunately, an answer came spontaneously from my heart: "Yoga is the study of the Self."

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