Meditation: Can Yoga Make You a Better Person?

Every now and then I find my at home yoga practice needs a little inspiration.

Most of the time I am content to practice a personalized version of Bikram's 26 postures with a few modifications and additions, but when I'm not I turn to Podcasts. My favorite right now is Elsie Escobar's Anusara Yoga Kula ("community"). I've actually been following her for about two years (?) and in that time her life has really changed. She got married, moved from L.A. to Pennsylvania, and had a baby. Somehow she maintained her connection to her kula and is back posting regularly. So yesterday I looked her up and did Episode 70: "Does your yoga make you a better person?".

The topic struck me as particularly pertinent, and now I realize that this past weekend on two separate occasions and with two very different people, I had the opportunity to discuss the relevance of spirituality. My Friday Friend and I tend to have talks about this often. It is something we consider regularly. She is a practicing Christian, and I have an appreciation for various aspects of most faiths. (Can that sound any more vague? What I mean to say is that I believe there is something guiding, shaping, and exploring this reality that is shared and quite powerful; that it is based in love and peace, stillness and respect. And frankly, I have a hard time trying to tie it all down to a few words.) So we sit sometimes to talk about what it is we believe to be true. She is curious because we tend to agree on many many things, but there are subtler aspects of terminology that sometimes make us pause and look more closely. Regardless of the finer points, we both agree that practicing spirituality is an important part of daily life.

My Saturday Sister is also a Christian. The nature of what we discussed was very similar. She simply commented on how attending service on Sunday set her entire family up for a much more pleasant week. Rather than being baffled by just how simple it was to set the mood for happiness and respect, we both simply recognized that again, spirituality is an important part of daily life.

Now here we come to the meat of the matter. Should it matter that I am not a Christian per say? Or that someone else is Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist, or Tao? Well, Mrs. Escobar began her class Monday on my mat by suggesting that as long as what you practice makes you shine brightly from a place of love, then truly, the more of that the better, brighter, shinier the world will be. That moving in ways that encourage you to open your heart, stand tall, and support yourself from within extends outward, bringing love, courage, and truth into the way you move through your day.

I think about how in school there were teachers that I learned from better than others, and that the same wasn't necessarily true for my friends. These experiences shaped who we became, who we are now. Spiritual teachers I imagine, are quite similar. There are some that will resonate more strongly for others than the one that resonates for us. But isn't it our collective responsibility as part of humanity to recognize what it is that makes us similar, what it is that ties us together, than focus so strongly on what it is that defines us as separate or distinct? Have we yet to learn that this isolation is not quite sustainable? Perhaps...

I'm reminded of something I learned in college about the I-Thou/I-It philosophy of Martin Buber. The part that made the strongest impact on me then still does today: it is the idea that man can come to see the boundaries between us not as walls, but as permiable screens enabling us to keep our unique shape but see through to the truth on the other side. When man exists in this condition of I-Thou, he is one with his creator, he walks with God. He is in unity. He is in a sustainable relationship with the universe. At least this is how I remember it. I would love to know your thoughts. Perhaps if you've read this far, you might consider jotting your initial impression below in the comment box...