My goal in teaching yoga is to help my students to live their yoga beyond their mats. Yes, yoga will make you stronger and more flexible. A regular practice will help you to heal the pains of your body. A regular practice can help you to overcome illness and recover from injury.
And, I firmly believe that yoga is more than just an aerobic practice. It is more than just exercise. Through yoga we learn to reach deeper into our true selves. We sweep away the fog from our awareness and find our own paths to strength and truth. We allow ourselves to soften so that we may ease our way into the fundamental strength of our core of true being.
If we allow ourselves to become more flexible upon our mats, then don’t we also find a way to be more flexible in our daily lives? If we allow ourselves to become stronger on our mats, then don’t’ we also then find more strength to live our daily lives? If in our practice we find we have more endurance, more will power, more self-awareness, then don’t those also walk with us beyond the studio?
- What is your dream?
- What are you willing to stand up for?
- What are you willing to sacrifice for?
- What is your truth?
- Where is your strength?
- Where can you be more flexible?
As you practice today, let these questions be at the forefront of your awareness. As you step onto your mat, ask yourself, why am I here? What is important to me? What truths do I hold to be self-evident. Where am I willing to apply my strength? Where am I willing to soften and be more flexible? What can I give to bring peace and healing, not just to my self but to my greater community.
As you practice today, reach out to the strength and vision of those who have come before us and shared with a vision of peace and community. Allow yourself to be inspired.
Shalom & Namaste,
Diana Bonyhadi
Issaquah, WA
Diana Bonyhadi Yoga 
These are three of my favorite MKL quotes that I would like to share:
“Cowardice asks the question, ‘Is it safe?’
Expediency asks the question, ‘Is it politic?’
Vanity asks the question, ‘Is it popular?’
But conscience asks the question, ‘Is it right?’
And there comes a point when one must take a position that is
neither safe, nor politic, nor popular,
but one must take it because one’s conscience tells one that
it is right.”
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
“We will have to repent in this generation not merely for the vitriolic words and actions of the bad people, but for the appalling silence of the good people.”
~ Martin Luther King, Jr.
“Never, never be afraid to do what’s right, especially if the well-being of a person or animal is at stake. Society’s punishments are small compared to the wounds we inflict on our soul when we look the other way.”
~ Martin Luther King, Jr
Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. day!
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Diane,
Thank you so much for these quotes. They are tremendous.
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great points about letting our practice spill over into our lives, and strength on the mat translating to strength in our lives. Indeed we should strive to make the transition from mat to life.
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