7 Tips for Mastering a Yoga Pose by Teaching It to a Newbie

by Baxter

Photo by Melina Meza

So you want to master some of your beginning level yoga poses? Trying to teach someone else how to do one of your favorites might be just the ticket! That's because I believe a big factor in learning a pose is that the “teacher” becomes very clear on what the steps are in doing the pose that they have been following in their own minds from what they themselves had been taught. These inner instructions that have been gleaned sometimes over years of study —often from multiple teachers—may initially seem automatic. But when you have to demonstrate or verbalize what it takes to do a pose to someone else, you become more conscious of the details and complexities of the pose, which leads to a greater sense of mastery. 

So here’s a list of tips to help you learn to teach a yoga pose to a beginner, whether that is in an official private lesson or just some friend or family member you’ve convinced/coerced into helping you by being your “student.”

Before trying to teach the pose to someone else, guide yourself into the pose and out, noticing what your “inner” teacher is telling you to do and how things are feeling inside. This will help you begin to get clear on the essential things you already know about your pose.

Tips for Teaching a Yoga Pose to a Newbie

1. Set your mats up parallel to one another. Ask your student to mirror what you do as precisely as they can, as you demonstrate the pose. Think of this as an adult version of Monkey See, Monkey Do! (Mirroring does require that, for asymmetrical poses, you do the left side while they do the right and right side while they do the left.)
2. As you get a sense of how well your student is copying you, can you use one hand to point out on your body an area that the student may not be noticing and exaggerate the position or movement they still need to find.
3. Don’t keep your student too long in any pose—newbies tire quickly! Instead, repeat the pose for short intervals several times.
4. Think about the top-three key actions or movements that you have learned to do in the pose and verbally share those with the student while you mirror it. Repeat the words several times, as sometimes it will take a while for the info to settle in.
5. Try entering and exiting from your pose using your breath, without hanging out in the pose. For example, with Triangle pose (Trikonasana), bring your arms up to parallel with the floor as you inhale, tip into the pose on your exhale, inhale back up to arms out to sides, and lower your arms to your sides on the exhale. This is a great way to warm your student up for the pose and bring them into greater connection to their breathing!
6. Some people are more tactile learners, so if your student gives you permission, you might use touch to gently guide the person deeper into the pose you are sharing with them. Or use a prop to assist you, such as a strap around the upper thighs in Downward-Facing Dog pose to pull the thighbones away from the hands, which will teach them to lengthen the spine.
7. Since mastering a yoga pose is as much about the internal “feeling experience” as it is the external alignment, you might describe to your student what internal sensations you are feeling in different areas of your body, and then ask them to notice and describe what they are feeling to you. It might be completely different because, of course, no two people are exactly the same—that is okay!

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Trauma Resurfacing in the Body, Part 3

by Nina

Meditating Together by Melina Meza

Three years ago when Baxter, Brad, and I started this blog, I was hoping that it would not only be a place where we could share some of our own knowledge about yoga, aging, and yoga for healthy aging, but that we would be able to engage in some interesting discussions with our readers as well. After all, we all have so much to learn from each other. In a way, perhaps because many of readers weren’t that comfortable using the comments section—or perhaps we just didn’t have enough readers in the early days—that “discussion” part of our blog never really took off. However, I’m very pleased that recently we have been getting some really interesting comments (see Friday Q&A: Trauma Resurfacing, Crying in Class, Part 2 ) and that some very stimulating exchanges have been taking place. And one particular topic, trauma resurfacing in the body, has triggered a lot of interesting discussion. Just the other day a reader wrote to me privately with some very interesting comments and suggestions related to the two posts Friday Q&A: Trauma Resurfacing, Crying in Class and Friday Q&A: Trauma Resurfacing, Crying in Class, Part 2. I found the comments so important, that I asked the reader for (and received) permission to post the email on our blog. So today, our main post will be written by this reader, who prefers to remain anonymous. (All of you should know that if you write to me privately or leave an anonymous comment, I will do everything possible to protect your anonymity if that is what you prefer.)

After this reader’s comments, I will provide an additional note from myself to clarify something that I believe the reader misunderstood. We corresponded about this misunderstanding and the reader also approved the content of my note. I’m only including the note because I believe that this clarification would be helpful for all our readers.

Email from Our Reader 

First, thanks to you and Baxter for addressing these concerns so thoroughly and providing resources. Having seasoned teachers like you take this seriously is very meaningful and reassuring.

I have only one qualm with what the two of you pulled together. I think you may run the risk of over-pathologizing emotional issues. They are really no different from physical ones, especially if they begin in the physical. Here is what I think is appropriate, from a student’s perspective (which I know is different than yours and you are free to disagree with me):

1. First, we all acknowledge yoga can kick up difficult emotions for people. So ideally teachers should get a tiny bit of training in this area. For example, Mental Health First Aid is a program that gives people tools to be helpful, while also setting boundaries. The training is not intensive and is designed for non-professionals. The result for yoga teachers would be something close to an intervention in class like Baxter described. But an explicit focus as part of teacher training would offer new teachers some scientifically grounded information, a couple concrete tools, and would de-stigmatize the emotional aspects of the practice—which is very empowering for both teachers and students.  

2. Second, if a student approaches you after class, here is what would have helped me (I am lucky to have gotten some of this). Please recall I was a beginning student at the time. More seasoned students might not need this. 

3. A bit of sympathy and an acknowledgement that it took courage to trust you with this information (the amount of shame associated with certain kinds of trauma cannot be overstated). 

4. Validation that, yes, yoga can surface strong emotions and memories. The student is not crazy. This happens, a lot and for different reasons.   

5. Empowerment —Reiterate that :  

• the student is welcome in your class 
• class is a safe place
• the student can retreat to child's pose (or whatever helps) whenever he or she likes during future classes 
• as the student learns his or her triggers (which can take time), the student should feel free to modify or ask for help with modifications from you. For me, I learned it was using a strap in bridge and other poses that was triggering me. So it was no straps for a long time.

6. Offer more resources if the student asks or you think they would be helpful. It is preferred that these recommendations are specific, not 'find a therapist,' but 'this is the name of a yoga teacher who specializes in things like this.'

In reflecting on this aspect of my yoga practice, it occurs to me that we spend a lot of time talking about our edges in class. And for me—after a lot of confusion and ups and downs—these memories simply turn out to be an unconventional kind of edge. Holding it in that space has allowed yoga to do its good work. And I am profoundly grateful for that.

Thanks again for all your thoughtful responses and for being willing to dig deeper into this topic.

Note from Nina

So many of those suggestions are excellent, don’t you think? And I love what the reader said about how the memories “simply turn out to be an unconventional kind of edge” and that “Holding it in that space has allowed yoga to do its good work.”

I would say, however, that I don't feel Baxter and I “over-pathologized” emotions that arise during yoga. What we meant was a person could be crying for ANY reason. For example, though some kind of trauma could be resurfacing, crying could also be the result of something more mundane, such as the person broke up with their lover, their cat is sick, the teacher read a poem that was so beautiful it brought tears to their eyes, or even they just feel relieved to be at yoga class after a stressful day—whatever. That's why the teacher shouldn't make assumptions about the reason for crying and try to comfort the person with words (which would also disturb the class in general and draw attention to the person in question). And, of course, if the student approaches the teacher before or after or before class to explain why there will be (or was) crying, it is completely appropriate to express sympathy and compassion in general, and for the teacher to reassure the student that it is not uncommon and that the class is a safe space. And if the student’s situation is serious, such as depression, anxiety, trauma resurfacing, and so on, it might be kinder to ask gently, “Are you seeing a professional about this?” because if the answer is yes, then you could just let them know this is a good idea and that yoga can be an excellent supplement to therapy. And if the answer is no, you could gently suggest, “Perhaps you should consider doing so. If you like, I can find some recommendations for you.”

I would also like to say that I hope this blog is a safe space where we can respectfully discuss controversial topics. So speak up, everyone! You can do this either in the comments section of our blog (see How to Comment) or on our Facebook page.  I moderate all the comments but I always publish anything legitimate, even if the reader disagrees with our postings. The only comments that I delete are those I believe to be spam. And you can always write any of us privately via the Contact Us page. 

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Multiple Sclerosis (MS) and Yoga: New Study Results!

by Baxter

Eric Small, Iyengar Yoga Teacher*

One of the four pillars of our Yoga for Healthy Aging program is focused on improving balance and we have many past posts  about how yoga can be beneficial in fostering better balance. I have also written previously about one particular health condition that can dramatically affect a person’s balance, Multiple Sclerosis (MS). I dedicated a Friday Q&A to it a while back and would highly recommend you review that post Friday Q&A: Multiple Sclerosis.

It turns out that most of the experience of applying yoga to MS symptoms has not been organized into formal scientific studies. Therefore, we call this kind of evidence “anecdotal.” An example of anecdotal evidence is the story of Eric Small’s personal results with yoga and MS that I wrote about in my post Friday Q&A: Multiple Sclerosis. The fact that so far there has only been anecdotal evidence does not mean that students with MS have not noted improvements in different aspects of their illness when regularly practicing yoga, but until now no one had done a focused study on MS. Now I’m happy to let you know that a study sponsored by Rutgers University has just recently been completed that demonstrated improved symptoms for MS patients who participated in a yoga program for eight weeks. And although the published version of this study is not presently available, an early press release shares some of the findings (see Yoga Relieves Multiple Sclerosis Symptoms).

Interestingly, the study will be formally presented at the upcoming Conference on Yoga Research in Boston in two weeks! The authors note that MS “can cause poor coordination, loss of balance, slurred speech, tremors, numbness, extreme fatigue and problems with memory and concentration.” The exciting findings of the study are that after eight weeks of participating in the study, “those who participated were better able to walk for short distances [for] longer periods of time, had better balance while reaching backwards, fine motor coordination, and were better able to go from sitting to standing. Their quality of life also improved in perceived mental health, concentration, bladder control, walking, and vision, with a decrease in pain and fatigue.”And what exactly did the study participants—all women—do? 

“For 90 minutes, twice a week for two months, they practiced techniques and exercises that would improve their posture, help to increase stamina, and teach them how to relax and focus.”

And because the women had different symptoms and severity of challenges, the practices were modified to address these differences. 

“The yoga practices were done by the women in the study sitting, standing, or lying on yoga mats, and using metal folding chairs situated close to the wall to provide them with more support.” 

I am so pleased to know that the researchers addressed that yoga is not a one-size-fits-all approach to addressing balance or any of the other issues that MS patients deal with. And one of the study participants interviewed felt that the group dynamics and camaraderie also seemed to be a positive factor for her. This is a sentiment I hear from my regular students as being a powerful motivator for sticking with their yoga practice.

The downside to the new study is that it only enrolled 15 students (bigger numbers allows for stronger and more confident conclusions), they were all women (although MS affects women three to four times more often than men, it would be helpful to have had a few men included), there was not control group (MS patients who were given standard mainstream treatments but no yoga) to compare with, and there was no long-term follow-up. 

However, like most yoga studies that are done these days, this one was called a “pilot study,” so the findings are encouraging. But this pilot study really needs to be followed up with study of a much larger group of MS patients to give us those more meaningful conclusions. The authors hope that such a large future study would allow them to be able to prescribe yoga for MS patients with moderate disability. In any case, this study is step in the right direction! 

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The Fourth Branch of Yoga: Pranayama (Toning down Agitation through Breath Practice)

by Ram

Irises in Monet's Garden by Claude Monet

In the Sadhana Pada of the Yoga Sutras by Patanjali we are introduced to the concept of Ashtanga Yoga (Ashta=eight; Anga=limbs), which refers to the eight-fold path/eight rungs/limbs/steps of yoga as described in the Raja Yoga section of the yoga philosophy. Its practice helps us to discriminate between ignorance and awareness and truth from illusion, which is the means for liberation or enlightenment. The first three limbs namely Yama, Niyama, and Asana, which I discussed in earlier posts help to prepare the body and mind for regulating the breath and achieving stillness.

The fourth limb in the Ashtanga series is Pranayama: Prana =life force, breath, wind, air, respiration, vital energy, and ayama = extend, stretch, draw out, regulate. Pranayama, a formal practice of regulating the breath, consists of techniques designed to gain mastery over the respiratory process while building a connection between the breath, the mind, and the intellect. The technique refers to a particular system of breath control involving three processes namely: puraka (inhalation), kumbhaka (retention), and rechaka (exhalation). When these three processes are balanced, there is union of the body and mind.

According to the Yoga Sutras, the practices of pranayama and asana are considered to be the highest form of purification and self-discipline for the mind and the body, respectively. Pranayama serves as the gateway to meditation and higher yogic practices, and the practice produces the actual physical sensation of heat, called tapas, or the inner fire of purification. It is believed that this heat is part of the process of purifying the nadis, the subtle nerve channels of the body. This allows a more healthful state to be experienced and allows the mind to become calm. As the yogi follows the proper rhythmic patterns of slow deep breathing, the patterns strengthen the respiratory system, soothe the nervous system, and reduce craving. As desires and cravings diminish, the mind is set free and becomes a fit vehicle for concentration. Thus, any individual who has a regular practice of pranayama is able remove the impurities of the body, the senses, and the mind through the power of breath regulation.

Pranayama not only pacifies and revitalizes a tired body, but it also calms, rejuvenates, and uplifts the mind, leading the individual into deeper state of meditation. There are several different forms of pranayama, however, several teachers caution that pranayama practice needs to be restricted only to experienced practitioners. There is some wisdom in being vigilant about the practice, for if done incorrectly it can lead to problems in the nervous system and psychological disturbances. But there are a few basic pranayama practices that are safe for nearly everyone, and we have discussed a few of them on our blog (see Pranayama for Everyone: Bhramari Breath and Balancing Your Nervous System with Your Breath). You can practice pranayama as an isolated standalone technique or integrate it into your daily yoga asana routine.

Thus, the first three limbs together with pranayama practice refine our personalities, helping us gain mastery over the body and develop an energetic awareness of ourselves, all of which help us to control our senses and our mind, and attain a higher state of consciousness. Several researchers have now reported that pranayama techniques are beneficial in treating a range of disorders, including:

• improving cardio-pulmonary functions 
• increasing autonomic functions 
• balancing the blood pressure 
• relieving symptoms of asthma 
• reducing physical and mental stress 

Additionally, pranayama practitioners report that this breathing practice helps in developing a steady mind, strong willpower, and sound judgment.

I consider pranayama as a “green therapy” because no harm is done to the environment, trees, or animals around us. All it requires is a place to be seated and your willpower, focus and concentration. While the requirements for this practice are minimal, the benefits are immense!

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Friday Q&A: Trauma Resurfacing, Crying in Class, Part 2

Morning Glories by Melina Meza

Last week when Baxter and I wrote our post Friday Q&A: Trauma Resurfacing, Crying in Class, we felt a bit like we were going out on a limb. Finding the right way to talk about trauma resurfacing during yoga practice was a delicate process, especially because neither of us has had the experience ourselves. And we also wanted to be as diplomatic as possible in discussing the role yoga teachers should play (and not play) when a student cries during classes. So we were very pleased to receive some positive comments about our post. In fact, Baxter found the comments on the blog site so insightful that he asked me to share them with you, our readers. Of course, some of you may read the comments sections of our posts and will have already seen one or both of these comments. But for those who read the original post early or those of you who don’t read the comments, I'm including them below. We are so grateful that these readers took the time to contribute their own thoughts about this important topic. Thank you, Kate and Mary!

—Nina

"Thank you for this post; I think lots of teachers will benefit as I've seen little written about it. This line of Baxter's really resonated with how I feel on the topic: "I try not to pacify or console, or imply that I know what they are going through, but continue to cultivate a safe environment for them to experience their full practice." Creating a safe space for the more intense moments of the practice to be digested is key, and I believe is often what enables them to come up for people in class in the first place. I find it useful to let students know that when practicing yoga over a series of years almost every emotion available will be experienced to some degree and that crying from sadness or any other emotion can be a healthy and useful way to process those emotions or experiences that arise. I wonder if saying even that much goes outside scope of practice, but nonetheless it's been beneficial for students who have cried in class to hear and understand so they don't feel there is something wrong with their practice or something that needs fixing. 
Nina, thank you for the resources for better supporting those working with a history of trauma. The front body protected poses are excellent reminders." —Kate

"Thank you for this important post. I think we will be seeing much more about the benefits of a yoga practice for trauma survivors. I can highly recommend the book by Emerson and Hopper, and the training through the Trauma Center at JRI. As an adjunct to talk therapy, I believe yoga is a powerful ally in the treatment of trauma, and hope that more people will become aware of its benefits. In those cases, making sure that the student is already actively in therapy is vital, so that what comes up in yoga class can be processed safely with a trusted professional. In my experience so far, your advice about child's pose (and front body protecting positions) is spot on – although, naturally any pose could trigger emotions and memories, as each individual's experience is unique. As the original commenter stated, I agree that there are likely many more trauma survivors in our classes than we realize, and although there is no way of knowing the reason for the spontaneous tears in class, I think it's a gift for any practitioner to be in an environment where experiencing and expressing emotions is welcomed and not judged – something that all yoga teachers can strive to provide." —Mary

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Featured Pose: Lunge Pose (Vanarasana)

by Baxter

Today I want to look at the Lunge pose (Vanarasana) and some variations to either practice a standalone pose or add into your Sun Salutations. Lunges come in different varieties (Ram described some of these in his post Exploring the Monkey Poses). Today I will talk about a basic High Lunge, two modified High Lunges and a Dropped-Knee Lunge. They all share a basic shape, but the variations can be more appropriate for some practitioners and can also have different effects on parts of the body. 

In general, the High Lunge and its variations are a good way to work on two primary movements in the hip joints: deep flexion (in the front leg) and extension (in the back leg). Because the front knee is bent to a 90-degree angle, the front quadriceps, psoas, and iliacus muscles are strengthened and the front leg gluteal and hamstring muscles are lengthened. The opposite occurs in the back leg, resulting in lengthening of the rectus femoris part of the quads, as well as the psoas and iliacus muscles, while strengthening the back gluteal and hamstring muscles. The back leg calf muscles can also get a nice stretch! The spine is somewhat neutral in alignment, although the lumbar region can end up in slight flexion due to the pull of the hips into a bit of backward tilt by the position of the front leg. This is a good pose in which to learn how to lengthen the front of your body. Your arms can contribute to the stability of the pose if you press your hands more fully into the floor, blocks or chair, and therefore assist in balance and also general strengthening of your arms and upper chest region. Ideally your head and neck align with the rest of the spine.

Lunges can be a good preparation for backbends, as stretching your quads, psoas, and iliacus muscles will help open the fronts of your thighs and hips, which helps make backbends more comfortable. They can be a great segue into many of the standing poses because you can move directly into many standing poses by simply pivoting the sole of your back foot down to the floor and then move into poses such as Warrior 1 or 2 (Virabadrasana 1 and 2), Triangle pose (Trikonasana), Extended Side Angle pose (Uttitha Parsvakonasna) or Pyramid pose (Parsvottanasana).

Baxter prescribes this pose for:

• arthritis or stiffness of the hips 
• tight, short psoas muscles (common for runners and cyclists)
• low back stiffness and mild low back pain situations 
• general spinal lengthening awareness 
• held tension in the psoas, quads, hamstrings and calves 
• practitioners who sit a lot during the day, as a general body enlivener
• preparation for standing poses of all sorts, as well as backbends 
• practitioners who need to work on balance (since all four limbs are in contact with floor, it challenges balance, though not dramatically) 

Instructions: Start by standing in Mountain pose (Tadasana) at the front of your yoga mat. Next, come into an easy Standing Forward Bend (Uttanasana), placing your fingertips on the floor, blocks, or the front edge of a chair. As you bend your right knee, keeping your front knee positioned directly above your front ankle joint, step your left foot back far enough (3-5 feet, depending on your height and leg length) so you can straighten your left leg. Keep the ball of your foot and toes on the ground, and keep your toes pointing straight forward. If you are not using a chair, position your arms parallel with your front shinbone, pressing your fingers or hands down while simultaneously lengthening back up your arms towards your shoulders. 

In basic High Lunge imagine a straight line moving from your back heel through your back leg and spine and out to the top of the head. Actively firm and fully straighten your back knee joint. Also, press down firmly into your front foot to activate the supportive muscles of the front leg without going to the point of straightening the front knee. Imagine lengthening the front surface of your body from your pubic bone to your collarbones. Stay for just a few breaths or up to one to two minutes in the full pose. 

To come out, bend your back knee slightly and step forward into Standing Forward Bend (Uttanasana). Then inhale back up to Mountain pose (Tadasana). Repeat on the second side. 

Version 2: In this version you use blocks to support your hands, at whichever height allows you to feel both the work in your hips and the length of your spine. Some practitioners have shorter arms and a larger chest, which can lead to more dramatic rounding the spine or a sense of claustrophobia and trouble breathing. The blocks can do wonders to balance this out. 

Version 3: In this version you use a chair to support your hands. This variation can allow those with greater limitations in hip flexibility and spinal flexibility a safe opportunity to experience the benefits of the pose without overdoing it. If you wish, you can place the chair against a wall so that when you come into the pose, the chair can not slide away from you.

Version 4: In this version, you bend your back leg and drop your back knee onto the floor. In general, this provides more lengthening of the back leg quad, psoas, and iliacus muscles, making it an especially good warm up for backbends, as well as deeper stretch to the front leg gluteus and hamstring muscles. 

Because the patella (kneecap) has only a thin layer of skin over the bone, most people prefer some padding under their back knee in this pose, so before coming into the pose, place a folded blanket on your mat. To come into the pose, start by going into full High Lunge pose (in any of the variations described above). Then bend your back knee and gently lower it down to the blanket. If your knee feels uncomfortable, try shifting your weight on to the upper part of the knee, rather than the mid-knee—experiment to find what works best for you. You can do this pose either with the tops of your back toes on the floor or with the toes turned under; with your toes turned under, you will get more calf stretch in you back leg. 

To come out of the pose, lift your back knee off the floor and step your back foot forward into Standing Forward Bend, just as you would for High Lunge.

Cautions: Because your legs are positioned in opposite directions, there can be torque in the pelvic bones, so people with sacroiliac joint issues should be mindful to try and keep the pelvis in a neutral alignment. Anyone with hamstring or groin pulls should wait until those areas are healed before trying the pose for any significant length of time. Those who have pain when deeply bending the front knee should use blocks or a chair to diminish the compression on the knee structures. Those with osteoporosis or osteopenia should be careful entering the pose from Standing Forward Bend (Uttanasana), being sure to bend their knees more deeply and keep their spines more neutral as they transition into the Lunge position. 

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Attachment (Raga) to Our Ideas About Ourselves

by Nina

Phil and Rita Stuck on Groundhog Day

2.3 avidya asmita raga dvesha abhinevesha klesah

The five afflictions (klesahs) which disturb the equilibrium of consciousness are: ignorance or lack of wisdom, ego, pride of the ego or the sense of ‘I,’ attachment to pleasure, aversion to pain, fear of death and clinging to life. —Yoga Sutras, translation by Edwin Bryant 

Lately I’ve been spending a lot of time talking with a young person who is struggling with depression. Of all the things this person told me, one sentence keeps haunting me. In a voice choked with tears, the person said, “I thought I had my life all figured out—and I thought I knew who I was—but now all that is gone.” 

Some time ago I wrote a post The Pains Which Are to Come about the klesahs, the five afflictions that cause human suffering (interestingly, the word means “poison” in Sanskrit). In that post, I concentrated on aversion to pain and fear of death/clinging to life. Today, I thought I’d consider attachment (raga). Here's the yoga sutra that defines attachment:

2.7 Attachment stems from experience of happiness

Edwin Bryant explains this sutra as:

“Attachment is craving for pleasure by one who remembers past experience of pleasure. Ego is the root of attachment just as ignorance is the root of ego. Ignorance and ego cause the deluded mind to associate the self with the latent impressions of past experience of pleasure.” 

Often attachment is described—as it is above—as attachment to pleasure or to things that give us pleasure. Attachment to pleasure causes suffering because we crave more of the same, and we suffer when we can’t get more. Perhaps it was a material object that gave us pleasure, and we end up acquiring more and more of the same thing until we end up overspending or hoarding or perhaps we just can’t afford more and are tortured by cravings. Or perhaps it was a sensory experience that gave us pleasure, such as eating or having sex, both of which can lead to problems if you go overboard with them. Or, perhaps it was an emotional experience. Remember in the movie "Groundhog Day" (yes, that’s one of my all-time favorite movies), when Phil has his first wonderful evening with Rita, the woman he secretly loves, and then he desperately tries to repeat that same night over and over, always failing?

But it seems to me that, like the young man I described above, we can also have profound attachments to the lives we plan for ourselves or the images we have of who we are. That gives us a different kind of pleasure—a sense of security. And losing that can feel devastating. I’m pretty sure that we, as “aging” people, have either all gone through this ourselves or seen it happen to other people. Maybe a marriage we once thought would last forever ends in a divorce. Maybe years of striving for success in a certain job or profession ends in failure. Maybe someone close to you dies unexpectedly, your house burns down, or you develop a chronic illness, and that one event changes your entire life. Maybe you’ve always been the strong one, but now you need help for the first time. Of course, it is not always a negative experience that alters your ideas about your life and yourself—maybe you meet someone or make a discovery that puts you on an entirely unexpected path, and you wonder: how did I get here?

But as yoga sutra 2.3 says, it is “attachment” that causes the suffering, not the loss of pleasure. So it is only our clinging to the life we imagined we would live or the selves we thought we were that is the real cause of our suffering. Otherwise, we could just let go and move on. 

I actually find this observation about the nature of the human mind to be very helpful on its own. I try to bring awareness to my attachment to my fantasies about what my life should be or my beliefs about who I am. Right now I’m in New Jersey, where I didn’t expect to be this month, helping a family member. I’m not sure how long I’ll be here or what will happen next. And the yoga philosophy I described above—my understanding of my own attachment to what I expected my life to be—is helping me let go of the agenda I once had for this time period (not to mention the feeling—how on earth did I ever end up in New Jersey, where I never, ever wanted to live?). But obviously a young person who is feeling for the first time that his whole life—and self—is being destroyed has a much greater challenge. I see so clearly his desperate wish to return to the way things once were, and his stubborn clinging to his old self image, and I was once in the same position myself, many years ago.

So what does Patanjali have to say about all this? After describing the klesahs, including attachment (raga) in detail, Patanjali simply says the following: 

2.11. The states of mind produced by these klesahs are eliminated by meditation. 

However, it seems to me, before you can move on to that step, you need to be ready to admit that attachment IS an affliction. I sometimes think we cling to our attachments in a form of magical thinking, because we feel as if fervently wishing for what we desire will make some kind of magic that will allow us to return to living the life we always imagined or to the self we once believed we were. (Joan Didion’s book The Year of Magical Thinking described this kind of thinking that she experienced after the sudden death of her husband.) But despite the fact that the movie "Groundhog Day" was magical realism, it was only after Phil truly gave up on escaping the day he kept living over and over in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania and somehow making Rita love him back—beginning to truly live his life in Punxsutawney on Groundhog Day—that he was able to wake up the next morning to a brand new day.

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