Having written you are what you practice and you are how you practice. It felt appropriate to finish this series in a trilogy and conclude with the title “you are why you practice”.
Whys are important, they often form the fires that drive us either towards or away from something. For example, the why could be a burning passion to achieve something or the why could be to run away from an undesirable state.
So if you are going to dedicate yourself to a practice (such as Ashtanga), that requires a great deal of effort and often sacrifice, especially to show up to at 6.30am for 6 days a week. You really should have a good why!
In yoga the why is referred to as “your intention”.
This could be as simple as wanting to be physically capable of performing all sorts of gymnastic and athletic poses and effortless transitions. It could be centred around wanting to be better than others. Or about how the practice makes you feel afterwards, i.e. a more relaxed nervous system and a feeling of being centred.
If our intention is to be athletically strong, we will hold onto a strong desire to work hard, sweat hard and constantly measure ourselves against ourselves and maybe even some others. This may or may lot lead you to occasions where you begin to feel frustrated, through lack of progress or even slipping behind when days are not going so well.
If it is for the feeling of being centred, then we will approach the practice differently, possibly a forum for us to release our frustrations from other aspects of life (work, relationships etc) and find perspective by slowing down our minds and being granted the fortune to witness them in relation to the whole (everything else in life).
It may feel more virtuous to value one intention more than the other, but we should embrace our humanity. And all intentions are equally valid. Having an ego and wanting to reach your potential is just as healthy as just being happy to be taking part.
Over time we may even find our intention (our why) playfully slipping from one focus to another, like the seasons evolving over time. The way in which they change can influence a certain context that we will exist in during that period. There may be a lot of usefulness from that.
For example, chasing goals can be useful to help us keep moving forward. Comparing ourselves to others may be a kick in the butt to remind ourselves if they can do it, than so can we. And in times when the next progression feels far away, it may serve us to slow down and take joy in just taking part and enjoying therapeutic aspects of simply just being able to practice.
As our whys drift from one state of being to another, so will how we perceive the world and quite comically how other perceive us. It is as if our intentions are revealed to the world, and thus the world (and other people within it), also react to adapt to it.
Next time you are about to invest time to practice a new hobby or sport or other skill, check in with yourself as honestly take a rain check on what your intention is. If you begin to resent how practice is making you feel, or how you perceive others are judging you or not even taking notice of you. You may find, revisiting your why might dramatically change the universe around you, and your pleasure in taking part… of your practice.
