Yoga guilt.  We've all been there.  That icky feeling of not quite measuring up because it's been 3 days since your last practice.  The little despot in your head starts throwing insults about how you're obviously not serious about yoga, not meant to practice or teach it and generally just an all around slob.  Maybe it's just me whose hefty inner critic has heckled me in this way - but I doubt it.  Those days are mostly past me now and instead of guilt after missing a practice or two I just feel a genuine longing to be back on my mat.  This changed for me when I realized that "disciplining" myself into practice really just lead me away from intimacy with life and spirit.  When I really looked at it the voice that prompted me day after day to "get on it" was really the insecure mutter of my ego.  Practicing in order to live up to standards in my own head created by an egoistic ideal was a practice no doubt - one bent on maintaining the illusion of my separateness. 

I teach yoga as a way for creating greater intimacy with life.  For me, yoga is generally a sure fire way to know the moment with greater clarity, understanding and love.  But sometimes it's not.  Sometimes, greater intimacy comes from a walk with a friend, a meander through my yard or an afternoon nap. And, all of these things can also serve to distract me from myself too!  When I want to do something other than yoga I like to inquire a little bit: Is what I'm about to do instead of my yoga practice going to help me know the moment and see myself as I really am today?  Will a walk with a friend, move me closer to Spirit?  Will a nap be a way to avoid myself or will in reenergize me so that I may move into the next part of my day with greater clarity?  With love as my intention, I then let myself be moved by my greater intelligence.  It feels like a magnetizing toward something.  I feel pulled, called toward one act or another - and most the time I act in good faith and follow the call.  This power of discernment and willingness to listen to my intuition has come over time, with much self-inquiry and willingness to let something other than ego take over once in a while.  It starts starts with a pause, a tuning in, and a longing to challenge the contracted ideas in our mind that keep us "disciplined" in the art of self-loathing.

Ironically, but understandably, since being liberated from the tyranny of a disciplined practice I find myself on my mat more regularly than ever before.  Questioning my guilt, the notion of discipline and what I thought I was striving for lead to being set free of these things. In the space that is no longer clogged by the drama of discipline there is something else.  It is the call of Spirit reminding me that I need not strive through unrelenting discipline to find It - It is looking for me.  So today, be easy on yourself.  Dance your way to your mat if Spirit's call is asking you to tango with a few asana.  If it's not, carry on beautiful child of yoga, because It will, and when guilt and self criticism is no longer there to muffle the sound of it's sweet voice you will truly be able to hear It.