Asana Was Never Just the Movement

In the Yoga Sutras, asana isn't described as a sequence of poses at all. It's really just one instruction: sit. Be rooted. Be comfortable. That's it. Out of the eight limbs of yoga, only one of them has anything to do with the physical postures we now think of as "yoga." Just one.

I think that's worth sitting with. Because most of us — myself included — came to yoga for the movement. I know I did. I was drawn in by the strength, the stretch, the way my body felt afterward. I wasn't thinking about ancient texts or meditation seats. I just wanted to move.

But somewhere along the way, something else caught up with me. When I first started practicing, I was only taking one class a week. And on the weeks I missed it, I noticed — not in my body, in my mind. I didn't feel "right." I didn't feel rooted or grounded. Something was off, and it took me a while to understand what that something was.

That's the part nobody tells you going in. The movement is the door, not the room. Asana gets you steady and present enough in your body that you can actually meet your mind and your breath. That's what the limb is for — not the pose itself, but what the pose makes possible.

This week's practice, The Rooted Seat, is built around that idea. We'll move, but the movement isn't the destination. It's the doorway in.

Rooted in practice. Rooted in purpose.