New Year, Not New You

January 01, 2020

New Years Eve has always been one of my favorite “holidays”! I love the tangible idea of a fresh start, a clean slate and endless possibilities. Some would say each  new day is full of possibly, and I agree, but I still feel there is a magical energy about New Years Eve.  

Before my yoga journey began I never gave much attention to the New Year New You ad slogan applied to everything from diets and fashion to gym memberships. But when applied to yoga, it doesn’t fit at all. While catchy, this slogan is the antithesis of what yoga is all about.  

Yoga isn’t about creating a new self or changing the fundamental being you are. It is about acceptance, forgiveness, letting go of attachment to false ideas allowing you to get out of your own way to free the best and truest self already in existence.   

Yoga is about clarity. Moving beyond illusions and distractions which hide our truest self from our self.  Yoga isn’t, nor has it ever been, about trading yourself in for a new model.  

Yoga is like an onion. It asks us to peel away the layers until our truest self is revealed.  ParaYoga founder Rod Stryker says it best “The idea that yoga changes you into someone better than the person you already were before is a bit of a misconception. It’s more accurate to say that yoga helps remove obstacles that obscure who you really are, that it helps you come into a fuller expression of your true nature. “ 

Exactly. 

Hilary Steinberg