A few months ago, I was reading Rebel Buddha by Dzogchen Ponlop. One of the headings in the book was 'The Trappings are a Trap," and that stuck with me. He was talking specifically about Buddhism and the various accouterments that people acquire in order to be "Buddhist-looking." I think the same sentiment is true in yoga. It's easy to get caught up in appearances.
The pants problem
If there's one thing more ubiquitous in the yoga world than Instagram posts of yogis in dynamic postures, it's yoga pants. There are pants with gimmicks, technology, and pockets. We've got the pants made from recycled plastic bottles and the pants to help you find your highest self. When I started practicing yoga in a studio, I was acutely aware of my lack of cool pants.
While talking to one of my yoga teachers (not a Union Yoga teacher, by the way), she remarked that my pants ought to be tighter. To be clear, she wasn't trying to tactfully tell me about a wardrobe malfunction, nor do I believe that this comment had any sexual connotations.
She informed me that when I hold up a pair of yoga pants, it should look way too small for me. I looked down and noticed the way the fabric crinkled at the creases of my knees in the pair I was wearing. That would never happen with the pants she described.
A solution to my coolness problem?
A few days later, I noticed a pair of fancy yoga pants on clearance. The fabric was cute enough, and when I held them up, they looked way too small... just like my teacher said they should. Even on sale, the price was beyond my budget. I thought about my commitment to yoga. If I wanted to be taken seriously, I thought I had to have those pants.
When I put them on, the new pants were like a second skin, but not in a good way. They were so completely form-fitting that I felt naked. I already avoided practicing in the front row because I didn't want anyone to see my rear end sticking up in the air when I was in Down Dog. (That's right. I, a yoga teacher, was and still am self-conscious about people looking at me while I practice. Go figure...) I checked to make sure they weren't see-through. They weren't, but they may as well have been. My mind started telling me all sorts of not-nice things about my body while I was in these pants. Nevertheless, I'd invested.
I got so many compliments when I wore the pants to the studio, including compliments from the teacher who suggested I get pants that "fit." I was finally looking like a "serious yogi", but the gratification was short-lived. At the start of class, I took off the extra-long sweater I'd been wearing to cover myself, and I proceeded to waste the entire 75-minute practice worrying about whether my underwear showed through or how incredibly exposed I felt.
I wore the pants maybe three or four times over the course of the next year and a half, and each time, it was the same. I didn't get better at yoga. I just felt worse about myself. Eventually, got rid of the things and found garments that were comfortable. None of them ever made me more enlightened though.
The mixed messaging of yoga
It's so easy to conflate the images we see of "good yogis" with our own motivations for practicing. One minute, you're trying to feel better, and the next minute, you're looking up Palo Santo on the internet and ordering affirmation cards while you slather yourself in essential oils. You're getting the matching yoga outfit, but really you're a seeker trying to find a way to make sense of this world and where you fit into it. You might have gone to the studio to tend to your body, but now you've got to have all the beads and incense.
I'm not throwing shade here – some of you get a lot of joy from these things, and they help you feel like your best selves. Heck, I really love some of these things, and you'll see me using them. To those of you reading this who love all this yoga-adjacent stuff, I am not trying to dim your shine. I just propose that these things are not necessities on the 8-limbed path.
At various points, I've bought into and bought so many different things because I thought they’d make me a better practitioner or they'd help me fit in. I didn't just buy stuff, either. I went to workshops that I knew wouldn't resonate with my practice just so that I could have the experience of being an explorer... a collector of quasi-spiritual experiences. (That's spiritual materialism, friends.) Today I understand a bit about different modalities, but none of this grasping for stuff made my practice stronger either.
This need for stuff got worse when I interacted with large groups of students who looked like the kind of yogis I wanted to be. "I ought to try to emulate them," I thought. Part of my programming (and maybe yours too) includes an almost insatiable desire to be seen and validated by my teachers. I am especially susceptible to anything that I think could make that happen for me.
What Patanjali has to say
Although Patanjali's Yoga Sutras were written long before modern, Western, postural yoga and all the trappings that come with it were imagined, he did spell out the 8-limbed path.
There's no limb of yoga asking you to buy stuff, but the first limb of yoga is Yama (moral restraints/ "deprogramming of mental patterns"). Under this first limb, you will find "subheadings". The two relevant ones for today's topic are non-stealing/ "absence of coveting or wanting" (asteya) and non-hoarding/ "absence of greed and possessiveness" (aparigraha). When we buy stuff that breaks our budget, we are, in a way, stealing from ourselves. If we hoard "spiritual" things, experiences, etc., we're at odds with aparigraha. The rampant materialism we see in yoga is not supported by the 8-limbed path. In other words, my friend, we are enough without this stuff.
*See Sutras 2.28-3.12 to learn more about the 8-limbed path as defined by Patanjali. For yamas, see Sutras 2.30-2.31.
The one thing you need to grow your practice
Being loved and being seen is a huge motivator. In yoga, so many of us are doing vulnerable work, and I think it can make us easy targets for marketing. At the same time, all the yogic-looking stuff can come with a high price tag, which leaves practitioners feeling left out when we can't shell out for all the retreats and green smoothies, or whatever other thing is hot at any given point.
Our vulnerable work also means that the words of our teachers can have ramifications far beyond what they intend. A casual comment from someone we hold in high regard can lead us to form false perceptions about ourselves and the practice. We may literally or figuratively buy the yoga pants we don't love in order to be more loveable.
It's taken me a few years and a lot of time by myself to figure this out. Maybe hearing about my mistakes can save you some time and dollars. The most important thing you need to grow your practice is your practice. Show up on your mat or cushion. Show up in the here and now. There's no shortcut to it. There's nothing you can buy that's going to make it happen for you.
Enjoy the shiny stuff if you like it. Practice in the ways that heal you and make your heart full. This yoga thing is a way of being, not a way of appearing. It's a system, but you can't pay for it in four easy payments of $14.95. It's so refreshing to let go of the trappings.
How wonderful is it that we don't have to be hemmed in by a shopping list? How magnificent is it that the things we need are the things we already have?