Why are we doing all these handstands, backbends and arm balances? I don't know why we're doing them unless our lives are shaped and changed.

Follow your nature. The practice is really about uncovering your own pose; we have great respect for our teachers, but unless we can uncover our own pose in the moment, it's not practice - it's mimicry. Rest deeply in Savasana every day. Always enter that pratyahara (withdrawn state) every day. And just enjoy yourself. For many years I mistook discipline as ambition. Now I believe it to be more about consistency. Do get on the mat. Practice and life are not that different.

I believe that yoga should lead us to a place where kindness and compassion are instantaneous.

We are deep into the year of the dragon and all around the intensity of the collective pushes forward to a new age. The pieces and parts, the far-flung shades of life that make our hearts beat faster are starting to coalesce directly to the source.

Eat by Choice, Not by Habit combines the author's humor, deep compassion for others and knowledge about food in a way that makes me eager to follow her lead toward healthy eating-and more importantly, toward a healthy attitude about eating. She aptly teaches us all to frame our food issues in a language that is both liberating and comforting.

You can't make yourself be compassionate, you can only keep stepping back and becoming a larger container in which compassion wants to live. The practice should open us up, and crack open our hearts again and again.

Living your yoga is not just doing it, but being it.