What astonishing feats of the human body evident at the Paris Olympics! Performances demonstrate great determination, focus and dedication — all central qualities of a yoga practice. From the yogic point of view, the top Olympic performers exemplify the utmost attribute necessary on the path of yoga — effort without strain. Each competitor demonstrates this hallmark of yoga practice, how one-pointed concentration without rigidity leads to skillful action. And it is through relaxed effort, known rather mysteriously as “effortless effort” that yoga is accomplished. The Olympians demonstrate incredible resolve — hours and hours of refinement result in staggering demonstrations of physical fluency and mental equipoise. Take Katie Ledecki and Leon Marchand in the pool, swimming frictionless, dolphinesque, through the water. Or Simone Biles in the floor exercises rendering seemingly impossible maneuvres with grace and ease. Her acrobatic athleticism reveals exquisitely fine-tuned proprioception, an awareness in space essential in postures like backbends, headstands and one-legged balancing poses. Ultimate mastery over any craft will appear so fluid that it bears the illusion of simplicity.
Yogis have known for millennia that the the path of practice must include not only discipline and rigor but ease and total absorption in flow. In the celebrated Yoga Sutras, a stable and steady yoga posture is described as being “soaked in ease.” In Taoist meditation, the breath, bones and glands are meant to rest in a “field of magnificent ease.”
Yoga could never be an Olympic sport. The difference being that unlike athletic competition, in yoga there is no place to “get to.” This makes the discipline of yoga enigmatic. The ultimate goal of yoga is beyond measure—never to be qualified by a stopwatch, tape measure or score judge.
Yoga can only be accomplished by a strange alchemy of engaged letting go both in heart and mind. In yoga, you must have a firm resolve not to get anywhere but only to remain completely present yet totally at ease in all that you do.
