“When the body is cleansed, the mind purified and the senses controlled, joyful awareness, needed to realize the inner self, also comes.”  –Yoga Sutras And now we begin our study of the niyamas, the second limb of the eight-limbed path of raja yoga.  Before we launch into them, I wanted to take a moment to distinguish between the first and second limbs, the yamas and the niyamas. The yamas are universal in their application, to be...

“By the observance of aparigraha, the yogi makes his life as simple as possible and trains his mind not to feel the loss or the lack of anything. Then everything he really needs will come to him by itself at the proper time.”  –B.K.S. Iyengar Now we come to the final yama, aparigraha, non-hoarding or non-collecting.  Like asteya, non-stealing, aparigraha begins with the trust that we will get our needs met. From that trust is born the...