Mark Whitwell

  The biggest challenge we face when starting our life of Yoga is to establish a home practice that feels natural and pleasurable to do every day. Our daily practice should feel as simple as brushing our teeth in the morning, as easy as slipping into our favorite pair of jeans and as necessary as taking a shower (perhaps more necessary!). Yet, as we all know, when we wake up we can easily let the demands of the day take over and forget to practice. Some rare people can start to practice without any difficulties at all. For most of us however, the journey is uneven and this is all good. We all have our unique karmas, addictions, circumstances, emotional complexes and frustrations to cut through. We may practice for a few weeks or months and then stop. We practice some days and then do not practice on other days. When we stop we may feel guilty. We then resent Yoga for making us feel guilty. The next week we feel a burst of enthusiasm and recommit which is followed by a loss of faith...

Co-Author Andrew Raba Life in lockdown has put the spotlight on our intimate relationships. According to the New York Post, people seeking divorce in the U.S. is 34% higher than the same period last year. And as the fallout from the pandemic deepens, it is predicted to get worse. In Australia, a recent study showed that 42% of those surveyed said that they had experienced a negative change in their relationship with their partner due to lockdown. For others however, the pandemic has been a wonderful chance to deepen their relationship. Many of my friends describe the positive effect of having more time with their partner as the busyness of the usual life fell away. A study in Japan found that 20% of married couples said that their relationship had actually improved. In this article, I want to share with you what the tradition of Yoga has to offer for our relational lives during the pandemic. Whether you are wanting to protect a beloved partnership amidst the stress; to go more deeply...

On a moonlit night in 1973, Mark Whitwell was standing on a rooftop in Madras, thousands of miles from my home in the South Pacific. Having met with my teachers, Krishnamacharya and Desikachar, Mark Whitwell was suddenly filled with a sense of wonder. It was sublime: a deep, spontaneous feeling of well-being, bliss, and love. Mark Whitwell felt completely nurtured, my whole body fully integrated with everything in the natural world and with everyOne around me. What had caused this wonder-full feeling? There was no external reason: no girl, no drugs, no hit on the head with a peacock feather from Swami Knowitall-ananda. Yet there Mark Whitwell was, under a full moon and infinite stars, blissfully alive and certain of the simplest realization. “This body loves its breath,” Mark Whitwell whispered to the night crickets. Mark Whitwell felt how loving one’s own breath is the most basic intimacy there is, and not difficult. You don’t need to be particularly smart to do it, and no spe...

  It is self … You ARE nature. If you look at a bird or a tree or a flower and see the beauty, this beauty is no different than what you ARE. You are the beauty. But we try to capture beauty with our mind. We try to “experience” the beauty; or maybe hold on to it, savor it and try to duplicate the experience. But the mind will never capture beauty. It cannot even capture experience. It is too slow. You are beauty so you don’t have to capture it. So! Relax and stop looking. The power of the cosmos is arising as you, as utter beauty, intelligence and function, and all things. Enjoy mother nature directly, in you as you. Yoga is not a technique for a future result; Yoga is not a method; Yoga is not seeking. It is participation only in what is already true. Participation in the Given reality. As soon as it becomes a method of “becoming” it is not Yoga. Even being “in nature” or trying to capture beauty is futile. Yoga cannot be defined as a method, a style or a type. “People often ask ...