The other day I went into a local sandwich shop that offers daily deals at a discounted price. On this particular day I did not order the daily deal so when the young man checking me out gave me the daily deal discount my first thought was, “Whoopy! I saved a dollar!” My 2nd thought was, “SATYA!!” which translates from Pantajali’s eight limb path into truth. My inner consciousness was battling between taking the reward or practicing honesty and setting the young man straight. Even as I was paying, I was thinking, “karma is going to get you for this one”. Still I didn’t speak up and walked out the door with a sense of foreboding of my inability to speak up. Within 10 minutes, Karma had shown up and repaid me for my less than truthful energy exchange. I dropped a piece of oh so savory chocolate in between my car seat and center console. My car was less than 2 months old and the temperature was over 95 degrees outside which makes for a recipe of sour disaster. I spent the next 30 minutes trying to MacGyver the chocolate out. Lesson learned Universe, Be Honest or your Karma will show up!
But satya is so much more than just not lying. Truth demands we show up for life with integrity. It means getting still and quiet and listening to that little voice of our hearts rather than participating in the story in our heads. It means constantly reevaluating our beliefs; asking ourselves the question, “Is this true?” It means speaking up when it is challenging or holding back when it’s appropriate.
If you have ever injured yourself while practicing yoga, you may have experienced that moment just before the injury where a warning bell was set off. Instead of listening to the body, the dishonesty led to physical pain or even a long term injury. Our yoga practice is meant to be a harmonious union between the mind, body and soul. So each time we step onto the mat a level of honesty is essential to showing up completely in the moment. Once we learn to practice honesty with ourselves we can begin to practice it with our friends, families, coworkers and even checkout guys at sandwich shops.
Truthfulness inspires vulnerability, creativity, freedom, reliability, trustworthiness. There’s some truth behind “and the truth shall set you free!”. If you find practicing satya challenging consider journaling on the following questions. Are you a people pleaser or fearful? Are you avoiding confrontation, rejection, discomfort? What would happen if you just spoke up and told the truth? Each situation we come across is an opportunity to explore our beliefs. We can start with ourselves and then move onto the people that we trust and love. Practicing satya is much like practicing asana (poses). We never master it, we refine it. Some days it comes easily and others it’s a challenge. We offer ourselves love, compassion and space to grow and expand within the process.
– Keegan White, ERYT500
