Effort and Ease by Rachel Lewis

As we welcome 2025, the main idea rolling through my mind and digging its teeth into my practice is the concept of sthira and sukha – effort and ease.

In the Yoga Sutra, Patanjali mentions “Sthira sukham asanam.” The most obvious way to map this onto your yoga journey is to think about whether or not a posture is both stable and comfortable. Are you about to topple over in that Warrior III? Can you actually feel your lungs expand in Puppy, or are you squishing your belly and not giving your being enough room? But there’s room for other applications that might feel more apt for this time of year. This balance of steadiness and comfort, effort and ease, is what sinks into my mind as we welcome the new year: where can my meditation be more balanced? My time moving on the mat, especially alongside others? My mind? 

I feel my ego kick in as yoga challenges bounce around online, encouraging us to get up, get moving, feel a renewed sense of alive, despite the various mantras of the very recent Winter Solstice (the one that resonated most with me and my mom and my sister, as we all practice together weekly, was this: “I rest in peaceful darkness. I offer myself tenderness and compassion”).

To jump from resting in peaceful darkness to, often quite literally, jumping to the top of the mat, feels out of balance for me. It’s been a time of hibernation. A time, for some of us, of loss. Of change. The sun still sets before dinner time, and the cold still keeps our skin and bones chilled. While some spirits may feel renewed in the weeks following celebrations with family and friends and fireworks and the tearing open of new calendars, a piece of me resists the idea that my time of peace and rest has ended, replaced by electric energy that wants me to move and move and move some more.

So, I consider sthira and sukha – effort and ease – and how these concepts can lovingly bolster my practice this January. I invite you to join me and do the same. Where are you pushing, and is it a space that actually requires pressure? Where can you create space for ease, whether physically or mentally or emotionally, maybe all of the above? What does “balance” feel like within your body? How can you honor that?

A big question. But, lucky for us, so often our minds and thoughts are the funny little things just getting in the way. Our bodies already know the answer.

Here’s to another year of shifting our gaze, looking internally, and doing so alongside community at the Yoga Garden.