There are as many yoga postures as there are stars in the sky.
The journey of one yoga asana to the next is an infinite one.
A journey of overcoming resistances and facing challenge.
So too is the practice of love? Sustainable love lasts, like a sustainable yoga practice that moves with mindfulness through challenge and support.
Sustainable love, like yoga requires a certain consciousness, a wisdom that comes before experience.
This consciousness is reflected in the five universal laws of nature, and in my new book, "Sacred Love, the honeymoon that lasts forever", they are revealed in the most simple and practical ways as the five keys to Sacred Love.
Key 1.
Stillness.
Many people fall in love by accident.
There they are minding their own business when WHAM, love just happens.
In that moment the individual can't think, speak or hardly breathe, they are lost and lost in love.
For most, this is the pinnacle of their relationship, or close to it, and they spend the rest of the relationship hoping for that accidental moment to rare its head.
It does, but again by accident.
In Sacred Love I share the keys to turning the experience of love from an occasional accident to a daily, hourly or by choice continuous experience.
Key 2.
Romance.
In nature what you appreciate grows.
Appreciation is romance.
Wisdom is defined as the capacity to see two sides of any circumstance.
Two sides of any person means that you love them honestly.
Romance rises beyond the infatuation and emotional drama of one sided impression and sees the two sides, positive and the negative in perfect balance.
Then simply focuses on the positive.
Beyond naïve and short term puppy love, romance is a consciousness, a true witnessing of the symmetry which makes a human divine.
Key 3.
In relationship, there is a balance of support and challenge.
Each support is an experience of happiness, and each challenge is like a posture we cannot surrender to.
Learning from these challenges takes us deeper and deeper in love.
As in all Yoga, challenge confronts the ego and that is why most people run from it.
For the ego, the most potent experience of love comes in the infatuation of the first months or years, the honeymoon period.
Using blame and accusation, the ego causes a scintillating burst of excitement, but it is all unsustainable.
Key4.
People are attracted to each other on the basis of "who helps me live my dreams?" The most potent secret to long lasting relationships is "dream matching".
So, knowing the difference between a goal and a dream is a vital awareness for sustainable attraction.
Goals are achievable outcomes, once achieved, they no longer count.
Many people are attracted because they feel the pull of a magnificent goal, but then, they achieve the goal and suffer deeply.
My experience working with clients is that this one key is the cause of nearly 99% of relationship failure.
In my book, Sacred Love, I have included a vision quest for lovers.
A do it yourself, 6 week stay at home process for vision quest.
Key 5.
Love is a lifestyle.
Life is a hierarchy of choices, priorities and decisions.
Like any yoga practice, we need a teacher to guide us through those choices with consciousness.
In life, love is the guru.
And where love does not exist, life cannot exist.
Love therefore, is a lifestyle.
A way of living that prioritizes the first four steps over the ego, emotion and short term choices.
Love is a way of turning up, making sure the past is not driving the future, for surely, any person who is running from the past, will run into it in the future.
Love is empowerment, the grand statement of this fifth key is that "I am the cause of all that happens to me" with this knowledge Yoga is practices every moment of every day.
Synopsis There is a deeper meaning to yoga, one that extends outside of the four walls in which a yoga practice is performed, or a meditation is experienced.
That deeper meaning is, according to ancient texts, love.
Love of life, love of nature, love of work, love of brothers and sisters.
But the most potent love of all, is the capacity to love a significant other, a relationship.
Here you will find many anomalies between the diverse teachers, teachings, and practices of yoga.
You will find advanced practitioners who are unable to hold a relationship, beginners who are in long term partnerships, you will find ashrams which are little more than singles camps and you'll find obsession with a physical experience of Yoga that does nothing to make a loving family home.
What more can Yoga be than a relationship, a deep and pure window through which spirituality can be experienced, practiced and challenged.
Here the five keys to SACRED LOVE help to bring yoga from the studio to real life.