I hesitated for a long time before I decided to put these photos out. I have a website coming online in a few weeks and it was a huge decision for me to go through with using these. In my head I hear the voices of all the people who will call these a shameful act of the ego, or a betrayal of the primary principles of Yoga proper. But this is how I practice, and I don’t call myself a Yoga teacher. In total honesty, part of me is very much afraid for how I will be interpreted here. But I think, at some point, real freedom requires something else to become more important than fear.
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Yoga and Asana are not interchangeable. If we’re being fair, most of the Asanas we practice in modern ‘yoga’ classes don’t come from Yoga proper. They come from Swedish gymnastics (Yoga Body, The Origins of Modern Postural Practice. Mark Singleton). While I hold many of the principles of Yoga proper very close to my heart, my Asana practice isn’t about any one doctrine. It’s about a connection to myself and my body. And through strengthening the connection to myself and my body, I gain the strength, insight, and willingness, to be of service to the world around me. Not because the world needs my service. But because I am happiest when I can be helpful to those around me.
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I don’t come from safe places. I don’t come from a world with safety nets. My life isn’t really a dangerous place anymore, but I am left with a lingering intuition of danger that I can’t shake. Sometimes fear is inescapable, regardless of whether or not it’s rational. Everyone’s path is different. But mine has been very much about making peace with fear, and about learning to navigate that which frightens me with whatever measure of grace I can accomplish at the time.
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A precise understanding of my own limits and abilities has been a key factor in my survival all the way up to this point. So I practice in places that require me to know myself, places that have consequences for hesitation and overconfidence alike. Places that remind me to be honest with myself. In places like these I find a heightened metaphor for the kind of life I understand, an external metaphor that I can touch, and see, and revel in. I revel here. I find calm. My outside environment perfectly mirrors my intuitive understanding. For me, maybe not for everyone, this is where the world looks balanced.
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I don’t encourage other people to do as I do. I encourage others to do as they do; to be strong enough for the kind of life they live in spite of how they fear the world will see or interpret them. To work hard at becoming the unapologetic embodiment of the creature they were designed to be and to take responsibility for the consequences of becoming so. No more, no less. And so after a long period of reflection, I also encourage myself. Practice is dynamic. It changes over time. How I feel today may not be how I feel a year from now. But I can only share myself as I am. So that’s what I endeavor to do. In spite of the fear that I will be misinterpreted or judged badly.
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I’m not saying everyone should go out and practice in conspicuously dangerous places to feel right with the world because it worked for me. I’m saying I want to encourage people to be themselves openly with purpose and responsibility, and I’m starting with myself. If you climb bridges or buildings to find yourself, train for that and do it with a healthy measure of respect for the task you’ve undertaken. If you meditate alone in your living room, train for that and be prepared for the kind of revelation that comes from going inward. If you go out into the mountains alone to face yourself in external solitude, train for that and revel in it. I don’t advocate risk-seeking behavior for its own sake. That’s the sort of thing that gets you killed. I advocate for self-awareness and consequently self-acceptance; Because these are the necessary prerequisites for accepting and connecting to others. Having fear is healthy, but living in fear is divisive.

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I wouldn’t follow in your footsteps, and you shouldn’t follow in mine. By going our own way we cultivate something we can share with each other when our paths cross. And I’m looking forward to it.
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Until our paths cross again…
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Kris