List of Yoga Quotations

Here are a list of Yoga quotations that I've compiled from my 200-hour yoga teacher training, other classes I've attended, and various yoga books.

Jon Isaacs

• "The pose begins once you want to leave it".
• "Who went to their first yoga class because their life was going really well‽"
• "I had a hedgefund guy fire me once because I was talking about greed in class."

Sean Feit

• On taking non-harming literally, "I take an antibiotic - genocide."

Jean Mazzei

• "You can have peace or mind, but not peace of mind because the mind's purpose is to think."

Cora Wen

• "You probably think you have a knee, there's nothing there. There's no knee."
• "The knee is the prisoner of the hip and the ankle."

Stacey Swan

• On being a good teacher, "It's not about putting your foot behind your head, but keeping it out of your mouth."
• "The american way is 'no pain, no gain', but yoga is 'no pain, no pain'"
• "A good yoga class should be like a Seinfeld episode," (in that is should come full circle at the end.

Karen Macklin

• "Vinyasa can also mean how you sequence your life."

Adrianna Webster

• "On an inhale, breathe out".

Leslie Kaminoff - Yoga Anatomy

• On the spine, "The full glory of nature’s ingenuity is apparent in the human spine…From an engineering perspective it is clear that we have the smallest base of support, the highest center of gravity, and the heaviest cranium (proportional to our body weight) of any other mammal.  As the only true bipeds on the planet, we are also earth’s least mechanically stable creatures."
• On breathing, "The energy expended in breathing produces a shape change that lowers the pressure in the chest cavity and permits the air to be pushed into the body by the weight of the planet's atmosphere. In other words, you create the space and the universe fills it."
• Paraphrase on hand balances, "4/5th of the foot is dedicated to weight-bearing  and 1/5th is dedicated to dexterity. The hand (on the other hand) is 1/5th weight-bearing, 4/5th dexterous."

Rudolf von Laban

• "Each bodily movement is embedded in a chain of infinite happenings from which we distinguish only the immediate steps and, occasionally, those which immediately follow… In every trace form created by the body, both infinity and eternity are hidden."

Joel Kramer - Yoga as Self-Transformation

• "The essence of yoga is not attainment, but how awarely you work with your limits."
• "If you're running from the feeling, it's pain." (Otherwise it's just intensity.)
• "Yesterday's Level of Flexibility". The (unhelpful) concept which I call YLF.

Desikachar -  The Heart of Yoga

• Yoga defined, "attempting to do something you haven't before."

Gibran

Oh headstand, "It's like Wu-Tang says, you gotta 'protect ya neck.'"

On stepping onto your mat, "Let's go for a magic carpet ride."

Travis Judd

• "Make a conscious choice about what kind of practitioner you want to be right now."

Unknown

I can't recall the provenance of these quotes sadly. Let me know if you can.

• "The idea that we are ever not moving is an illusion."
• "asana is a process not a product otherwise we could say 'not in a pose' if head isn't touching knee, but that is false."
• 'Yoga' has the root 'Yuj' which is the root for the English word 'Yoke.'
• Like humans, "water is transparent and reflective but don't see those properties when in motion."
• "If you feel like you're being inauthentic start telling the truth."