The most important yogic quality
Practice this foundational yogic trait to find more peace in your life
Sutra 2.30: There are five universal disciplines you must cultivate to succeed in interacting with the world around you. These are:
Compassion (Ahimsa)
Truth (Satya)
Generosity (Asteya)
Moderation (Brahmacharya)
Abundance (Aparigraha)
Sutra 2.31: Practicing these five universal disciplines applies to everyone, regardless of your class, where you live, the times you live in, or what is happening in your life at any given moment.
Sutra 2.35: When you live from the seat of compassion, all hostility towards you disappears.
~From Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra
This is the fifth installment in my series on applying the wisdom of the Yoga Sutra from a mother’s perspective.
Tell me: How are you practicing compassion today?
The 10 yogic qualities
Patanjali’s Yamas and Niyamas are the Yoga Sutra’s most famous and applicable wisdom. These principles constitute the “10 Commandments” of yogic living. Most translations define the Yamas as “restraints,” or what not to do in order to live peacefully with others. As such, you typically see each of the Yamas presented with negative language—non-violence, non-stealing, non-hoarding, etc. Inspired by my teachers and Nischala Devi, I’ve come to appreciate looking at the Yamas and Niyamas through a positive lens. Instead of focusing on what not to do, I find it easier to integrate the Yamas into my life by cultivating the essence behind the restraint. The first Yama1, ahimsa, commonly translated as non-violence, can be realized by developing compassion.
Cultivating compassion
Sutra 2.35: When you live from the seat of compassion, all hostility towards you disappears.
Growing up I hated spiders. If I saw a spider in my room I’d scream and make my parents kill it. Spiders have too many legs, move too fast, and they’re just creepy. These days, I’ve evolved. Instead of screaming when I see a spider, I respond with curiosity; I still think they have too many legs and move too fast, but I consider them a good omen, a symbol of feminine energy and creativity. They are a reminder to nurture the divine feminine, not an immediate panic-inducing life threat (except for the three tarantulas I found in my room in Mexico once…definitely a panic-inducing life threat 😂). As I’ve built up my reservoir of compassion for living things through my many years of yoga practice—I admit I’m still working on cultivating compassion for mosquitoes—I’ve learned to calmly collect spiders in a jar and release them far away from where I sleep. Sometimes I’ll even let the spider be.
Negative attitudes, bad moods, illness, and stress are lethal, not just for your own health and wellbeing but also for the health and wellbeing of the world around you. Despite my good intentions to be compassionate, a stressful day is enough to knock down the fragile behaviors I’ve worked hard to cultivate over the years. If you find yourself killing spiders left and right, yelling at your kids for nothing, or operating on a short fuse, it might be time to sit down and have a good look at what is preventing you from accessing your compassion. Maybe you need to get back into a practice habit, stop reading the news, or let go of a project, relationship, or commitment that has you feeling overextended. Like any yoga pose or meditation, compassion is a practice.
Be nice and people will be nice to you
The Sutra can be challenging to understand, but sometimes it’s quite straightforward. Each sutra defining a Yama is followed by another sutra describing the benefits you receive by integrating the Yama. The benefit of practicing compassion? No one will be mean to you. Think about the compassionate, wonderful people you know in your life—their compassion is infectious. Surround yourself with compassionate people and you’ll find it easier to develop your own compassion. Stop worrying about the mean people in your life. Spend your energy on compassionate acts instead.
No one is above yogic law
Sutra 2.31: Practicing these five universal disciplines applies to everyone, regardless of your class, where you live, the times you live in, or what is happening in your life at any given moment.
Sutra 2.31 rarely gets mentioned in discussion around the Yamas and Niyamas. In this sutra, Patanjali reminds us no one is above yoga’s moral codes. It doesn't’ matter if you’re the President of the United States, the King of England, the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia, the richest woman in the world, a homeless veteran, a Midwestern farmer, Muslim, Christian, Jewish, gay, transgender, straight, an immigrant, a refugee, or an average Jane. If you want to live an enlightened life, the Yamas always apply. No one is going to punish you if you don’t practice compassion—you’ll just suffer for the rest of your life. So, it’s up to you 🙂. How do you want to be in the world?
A short practice for cultivating compassion
Practice Karuna Mudra to shift into the seat of compassion.
Let’s connect
Tell me: How are you practicing compassion today? Leave a comment and let me know!
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Any list presented in the Sutra is presented intentionally in a hierarchical order with the first step being the most important followed by all the rest. That makes compassion the most important quality to develop, according to the Yamas & Niyamas, although all of the qualities are worth practicing.
This post hit me in the chest. The way you frame the Yamas—not as a set of external rules but as something internal to cultivate—feels like the only way I’ve ever been able to approach them. Otherwise, they become another impossible standard, another list of ways I’m falling short.
Ahimsa has been a complicated one for me. Not because I struggle with being cruel to others, but because I’ve spent most of my life being relentlessly unkind to myself. The things I say to myself in my own mind are things I would never say to another living being. It’s taken me years to realize that non-violence isn’t just about not hurting others—it’s about not being at war with myself. And like you said, when I’m depleted, when I’m stressed, when life is pressing in from all sides, that fragile practice of compassion is the first thing to go.
And then there’s the piece about no one being above these principles. That one got me. Because I’ve spent a lifetime feeling like an outsider—like I was somehow just bad at being human, like other people had an instruction manual I missed out on. But yoga reminds me again and again: these teachings belong to everyone. The practice meets us exactly where we are. No one is disqualified from this work, and no one is exempt from doing it.
I needed this today. Thank you for sharing it. I already know you’re someone I want to be in conversation with.
The phrase in the video about the hands being an extension of the heart -- when people -watching yesterday I was noticing how people often walk with stiff arms and hands and recognizing that I do this too. Maybe we don't know what to do with our hands because we don't know what to do with our hearts? Love the compassion mudra. Thank you.