surrender isn't giving up

yama and niyama series

ishvara pranidhana: trustful surrender

the fifth niyama -- and the final post in our summer series

written by diane, moondog yoga

ishvara pranidhana, the fifth niyama, is translated as trustful surrender to the divine. it doesn't mean giving up -- it actually means letting yourself be helped, supported, and most importantly loved. in our culture, surrender is often looked at as negative, coming from a "manifest destiny" type of attitude -- "i can (and should) dominate and control my world or environment."

but, it's actually about love -- the knowledge that you are loved and supported by something greater than yourself. fear at the very epicenter is a lack of love, feeling not loved, feeling all alone. thinking that you are all alone in this world is SCARY and would make anyone fearful.

the practice of ishvara pranidhana allows us to step away from the grip of fear.

june likes the saying: "it will all be okay in the end, and if it's not okay, it's not the end" as an expression of trustful surrender.

how the last three niyamas work together

as a group, they comprise kriya yoga, which patanjali defines as yoga in action, yoga of action, yoga of awareness (yoga sutra 2.1). let's see how they can work together in a specific situation.

a student, a relatively accomplished practitioner, wakes up in the morning, and with tapas, completes her morning practice (getting up before 6, tongue scraping, neti pot, meditation -- all shaucha or self-purification practices), and gets ready to go to yoga class. as she drives to class, she encounters a lot of traffic and starts to worry that she will be late. she isn't, but when she gets there, there isn't any parking. as she makes her way into class, she finds another student already in the spot she was hoping for. she is feeling prickly and annoyed. so, she practices svadhyaya -- awareness of how she is feeling and what she knows can help relieve her irritation. this practice enables her to focus her attention on her yoga practice, and away from external stimulation. she starts to feel more in control, calmer, present. at the end of the class, she settles into savasana.

savasana is the simplest experience of ishvara pranidhana. it IS the practice of trustfully surrendering. it is all about letting go. our yoga instructors tell us how important savasana is -- as the third element of kriya yoga, it completes your practice and is the result of your practice. it's also an important lesson on letting go.

you might be able to look back at all the yamas and niyamas and see how they all work together: the yamas set an ethical framework and the niyamas turn them inward and make them personal. and, of course, they all come together under the umbrella of ahimsa.

thank you for joining us this summer. june and i enjoyed exploring the yamas and niyamas with you. look for a new series from us coming up in the fall, and if you have any ideas or suggestions, we'd love to hear from you!