Jessamyn Stanley > Quotes

“At what point would you finally say, 'I've had enough of hating my body.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear. Get On the Mat. Love Your Body

“I think meditation should be the most normalized and basic practice on Earth. Just think about what it means. It really just means extended thought, reflection, contemplation. What's the opposite of meditation? Overlooking, disregarding, ignoring.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“There’s nothing you can learn from another person that you couldn’t understand more clearly from within yourself. Your truest connection with the god of your own understanding happens inside yourself, not with someone else.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“Gradually, for one reason or another, your body is gonna stop working the way it once did. And as your skin wrinkles and sags, you'll be forced to reckon with what lies underneath it all. And the wisdom you've gained from that inevitable reckoning will always trump the naive glory of your physicality.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“I don’t know where all of this leaves us, but I do know that cultural appropriation is not a requirement of practicing American yoga. Yoga will lead you back to your own native culture every time. If you’re really reckoning with the light and dark within yourself, if you’re really doing the work of yoking, you will always end up reckoning with the White supremacy that lives inside of you. It’s impossible to hide from the truth forever.
There’s no easy solution to any of this conflict, and I think that’s okay. I don’t think you need to find a solution. I think you just have to observe everything that’s here, even the parts you don’t like. I don’t think there’s an answer that’s not gonna piss off somebody. But I think that’s where Acceptance comes in. Your only real option is to just accept the reality of all this. Don’t try to change it. Don’t try to rationalize it. Don’t try to fix it. Just accept it. Then we can all move forward together.
[...]Don’t waste time on self-flagellation - learn from your mistakes and move forward. (p.108-9)”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“But the art of aging is life's great crescendo. Your aging is your loudest moment, your greatest depth. You exist to age. I think the art of aging is to age with humility and grace. To age and enjoy the process. To welcome age with open arms. Obsessing over the human body's physical condition and postures is another way of trying not to age.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“...it's most important to accept that your yoga poses may not look like everyone else's. That's okay. Just adapt the poses to your current state of being.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear. Get On the Mat. Love Your Body

“Yoga is for everybody and EVERY BODY. You don’t have to be thin and you don’t have to be fat. You don’t have to be a specific color or commit to a specific diet. You don’t have to earn (or have access to) a certain amount of money. You don’t have to embody anything other than your truest and most honest self in order to practice yoga. You don’t have to omit the sadness, the anger, and all of the other “ugly” emotions that flavor our lives. You don’t have to be anyone other than yourself. And I think it’s high time that someone shouted it loud enough so everyone can hear.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“Meditation looks more peaceful than it feels.... You're supposed to have thoughts, and they're chaotic by nature. The point is to accept your chaos. When you accept your chaos, it gets a lot easier to put shit in order.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“Capitalism thrives when you hate yourself and there'll always be a cuter dress, a more impressive house, or a better pair of shoes. Nothing you buy will ever be enough, and it's set up that way by design. But while capitalism is all about looking outside your Self, yoga says the exact opposite. Yoga and capitalism are like oil and water. They just don't go together.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“I thought smoking weed would tranquilize my senses and distort my connection to reality. But capitalism tranquilizes your senses in a way that weed can't. Capitalism makes you cling to the belief that you're fundamentally unworthy and that the right product is out there, somewhere, to bring about evolution. It makes you hungry for something other than what's happening inside yourself. But cannabis unlocks a world beyond capitalistic greed in which you're able to enjoy right now, today. A world in which you're allowed to be yourself.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“I wrote this book for every fat person, every old person, and every exceptionally short person. I wrote it for every person who has called themselves ugly and every person who can’t accept their beauty. I wrote it for every person who is self-conscious about their body. I wrote it for every human being who struggles to find happiness on a daily basis, and for anyone who has ever felt overwhelmed by the mere act of being alive. I’ve been there. We all have. Yoga”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“Brahmacharya: chastity is about trying not to use sex and the love of others as a path toward self-love”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear. Get On the Mat. Love Your Body

“In retrospect, all of these experiences directly point to a need for some kind of yoga. And not as an exercise routine, but as a way to stop acting like my own worst enemy. It only took me the greater portion of three decades to figure that out. My practice helps me transcend the all-consuming nonsense of daily life. It allows me to step outside of my mundane fears, endless obsessions, and senseless anger.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“My first yoga experience was hell on earth. Are you hearing me? HELL. ON. EARTH.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“By speaking of ourselves in a positive and affirmative fashion and finding ways to eradicate self-hate, by speaking kindly about ourselves and those around us, we can foster a sense of love and compassion powerful enough to restructure our society’s entire perspective of “body love.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“A true practitioner walks the eight-limbed path until their final breath.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“It's really that my expectations of what I'm capable of are holding me back from accepting who I am.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“- The key to holding your downward dogs without wanting to kill yourself and your yoga instructor? CLAW THE MAY. Plug into your fingertips and knuckles when you step into the pose - this will create a kind of suction cup in the palm of your hand that will protect your wrist and be much more comfortable overall. This grip will allow you to balance the weight of your body between both your top and bottom halves, as opposed to bearing the full weight of your body into one joint.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear. Get On the Mat. Love Your Body

“Ultimately, mastering postures is a moot point. Postures aren’t about getting shit perfect. After all, you were already perfect before the postures, and being able to practice them isn’t gonna shift that truth.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“The fuckery never ends.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear. Get On the Mat. Love Your Body

“But the yogic path is just preparation for Death, the final stage in your inevitable decay. It’s not a preventive measure, but it’s a way of showing up fully for both the voyage and the destination of the infinite.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“Usually, I practice poses in this order: standing, balance, hamstrings and core), hips, backbends, and restorative—however, don’t be afraid to mix”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“notice the difference between who I am in the privacy of my own identity and who I choose to be in front of other people.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance

“As much as social media has given me, it shouldn’t be the only source of inspiration for people who don’t fit the typical yoga mold. That’s why I wrote this book. Because all yoga bodies deserve to be represented in print, not just those that are slender, female, and white.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“In the summer of 2012, I was an unemployed grad-school dropout and relatively new to yoga. I enjoyed going to classes, but like many other yoga students who look “different,” I always left the studio feeling a vague sense of discrimination at the hands of my teachers and fellow students.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.

“And it’s because yoga is NOT just exercise—it’s a life path. And if you allow it, the yogic path will envelop every moment of your life—every breath, every interaction, every gaze, and every thought.”
― Jessamyn Stanley, Every Body Yoga: Let Go of Fear, Get On the Mat, Love Your Body.