Everything Is Spiritual

I caught myself being ignorant yesterday.

Yesterday morning, as I was preparing for my practice, I found myself thinking about teaching yoga in a place where most people are primarily interested in asanas. I caught myself thinking:

"No, I'm not doing that anymore. I want to teach people who are more interested in the spiritual side of yoga."

Then another thought arose:

"Everything is spiritual."

I paused.

What struck me wasn't the thought itself, but the realization that I had been caught in one of the kleshas: avidya.

Ignorance.

Not ignorance in the conventional sense, but the mistaken perception that I was seeing things clearly when I was actually looking through the lens of my own conditioning, preferences, and biases.

The divisions we create

How often do I create these divisions?

Physical and spiritual.

Sacred and ordinary.

Beginner and advanced.

Traditional and modern.

I do it so naturally that I rarely stop to question whether the separation is actually there.

I had caught myself assuming that someone who comes to yoga for flexibility or fitness is somehow less interested in the deeper teachings. And if I'm being completely honest, there have been times when I've thought of myself as more "advanced" because my own practice is no longer focused on asanas.

That is the ego talking — asmita.

Not the loudest boastful kind of ego, but the subtle kind that quietly identifies with being "the spiritual one." The one who has moved beyond the physical practice. The one who thinks she knows better.

And that is exactly why yoga asks me to keep looking.

Who am I to know where another person's path begins?

Because who am I to know where another person's path begins?

Who am I to know what brought them to their mat?

Many people enter yoga through the body. Some come because their back hurts. Some because they're stressed. Some because they want to feel stronger, healthier, or more at ease.

Then somewhere along the way, something shifts.

A moment of stillness.

A deeper breath.

A sense of connection.

A glimpse of being fully present.

The body becomes a doorway.

And isn't that spiritual?

When I look back on my own journey, I entered through the body too. I started meditating because I was stressed. Looking back, it wasn't really the mind that was stressed. The mind was simply doing what minds do. It was my relationship to my thoughts, sensations, and experiences that created suffering.

The doorway was physical.

Spirituality in the mundane

Spirituality is not confined to meditation halls, temples, monasteries, yoga studios, or yoga shalas. It doesn't matter if it's in the city or in nature. Haha.

It is not reserved for people who read philosophy books, chant mantras, or spend hours in contemplation.

Spirituality is in the mundane.

It is in everyday life.

It is the mother soothing a crying child at three in the morning.

It is waiting in traffic.

It is doing the dishes mindfully.

It is the student learning how to balance in Tree Pose for the very first time and allowing their whole being to be there.

After all, the meaning of asana is not a posture but a seat.

If I can let my mind take a seat in whatever I am doing, that is a spiritual practice.

Life itself is spiritual practice.

When I bring awareness to what is here, when I meet this moment with presence, curiosity, and care, the ordinary reveals itself as sacred.

No true separation

This moment became a reminder for me that there is no true separation between the physical, material, and spiritual worlds. The body is not separate from consciousness. The material world is not separate from spirit. What I call "spiritual" is not somewhere else waiting to be found.

It is expressing itself through everything.

Through every breath.

Through every relationship.

Through every challenge.

Through every moment of joy and heartbreak.

When I look closely, I begin to see that the boundaries I have created are not as solid as they seem. Beneath roles, achievements, identities, and stories, there is something that connects us all.

Some call it awareness.

Some call it consciousness.

Some call it love.

The words are different, but the experience points in the same direction.

A remembering.

A coming back.

A recognition that I was never truly separate to begin with.

The forms may be different, but the essence is the same.

Everything belongs.

Everything is connected.

Everything is spiritual.