Finding self-acceptance both on and off the mat. In Sanskrit yoga means to yoke.” To yoke mind
and body movement and breath light and dark the good and the bad. This larger idea of yoke”
is what Jessamyn Stanley calls the yoga of the everyday—a yoga that is not just about
perfecting your downward dog but about applying the hard lessons learned on the mat to the even
harder daily project of living. In a series of deeply honest funny autobiographical essays
Jessamyn explores everything from imposter syndrome to cannabis to why it’s a full-time job
loving yourself all through the lens of yoke. She calls out an American yoga complex that
prefers debating the merits of cotton versus polyblend leggings rather than owning up to its
overwhelming Whiteness. She questions why the Western take on yoga so often misses—or
misuses—the tradition’s spiritual dimension. And reveals what she calls her own whole-ass
problematic”: Growing up Baháí loving astrology learning to meditate finding prana in music.
And in the end Jessamyn invites every reader to find the authentic spirit of yoke—linking that
good and that bad that light and that dark.
