Yogis around the world regard Patañjali's Yoga Sūtras as a foundational text. Patañjali offers helpful advice on a wide variety of topics, but this article will focus on just one: loving-kindness. Growing up, nearly all of us learned about the importance of kindness from our parents, the Golden Rule, religious teachings, or other people. In Chapter 1, Sutra 33 of the Yoga Sūtras, Patañjali writes (in Sanskrit) Maitrī karuṇā muditā upeksanam sukha duhkha punya apunya visayanam bhavanatas citta prasadanam, which can be translated, "By cultivating attitudes of loving-kindness for the happy, compassion for the unhappy, sympathetic joy for the virtuous, and equanimity for the evil, the mind remai
It’s strange to be living during a period of unprecedented challenging times. Hopefully soon we will be looking back and processing this experience in retrospect. Until then, pausing periodically to realize what we’ve learned, or are learning along the way, may provide some valuable lessons. When I’ve experienced various “storms” throughout my life, it has taken a lot of courage to simply move through the motions of my days. It isn’t until the storm has passed that I can truly understand how I was affected by the experience of what I was going through. Having now settled into a few months of living through a pandemic, I took some time to think through what I’ve learned thus far. It’s sta
