B. K. S. Iyengar Quotes

156 Sourced Quotes

If you practice yoga every day with perseverance, you will be able to face the turmoil of life with steadiness and maturity.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Do to your capacity. Always strive to extend your capacity. Ten minutes today, after a few days, twelve minutes. Master that, then again extend.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Yoga is effort. Only practice is important. The rest of knowledge is only theory.

B. K. S. Iyengar
An intellectual mind that is unconnected to the heart is an uncultivated mind.

B. K. S. Iyengar
In whatever position one is in, or in whatever condition in life one is placed, one must find balance. Balance is the state of the present - the here and now. If you balance in the present, you are living in Eternity.

B. K. S. Iyengar
The conjunction of effort, concentration and balance in asana forces us to live intensely in the present moment, a rare experience in modern life.

B. K. S. Iyengar
In whatever you are doing, be one: body, soul, mind. Do it beautifully and with purity.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Yoga has a threefold impact on health. It keeps healthy people healthy, it inhibits the development of diseases, and it aids recovery from ill health.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Do not allow past experiences to be imprinted on your mind. Perform asana each time with a fresh mind and with a fresh approach.

B. K. S. Iyengar
From Freedom of the Body comes Freedom of the Mind and then Ultimate Freedom!

B. K. S. Iyengar
Asana done from the brain makes one heavy and done from the heart makes one light.

B. K. S. Iyengar
When the restlessness of the mind, intellect and self is stilled through the practice of Yoga, the yogi by the grace of the Spirit within himself finds fulfillment.

B. K. S. Iyengar
The challenge of yoga is to go beyond our limits - within reason. We continually expand the frame of the mind by using the canvas of the body. It is as if you were to stretch a canvas more and create a larger surface for a painting. But we must respect the present form of our body. If you pull too much at once, we will rip the canvas. If the practice of today damages the practice of tomorrow, it is not correct practice.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Our greed comes from our fear that we will not have enough - whether it is money or love that we grasp. Yoga teaches us to let go of these fears and so to realize the abundance around us and within us.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Willpower is concrete, not ethereal. When you do something, you demonstrate your willpower, and it becomes all the easier to have the same power of will the next time.

B. K. S. Iyengar
The needs of the body are the needs of the divine spirit which lives through the body.

B. K. S. Iyengar
After a session of yoga, the mind becomes tranquil and passive.

B. K. S. Iyengar
A stable mind is like the hub of a wheel. The world may spin around you, but the mind is steady.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Yoga is an interior penetration leading to integration of being, senses, breath, mind, intelligence, consciousness, and Self. It is definitely an inward journey, evolution through involution, toward the Soul, which in turn desires to emerge and embrace you in its glory.

B. K. S. Iyengar
You must be as joyful when you fail again and again as you are joyful when you succeed. It is often when you fail that you move toward the goal without being aware of it. You must feel joy even when you have not fully succeeded but only moved toward achievement of your goal.

B. K. S. Iyengar
When you cannot hold the body still, you cannot hold the brain still. If you do not know the silence of the body, you cannot understand the silence of the mind. Action and silence have to go together. If there is action, there must also be silence. If there is silence, there can be conscious action and not just motion.

B. K. S. Iyengar
The lotus grows in muddy waters but this flower does not show any trace of it: So we have to live in the world.

B. K. S. Iyengar
You must do the asana with your soul. How can you do an asana with your soul? We can only do it with the organ of the body that is closest to the soul - the heart. So a virtuous asana is done from the heart and not from the head. Then you are not just doing it, but you are in it. Many people try to think their way into an asana, but you must instead feel your way into it through love and devotion

B. K. S. Iyengar
The primary aim of yoga is to restore the mind to simplicity and peace, and free it from confusion and distress

B. K. S. Iyengar
Whenever asana is done mechanically from the front brain, the action is felt only on the peripheral body, and there is no inner sensation, there is no luminous inner light. If the asana is done with continual reference to the back of the brain, there is a reaction to each action, and there is sensitivity. Then life is not only dynamic, but it is also electrified with life force.

B. K. S. Iyengar
You do not need to seek freedom in some distant land, for it exists within your own body, heart, mind, and soul. Illuminated emancipation, freedom, unalloyed and untainted bliss await you, but you must choose to embark on the Inward Journey to discover it.

B. K. S. Iyengar
Health is not to be mistaken for mere existence. It is the balance of the body, mind and self... there rests the mind. If the breath scatters, the mind wanders. If mind wanders, the breath scatters. So still the breath to still the mind. Mind is the king.

B. K. S. Iyengar
It took me decades to appreciate the depth and true value of Yoga. Sacred texts supported my discoveries, but it was not that signposted the way. What I learned through yoga, I found out through yoga. I am not however, a self made man. I am only what seventy-two years of devoted yoga sadhana has created out of me. Any contribution I have made to the world has been the fruit of my sadhana.

B. K. S. Iyengar
If you can adapt to and balance in a world that is always moving and unstable, you learn how to become tolerant to the permanence of change and difference.

B. K. S. Iyengar
The flexibility we gain in asana is the living symbol of the suppleness we gain in relation to life's problems and challenges.

B. K. S. Iyengar