Quotes from Tara Stiles

When we focus mostly on our immediate needs, wants, and desires, we may achieve some of them but hardly feel satisfied. When we feel connected to ourselves on a deeper level, we get happy. We feel safe.

A trap in dealing with difficult people is getting wrapped up in their personality. When we can stay objective and remove ourselves from other people's roller-coaster psychology, we have a much better chance of moving through the situation positively.

A successful tree pose probably won't change your life. Learning how to keep your breath easy, long, and deep no matter what the circumstance? That absolutely will.

When we work on carving out balance in our lives, we are then shuttled to the superhighway of our best life fueled by our intention. The power and confidence comes from the knowledge that we can absolutely do something to achieve balance.

Interactions - whether personal or business, teacher-student, friend to friend, or family member - all call for balance, respect, and compassion.

We all have the power, intuition, and ability to think and act for ourselves until we give that power away. We give our power away because we're bullied into thinking we aren't good enough and someone else must know better than us; therefore, we should give over our instincts and act according to instruction.

A huge problem we face when we're in need is giving up our intuition and blindly following instruction. Letting go works when we are following our hearts, but not so well when we are following a leader.

When we allow distractions to wobble us away from ourselves, that's when our intuition starts to fade and our focus dulls.

There are people who intensely clutch an idea that yoga is a higher system, not to be lowered to the weight loss or even fitness category. This is the same kind of clutching that has kept yoga part of a tightly knit club for so long since its introduction in America.

What fun is life if it's taken so seriously, and what fun is yoga and the search for enlightenment if we are tight, tense, and clenched up from the inside out?

Yoga practice is therapeutic for the body and mind, reminds us of our goodness, energizes our creativity, and inspires.

I think yoga should be for everyone, not just the folks who change their name to something Hindu.

Yoga is not about the history of yoga. Yoga is not about being in a sacred community of the initiated few. Yoga is about uniting inward, which takes place in the present, not the past, in each and every moment.

Yoga, in its authentic form, is a system of health for the body, mind, and spirit. Neglecting an element transforms the practice into something that is not, in fact, yoga.

Practicing yoga has helped me realize a deeper, grounded way of being in the world. I have learned how to communicate in a meaningful way that makes me smile and have learned the super handy skill of efficiency. Use what you need. Rest what you don't.

I started practicing yoga when I was a teenager, studying classical dance. My body and mind were very open but not very strong. I was trusting, excited, passionate, and receptive. All good qualities when balanced with the proper amount of strength and awareness.

It's no secret the benefits of yoga include but are not limited to a healthy body, calm mind, reduced stress, feeling of connectivity with self and the world, increased awareness and sensitivity, and an overall feeling of awesomeness.

Yoga can get at the roots of issues that cause behaviors leading to obesity, heart disease, and stress.

It's a great thing that yoga is so popular.

The world needs yoga. This stuff is powerful and intense. It has the power to harm when held tightly, studied without practice, and posed rigidly. Done right, it also has the ability to heal and cure.

Yoga puts us back in touch with our bodies' needs and equips us with the tools we already have: the intuition and awareness to nourish our bodies properly with wholesome, healthy foods. Yoga doesn't show us how to starve ourselves. That is a terrible disorder, as terrible as overeating.

Yoga and mediation exist whether we choose to acknowledge or practice. It's like a tree. You can walk by the tree and inhale the oxygen it provides consciously or unconsciously. You'll still be benefiting from the tree.

I grew up feeling from a very young age that what was right was right, no matter if God or my teacher said so.

The mere acknowledgment that 'God is watching' can act as a trap, fueling bad behavior, corruption, and guilt, all remedied by God's forgiveness. No personal responsibility is needed - someone on the outside sees whatever we're doing and makes it all OK.