Aparigraha: the yoga practice of letting go

Aparigraha: what the fifth yama teaches about letting go

Open your wardrobe and look down. For a lot of us, the floor is covered in shoes. There's a shelf of jeans in three different sizes, a few hand-me-downs we said yes to, and a dress still carrying its tag. Then we walk through the mall on a Saturday, spot a new pair of boots, and feel the pull all over again.

Aparigraha, the fifth yama of yoga, asks us to look at that pull with a bit of honesty. What are we holding on to, and why?

What aparigraha means

The yamas are the moral observances of yoga, the first of the eight limbs described in the Yoga Sutras. There are five of them, and aparigraha is the last.

The word breaks down simply. Graha means to take or grab. Pari means on all sides. The "a" at the start negates it. Put together, it translates as non-grasping, non-greed or non-attachment. Or in plain Kiwi: don't grab at everything.

The practice is to hold on to what we need, for as long as we need it, and to let it go when its time is up. That applies to our possessions, and just as much to our positions, our status, the people in our lives and the outcomes we chase.

Let go of the fruits of the action

The Bhagavad Gita is a conversation between Krishna and the warrior Arjuna, and one of its best-known teachings sits right at the heart of aparigraha. Krishna tells Arjuna to focus on the action and never on its fruits. The reward shouldn't be the motive. And he adds a warning: don't become attached to doing nothing, either.

That lands differently in a culture that loves outcomes. We talk about manifesting the new job, the house, the body. Often what actually happened is that someone worked hard and took action, and the result followed.

Aparigraha asks us to pour our whole heart into the doing and let the result be what it is. Kristina's favourite example is the pavlova. You don't know whether it's going to crack or sink in the oven. You make it anyway, with as much joy as you can, and accept what comes out.

The scale, the outcome and the person you become

This is where aparigraha meets weight loss. It's very easy to judge a whole week by the number on the scale on Monday morning. When the number drops we feel capable. When it doesn't, we decide we've failed.

Progress is lovely, and it can give the ego a real boost. But it doesn't have to be the only reward. The woman who has started cooking at home instead of ordering takeaways, who has swapped some processed food for plants, is becoming someone new. That change counts whether the scale moved this week or not. The number is an outcome. The person you become along the way is the point.

Fear is a form of grasping too

Attachment to outcomes has a flip side. Sometimes we're so afraid of failing, or even of succeeding, that we never take the first step. We grip the fear as tightly as anyone ever gripped a pair of shoes.

That grip limits us in the same way. Aparigraha invites us to take risks towards what we really want, give it everything, and loosen our hold on whether it works out.

Grasping and the feeling of lack

Most grasping grows out of a sense of lack. We feel a bit empty, so we eat the ice cream. The season changes, so we buy the slightly different shoes everyone's wearing. Over time we start to believe that something outside us can solve what's happening inside.

The yogic view is that nothing outside you can define you, and nothing outside you can solve your problems. The more we accumulate, the more we have to worry about. Possessions bring the fear of losing them.

None of this makes money or comfort wrong. Life is easier when the bills are paid and there's a holiday to look forward to. The practice is to notice the attachment and ask what it's really about.

Aparigraha at the dinner table

Yoga and Ayurveda both treat how we eat as part of the practice. Ayurvedic tradition suggests stopping before you're completely full, at around three-quarters, and overeating is seen as a hindrance on the yogic path. In Okinawa, one of the world's Blue Zones, people follow a similar habit called hara hachi bu, eating until they're about 80 percent full.

Aparigraha also shows up in the fridge. How much of what we buy each week gets thrown out? Shopping for what we'll actually eat, planning meals around the vegetables already in the crisper, and eating the leftover chicken pie before cooking something new are small, practical ways to live this yama. The same goes for clothes, where fast fashion fills our wardrobes and then our landfills.

Holding on to memories

We grasp at memories too, the painful ones and the happy ones. Replaying the past keeps us stuck there. Gripping a feared or hoped-for future does the same. Either way, we miss what's in front of us right now.

When we loosen that grip, life gets simpler. We can be present with what's actually happening and trust that what we need can arrive when it's ready.

How to practise aparigraha this week

Try the 24-hour rule. When you want to buy something, walk away and come back the next day. If you still want it, ask whether it's a need or a want, and what you're hoping it fills.

Then take some time with a journal and these questions:

• What are you attached to that you worry about losing?
• Which memories, painful or positive, do you keep holding on to, and how are they keeping you from this moment?
• Is there a goal you're striving for so hard you've stopped enjoying the process?
• Is there a goal you haven't started because fear is holding you back?

Finally, make a start on the spring clean. Kristina goes through her wardrobe often, and admits there are nights she lies in bed wishing she still had a certain dress. She'd probably only have worn it once more. It's okay.

Back to the wardrobe

So go back to that wardrobe this weekend. Pick up the jeans that haven't fitted in years, the shoes you haven't worn since last winter, the dress with the tag still on. Thank them and take them to the op shop. Next time you open that door, notice the space on the floor, and how much lighter you feel standing in front of it.