Do you know what they are?
If you said flexibility, strength and stamina you are wrong. While these are important attributes they are not the ones that make you successful at yoga.
The 3 key attributes do not depend on your flexibility, strength or stamina. The key attributes are more mental than physical.
These key attributes are
- Belief
- Challenge
- Commitment
The most important of these is Belief. Without belief the other two don’t matter.
1 – Belief
You believe that yoga can help you to improve yourself. It does not matter what your goal is. If you want to be more flexible you need to believe in yourself. If you want to reduce stress you need to believe that yoga is going to make it happen for you.
To be a successful yogi you need to believe that you can do it. And you need a team behind you that believes you can do it as well. Your yoga teachers, your spouse / partner, your friends and your family they all believe in you. They support you in your effort to improve yourself.
Believing in yourself and having a team that believes in you is just the start. You also need to accept the challenge.
2 – Challenge
Taking on a new activity and sticking to it is challenging. Accepting this challenge leads you down the road towards a successful yoga practice.
With belief in yourself, accepting the challenge and making a commitment you will go far with your yoga practice.
You are stepping outside of your comfort zone when you take on a new and challenging activity. You must be willing to accept this challenge.
Life is going to get in the way from time to time. This is a challenge that you will face often. Developing plans to overcome these challenges and get to yoga class moves you further towards your goal.
Working through a yoga practice is challenging as well. You are going to find poses that are going to be difficult to do and other that are going to be impossible.
The successful yogi accepts these challenges and realizes that overtime these difficult poses will become routine.
You need one more thing to complete the set of attributes. You need commitment
3 – Commitment
For any sort of success in life you have to be committed. A yoga practice is no different.
Coming three times one week and missing a week or two is not going to cut it. The successful yogi commits to turning up on a regular basis, week after week.
Committing to put in the effort day after day for the long haul is a major step on the path of becoming a successful yogi.
Finally you need to commit yourself to turning up even when it is inconvenient.
Summary
The 3 key attributes of a successful yoga student have nothing to do with your physical body. They have everything to do with your mind.
Having a belief in yourself and your ability to develop a yoga practice is the first step. Believing that you can reach your goal with yoga gets you started.
Accepting that yoga is a challenging practice will help you to work through the difficult times.
Finally committing to put in the effort on a regular and frequent basis week after week will turn you into a successful yogi.
Next Steps
Talk to your teacher about your goals for your yoga practice. Together you can create a plan to reach those goals. Your teacher will guide you down that path one inch pebble at a time.
Additional Reading
Here is a list of many articles that will support you through the process of developing the 3 key attributes of a successful yogi.
Frequency
– How many times a week should you do yoga
– Why do people succeed at yoga?
Chaos planning
– How to keep your practice going when Chaos strikes
– How to keep your daily yoga practice going when the dragons strike
– How the Resistance game keeps moving your yoga practice forward
Goal setting
– How to use Hansel’s inch pebbles to enhance your yoga practice
– How to develop a concrete goal for your yoga practice
