By Gurudevi Nirmalananda

When you have just finished a yoga class, you are a more caring and compassionate person. You have noticed this by now. 

Compassion is a quality that arises when you have connected inside. It is part of living “inside out,” our contemplation theme from last month, which is the filling of yourself from the inner spaciousness and then living from this basis.

Yoga clears away the inner clutter and eases you into the vast fullness of your own beingness. From this, all the divine qualities emerge in you, including compassion.

When you are not feeling compassionate, it is because you are hungry. This hunger is more complex than a simple hunger for food, though eating a meal does help. You are more kind and caring after you have eaten compared to before. This is one of the great joys of Thanksgiving. The primary feature of the day is the Great Feast, shared with family and friends.  

But food alone does not fill your deeper hunger, thus it gets projected outward into your life. It shows up in the push of your day — trying to get everything done. It shows up in your relationships — with you trying to make others in your life happy, or maybe you are trying to get them to make you happy (which is infinitely more complicated). 

This hunger or need shows up in your work — as you strive to succeed or to get ahead, or maybe you are just trying to survive the day.

Excerpt from Yoga: Inside & Outside, page 29