Nadia Gilani - A Reclamation of the Principles of Anti-Colonial Yoga Practice
“We're living in a world that doesn't really want us to change our mind or make mistakes.” - Nadia Gilani
I love fangirling over my guests and today is no exception. I’ve followed Nadia Gilani, a London-based yoga teacher and author of The Yoga Manifesto, for a long time. She is what I describe as “a warrior pose of a woman”. Sure, we could minimize this conversation to appropriation vs. apprectiaion within the retail-oriented, whitewashed atmosphere of modern yoga but our conversation goes much deeper. Like a good asana, we’re inviting folks to explore their relationship to yoga and its tenets, question the teachers, and consider how our favorite classes are taught and sold. I love yoga. I love teaching it. I love practicing it. But I also love being skeptical of what I’m being fed which is why I love Nadia’s perspectives.
"I don't think yoga belongs to any of us in the sense that none of us owns it. I'm not even Indian. I'm of Pakistani heritage," says Nadia. "It doesn’t belong any more to me because of ancestral lineage than to you. It's an ancient practice, a spiritual practice rather than a religious one. I see it as a secular practice also, which has offended some people." If no one owns yoga, that absolutely extends to white Western folks, but we sure have "innovated" the practice into something well beyond its original spirit. Our capitalist and competitive scene still promotes exclusivity to those who live an able-bodied, racially homogenized, and financially comfortable life. Capitalism will have you saying, “I need to do a handstand like that teacher on Instagram.” Yoga will have you saying, “I wonder what my body needs” instead.
Neither Nadia nor I view able-bodied, white students as the problem with yoga. I’m one of them, that would be pretty hypocritical. Instead, we are skeptical of teacher trainings and studios that foster (either consciously or unconsciously) a colonizer POV, dismiss the origins of yoga and the contributions of all bodies. "I don't think it's enough not to take other people's stuff, and not to take more than your fair share," Nadia says. "That's important. But then, why don't we flip that around and think about generosity? We need to do it with respect and integrity. The classes are getting quite mixed up with alcohol, puppies and goats, music that turns it into a rave." Listen, I love my dogs, but they are not conducive to the self-exploration that I’m trying to get from my yoga practice.
There’s no right or wrong wat to asana (that’s colonizer thinking!). Nadia is here to gracefully encourage everyone to get into a sloppy lotus if that’s where you’re at today, investigate you relationship to this incredible living practice, and question your participation process, whether that’s as a teacher or a student.
Mentioned in this Episode
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Nadia Gilani (she/her) is a yoga teacher and author of The Yoga Manifesto a part-memoir, part-polemic on the wellness industry and state of play within modern yoga.(
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