59 Yoga Quotes about Effort and Ease to Balance Life

Yoga is not just about workout, it is certainly a great way to improve your balance and strength while sweating.

Yoga is a unique way to build your power and tenacity during challenging and difficult phases in your life. It is also a great way to confront the deepest and buried emotions that get in the way of your mental tranquility and spiritual progress.

59 Yoga Quotes

1. “The very heart of yoga practice is abhyasa – steady effort in the direction you want to go.” – Sally Kempton

2. “We do yoga to make life more beautiful… to stop misery from entering our world.” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

3. “The ultimate essence of yoga is the contact and the union between the individual consciousness and the divine consciousness.” – Raphael

4. “Since you alone are responsible for your thoughts, only you can change them. You will want to change them when you realize that each thought creates according to its own nature. Remember that the law works at all times and that you are always demonstrating according to the kind of thoughts you habitually entertain. Therefore, start now to think only those thoughts that will bring you health and happiness.” – Paramahansa Yogananda

5. “Yoga is a study of life, study of your body, breath, mind, intellect, memory, and ego. Study of your inner faculties!” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

6. “We all wish for world peace, but world peace will never be achieved unless we first establish peace within our own minds.” – Geshe Kelsang Gyatso

7. “Make an attitude to be in gratitude, you will find the whole Universe will come to you.” – Harbhajan Singh Yogi

8. “The body of a human being is a temple of God. But this temple has to be enlightened and has to be auspicious. You have to clear and clean your being completely so it’s a beautiful temple for God to reside.” – Nirmala Srivastava

9. “In the East, they say suffering is avoidable and not necessary. Life is bliss! You know why? This is because wisdom, yoga, and meditation are ways to avoid suffering which has not yet come.” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

10. “Yoga is not a religion. It is a science, science of well-being, science of youthfulness, science of integrating body, mind, and soul.” – Amit Ray

11. “When mind controls man, it’s… Bhoga (bondage). But when a man controls the mind, it’s… Yoga!” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

12. “The wave uniting with its depth is yoga.” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

13. “Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” – Mahatma Gandhi

14. “Elevate. Each day, live to elevate yourself, each day elevate one person. Make elevation your religion and you shall reach infinity.” – Harbhajan Singh Yogi

15. “Yoga is the golden key that unlocks the door to peace, tranquility, and joy.” – B. K. S. Iyengar

16. “Recognize that you have the courage within you to fulfill the purpose of your birth. Summon forth the power of your inner courage and live the life of your dreams.” – Gurumayi Chidvilasananda

17. “Yoga takes you closer to your true nature. Yoga with its techniques helps you to harmonize with nature. Peace is our very nature, and yoga leads you to inner peace.” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

18. “Being empowered includes developing the powerful qualities that lead human beings to cultivate wellness and healing. And those are the same qualities that enhance all relationships on earth and reduce stress (which seems to be the largest precursor to disease)-gentle ness, calmness, patience, humility, compassion, and gratitude.” – Bryan Kest

19. “Yoga is a light, which once lit, will never dim. The better your practice, the brighter the flame.” – B. K. S. Iyengar

20. “Yoga is the artwork of awareness on the canvas of body, mind, and soul.” – Amit Ray

21. “Your mind, emotions and body are instruments and the way you align and tune them determines how well you play life.” – Harbhajan Singh Yogi

22. “Peace is our very nature, and yoga leads you to inner peace.” – Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

23. “Yoga cultivates the ways of maintaining a balanced attitude in day-to-day life and endows skill in the performance of one’s actions.” – B.K.S. Iyengar

24. “What is meditation? When you empty yourself and let the universe come in you.” – Harbhajan Singh Yogi

25. “Take up one idea. Make that one idea your life; dream of it; think of it; live on that idea. Let the brain, the body, muscles, nerves, every part of your body be full of that idea, and just leave every other idea alone. This is the way to success, and this is the way great spiritual giants are produced.” – Swami Vivekananda

26. “We are not going to change the whole world, but we can change ourselves and feel free as birds. We can be serene even in the midst of calamities and, by our serenity, make others more tranquil. Serenity is contagious. If we smile at someone, he or she will smile back. And a smile costs nothing. We should plague everyone with joy. If we are to die in a minute, why not die happily, laughing?” – Swami Satchidananda

27. “Crying is one of the highest devotional songs. One who knows crying, knows spiritual practice. If you can cry with a pure heart, nothing else compares to such a prayer. Crying includes all the principles of Yoga.” – Kripalvanandji

28. “Undisturbed calmness of mind is attained by cultivating friendliness toward the happy, compassion for the unhappy, delight in the virtuous, and indifference toward the wicked.” – Patañjali

29. “Yoga means addition – addition of energy, strength and beauty to body, mind and soul.” – Amit Ray

30. “Meditation is a way for nourishing and blossoming the divinity within you.” – Amit Ray

31. “Exercises are like prose, whereas yoga is the poetry of movements. Once you understand the grammar of yoga; you can write your poetry of movements.” – Amit Ray

32. “Our stresses, anxieties, pains, and problems arise because we do not see the world, others, or even ourselves as worthy of love.” – Prem Prakash

33. “Self-observation is the first step of inner unfolding.” – Amit Ray

34. “As spiritual searchers we need to become freer and freer of the attachment to our own smallness in which we get occupied with me-me-me. Pondering on large ideas or standing in front of things which remind us of a vast scale can free us from acquisitiveness and competitiveness and from our likes and dislikes. If we sit with an increasing stillness of the body, and attune our mind to the sky or to the ocean or to the myriad stars at night, or any other indicators of vastness, the mind gradually stills and the heart is filled with quiet joy. Also, recalling our own experiences in which we acted generously or with compassion for the simple delight of it without expectation of any gain can give us more confidence in the existence of a deeper goodness from which we may deviate.” – Ravi Ravindara

35. “We all are so deeply interconnected; we have no option but to love all. Be kind and do good for any one and that will be reflected. The ripples of the kind heart are the highest blessings of the Universe.” – Amit Ray

36. “Yoga, an ancient but perfect science, deals with the evolution of humanity. This evolution includes all aspects of one’s being, from bodily health to self realization. Yoga means union – the union of body with consciousness and consciousness with the soul. Yoga cultivates the ways of maintaining a balanced attitude in day to day life and endows skill in the performance of one’s actions.” – B. K. S. Iyengar

37. “When you catch yourself slipping into a pool of negativity, notice how it derives from nothing other than resistance to the current situation.” – Donna Quesada

38. “If you have done something meritorious, you experience pleasure and happiness; if wrong things, suffering. A happy or unhappy life is your own creation. Nobody else is responsible. If you remember this, you won’t find fault with anybody. You are your own best friend as well as your worst enemy.” – Swami Satchidananda

39. “You cannot always control what goes on outside. But you can always control what goes on inside.” – Mr. Yoga

40. “When the breath wanders the mind also is unsteady. But when the breath is calmed the mind too will be still, and the yogi achieves long life. Therefore, one should learn to control the breath.” – Hatha Yoga Pradipika

41. “Yoga has a sly, clever way of short-circuiting the mental patterns that cause anxiety.” – Baxter Bell

42. “For me, yoga is not just a workout – it’s about working on yourself.” – Mary Glover

43. “Yoga teaches us to cure what need not be endured and endure what cannot be cured.” – B. K. S. Iyengar

44. “Chair pose is a defiance of spirit, showing how high you can reach even when you’re forced down.” – Unknown

45. “Yoga is the perfect opportunity to be curious about who you are.” – Jason Crandell

46. “Warrior pose battles inner weakness and wins focus. You see that there is no war within you. You’re on your own side, and you are your own strength.” – Unknown

47. “Yoga is the fountain of youth. You’re only as young as your spine is flexible.” – Bob Harper

48. “Yoga is possible for anybody who really wants it. Yoga is universal… but don’t approach yoga with a business mind looking for worldly gain.” – Sri Krishna Pattabhi Jois

49. “Yoga is 99% practice and 1% theory.” – Sri Krishna Pattabhi Jois

50. “Mountain pose teaches us, literally, how to stand on our own two feet… teaching us to root ourselves into the earth… our bodies become a connection between heaven and earth.” – Carol Krucoff

51. “For those wounded by civilization, yoga is the most healing salve.” – T. Guillemets

52. “Anyone who practices can obtain success in yoga but not one who is lazy. Constant practice alone is the secret of success.” – Hatha Yoga Pradipika

53. “Yoga exists in the world because everything is linked.” – Desikashar

54. “This calm steadiness of the senses is called yoga. Then one should become watchful, becomes yoga comes and go.” – Katha Upanishad

55. “You can enter yoga, or the path of yoga, only when you are totally frustrated with your own mind as it is. If you are still hoping that you can gain something through your mind, yoga is not for you.” – Osho

56. “Yoga is really trying to liberate us from… shame about our bodies. To love your body is a very important thing — I think the health of your mind depends on your being able to love your body.” – Rodney Yee

57. “This yoga should be practiced with firm determination and perseverance, without any mental reservation or doubts.” – Bhagavad Gita

58. “Yoga is a science, and not a vague dreamy drifting or imagining. It is an applied science, a systematized collection of laws applied to bring about a definite end. It takes up the laws of psychology, applicable to the unfolding of the whole consciousness of man on every plane, in every world, and applies those rationally in a particular case. This rational application of the laws of unfolding consciousness acts exactly on the same principles that you see applied around you every day in other departments of science.” – Annie Wood Beasant

59. “Yoga is about clearing away whatever is in us that prevents our living in the most full and whole way. With yoga, we become aware of how and where we are restricted — in body, mind, and heart — and how gradually to open and release these blockages. As these blockages are cleared, our energy is freed. We start to feel more harmonious, more at one with ourselves. Our lives begin to flow — or we begin to flow more in our lives.” – Cybele Tomlinson

Final Thoughts

Yoga is a lifestyle. Most yoga practitioners refer to the mat as a sanctuary, and if you are moved by the yoga quotes listed above, you too will understand its essence.

I hope these collections of quote helped remind you to connect with your inner self once in a while, so get on your mats and get grounded.