When "women's yoga" appeared

Once upon a time, back in the pre-Facebook era of the world, Yoga was not female. But it wasn't male either. It wasn't pink, it wasn't holistic, it wasn't hormone harmonizing, it wasn't ylang-ylanged. Yoga it was simply: silence, awareness, self-discipline. In the desert of ego, a source.

Then something happened.

One afternoon, as the sunset produced a particularly Instagram-worthy range of colours, someone exclaimed:

"What if we did women's yoga?!"

The others did not understand at first.

- I mean... what?
- Well, something that soft, adapted to the cycle, fragrant, heart chakra, self-loving, self-admitted... and preferably include a female circle with petals.
- But yoga is not a man's sport...
- Yes, but this will be different. This is... female energy!

And so it was.

The birth of women's yoga:

A logo, an Instagram page, a group photo with a floral wreath and a playlist featuring Nessi Gomes, Loreena McKennitt and The Sound of the Womb were endless. Along with the Sanskrit mantras came new slogans:

• "Allow yourself to relax."
• "Your womb is wise."
• "You don't need to be enlightened. It's enough to be soft."

In classical yoga, the body is not used for a gender role, but sacral structure belong to. The body śakti, the mind śiva - and these are present in all practitioners, regardless of gender.

But women's yoga is often (with respect to the exception) confuses spirituality with self-comfort. The goal of practice is not to transcend the self, but to "love" the self. The samsara does not decompose, but dipped in lavender oil.

Fictional rites vs. real initiation:

They appear frequently in the world of women's yoga:

• "Uterine cleansing" exercises (i.e. sitting and listening to what your uterus has to say).
• Moon circle attunements, where the cycle becomes a divine mystery - while the cycle is biology and consciousness is transcendent, and mixing the two is like looking for the absolute in a tampon advert.
• Goddess activation - because a goddess is never tired, she just "retreats into the abyss" (or simply gets fed up with workshops).

What if we let go of "women's yoga," "men's yoga," "menopause yoga," "biodynamic trans-hip yoga flow" - and simply we would return to silence?

What if. the practice is not an affirmation of identitybut to dismantle it? What if yoga would not say "I am good like this", but would ask "who am I really?"

And what if the true sanctity of the female soul was not in the softness but in the in the sovereign power of consciousness lies in what is shockingly simple: attention, presence, renunciation.

Because yoga has never excluded women.
But marketing is.