Yamas and Niyamas with Real-Life Examples

Living Yoga Beyond the Mat

The yamas and niyamas are the first two limbs of Patanjali’s eight-limbed yoga. They form the ethical foundation without which the other practices - asana, pranayama, meditation - cannot reach their full potential. Understanding them philosophically is one thing; living them daily is another.

This article provides practical examples of what each yama and niyama looks like in contemporary life - not in ancient ashrams but in modern homes, workplaces, and relationships.

The Five Yamas: External Ethics

The yamas govern our relationship with others and the world. They are sometimes called restraints because they ask us to restrain harmful tendencies.

1. Ahimsa (Non-Violence)

Principle: Do no harm - in action, speech, and thought.

What it looks like in daily life:

• In speech: Choosing words that don’t wound. Not gossiping about coworkers. Refraining from harsh criticism, even when frustrated. Not using sarcasm to belittle.

• In action: Being gentle with your body during asana practice rather than forcing poses. Not slamming doors when angry. Choosing products that minimize harm to animals and environment.

• In thought: Catching self-critical thoughts before they spiral. Not mentally rehearsing arguments. Not wishing ill on others, even those who’ve hurt you.

• At work: Declining to participate in office gossip. Speaking up when someone is being treated unfairly. Not throwing colleagues under the bus.

• The subtle dimension: Recognizing that violence often wears disguises - “helpful” criticism, “just joking,” passive aggression. Ahimsa asks us to examine our intentions.

Common challenges: “I’m not violent - I’ve never hit anyone!” Physical violence is obvious; emotional and verbal violence are subtler but equally harmful. The spiritual practitioner notices the violence in an eye roll, a cold shoulder, a cutting remark.

2. Satya (Truthfulness)

Principle: Align speech with reality. Don’t deceive.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Basic honesty: Not lying about why you’re late. Not exaggerating accomplishments. Not making excuses when you’ve simply made a mistake.

• In relationships: Being honest about your feelings rather than expecting your partner to read your mind. Having difficult conversations rather than avoiding them. Not saying “I’m fine” when you’re not.

• At work: Not overselling your capabilities. Admitting when you don’t know something. Not taking credit for others’ work.

• With yourself: Honest self-assessment about your strengths and weaknesses. Not fooling yourself about unhealthy patterns. Seeing situations as they are, not as you wish they were.

• In harmony with ahimsa: Truth that harms unnecessarily is not satya. “Your outfit is ugly” may be true but violates ahimsa. Satya seeks truth that serves, not truth as a weapon.

Common challenges: White lies, social politeness, avoiding conflict through omission. Satya asks us to notice where we bend truth for convenience - and to consider whether that serves or hinders our integrity.

3. Asteya (Non-Stealing)

Principle: Don’t take what isn’t given. Respect what belongs to others.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Beyond property: Yes, don’t shoplift - but also don’t steal time (showing up late habitually), attention (dominating conversations), credit (claiming others’ work), or energy (dumping your problems on others without reciprocity).

• At work: Not padding expense reports. Not using company time for personal business excessively. Not stealing intellectual property or ideas.

• In relationships: Not taking your partner for granted. Not depleting someone’s energy and giving nothing back. Respecting others’ boundaries.

• With creativity: Properly attributing sources. Not plagiarizing. Acknowledging influences and teachers.

• With nature: Not taking more from the environment than you need. Awareness of overconsumption.

Common challenges: Digital piracy, “borrowing” ideas, taking more than your share in communal situations. Asteya asks us to notice the countless small ways we take what isn’t ours - and the sense of scarcity that drives such behavior.

4. Brahmacharya (Right Use of Energy)

Principle: Direct vital energy toward higher purposes. Traditionally: celibacy. More broadly: wise use of sexual and creative energy.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Energy management: Noticing where your energy goes and making conscious choices. Not depleting yourself through overwork, overstimulation, or excess.

• With sexuality: In traditional interpretation, celibacy or sex only within committed relationship. In modern interpretation, conscious sexuality - not using sex for validation, manipulation, or escape.

• With consumption: Not numbing yourself with food, alcohol, screens, or shopping. Recognizing when consumption substitutes for addressing real needs.

• With creativity: Channeling creative energy into meaningful work rather than dissipating it through distraction.

• With media: Being selective about what you consume - news, entertainment, social media. Recognizing when input depletes rather than nourishes.

Common challenges: Modern life offers infinite ways to leak energy - doomscrolling, binge-watching, mindless consumption. Brahmacharya asks us to become conscious stewards of our vitality.

5. Aparigraha (Non-Possessiveness)

Principle: Don’t grasp or accumulate unnecessarily. Let go of attachments.

What it looks like in daily life:

• With possessions: Keeping what you need and use; releasing what you don’t. Not buying things to fill emotional voids. Recognizing when “retail therapy” is avoidance.

• With people: Not clinging to relationships out of fear. Not trying to possess your partner, children, or friends. Allowing others to be themselves.

• With outcomes: Working diligently without attaching to results. Not grasping at success or dreading failure. Doing your best and releasing the rest.

• With identity: Not clinging to self-image. Allowing yourself to change and grow. Not being defined by roles, possessions, or achievements.

• With life stages: Accepting aging, change, and transition. Not grasping at youth, the past, or how things “should” be.

Common challenges: Living in a consumer culture makes aparigraha difficult. We’re trained to want more, acquire more, hold tighter. Aparigraha asks us to find security within rather than in accumulation.

The Five Niyamas: Internal Practices

The niyamas govern our relationship with ourselves. They are personal practices that prepare the inner life for deeper work.

1. Saucha (Cleanliness)

Principle: Maintain purity of body, speech, and mind.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Physical: Basic hygiene, clean living space, pure diet. The Ayurvedic daily routine (dinacharya) is an extended practice of saucha.

• Environmental: Creating spaces that support clarity. Decluttering. Not accumulating physical or digital clutter.

• Mental: Noticing what you let into your mind through media, conversation, and thought. Choosing inputs that clarify rather than muddy.

• Dietary: Eating fresh, wholesome food. Minimizing substances that cloud awareness. Conscious eating.

• Speech: Speaking clearly, avoiding crude or negative speech that pollutes your own mind.

Common challenges: We often underestimate how physical environment affects mental state. Saucha asks us to notice: does this space, food, media, or conversation make my mind clearer or more agitated?

2. Santosha (Contentment)

Principle: Find peace with what is. Cultivate sufficiency.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Accepting circumstances: Not meaning passive resignation, but releasing the constant argument with reality. “This is how things are right now” as a starting point.

• Gratitude practice: Actively noticing what you have rather than fixating on what you lack. Simple gratitude at meals, before sleep, upon waking.

• Comparison detox: Noticing when social comparison steals contentment. Not measuring your insides against others’ outsides.

• Enough: Recognizing when you have enough. Not endlessly striving for more, better, different.

• Present moment: Contentment is here or nowhere. Not “I’ll be happy when…” but finding completeness in this moment.

Common challenges: Culture trains us toward perpetual dissatisfaction - it sells products. Santosha is counter-cultural: radical acceptance that you are enough, have enough, and this moment is enough.

3. Tapas (Discipline/Heat)

Principle: Generate the heat of transformation through discipline and effort.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Daily practice: Showing up consistently for yoga, meditation, or whatever practice you’ve committed to - especially when you don’t feel like it.

• Discomfort tolerance: Not always choosing the comfortable option. Taking cold showers. Fasting. Sitting with difficult emotions rather than numbing them.

• Following through: Completing what you start. Keeping commitments to yourself.

• Working through resistance: Recognizing procrastination and avoidance as patterns to burn through, not indulge.

• Physical tapas: Challenging the body appropriately through asana, exercise, or physical work - generating heat that purifies.

Common challenges: Modern convenience culture is the opposite of tapas. We’re trained to avoid discomfort at all costs. Tapas asks: what happens if you sit with discomfort instead of escaping it?

4. Svadhyaya (Self-Study)

Principle: Study yourself and study wisdom teachings.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Self-observation: Noticing your patterns, triggers, reactions. Journaling. Therapy. Honest reflection on your behavior.

• Scripture study: Regular engagement with wisdom texts - the Yoga Sutras, Bhagavad Gita, or whatever texts speak to you. Study with attention, not casual reading.

• Mantra practice: Repetition of sacred sounds as a form of svadhyaya - the practice reveals insights over time.

• Seeking feedback: Welcoming input from teachers, partners, and friends. Being willing to see your blind spots.

• Inquiry: Asking “Who am I?” “What is this?” Not accepting easy answers.

Common challenges: It’s easier to study external subjects than to study yourself. Svadhyaya requires courage to see clearly - including parts you’d rather not see.

5. Ishvara Pranidhana (Surrender to the Divine)

Principle: Release the ego’s claim to control. Dedicate actions to something larger than yourself.

What it looks like in daily life:

• Offering practice: Dedicating the fruits of your work to the divine, to the welfare of all beings, to something beyond personal gain.

• Accepting grace: Receiving help, luck, and blessing without claiming credit. Acknowledging that not everything is earned.

• Releasing control: Recognizing the limits of personal will. Doing your best and surrendering outcomes.

• Prayer or devotion: Whatever form this takes for you - formal prayer, nature connection, sitting in awe, service.

• Dying to the small self: Not in a nihilistic way, but allowing the constricted ego perspective to relax into something larger.

Common challenges: Modern secular culture has little framework for this. Ishvara pranidhana doesn’t require specific religious belief - it requires recognizing that you’re not the center of the universe and that control is largely illusion.

Common Misunderstandings

Perfectionism: The yamas and niyamas are not rules to follow perfectly. They’re practices to engage with over a lifetime. Progress, not perfection.

Moralizing: These aren’t commandments to impose on others. They’re personal practices for your own development.

All or nothing: You don’t have to master one before working on another. They develop together over time.

External focus: It’s easier to see others’ violations than our own. The practice is internal work first.

A Weekly Practice Plan

If this feels overwhelming, try focusing on one yama or niyama per week:

Week 1: Ahimsa - Notice every impulse toward harm, however small Week 2: Satya - Notice where you bend truth Week 3: Asteya - Notice what you take without giving Week 4: Brahmacharya - Notice where your energy goes Week 5: Aparigraha - Notice grasping and releasing Week 6: Saucha - Clean one area of life thoroughly Week 7: Santosha - Practice gratitude daily Week 8: Tapas - Do something difficult each day Week 9: Svadhyaya - Journal about patterns you notice Week 10: Ishvara Pranidhana - Offer each day’s work to something larger

Then cycle through again, going deeper.

The yamas and niyamas are not separate from the rest of practice - they are the foundation that makes everything else possible. Without ethical grounding, asana becomes mere exercise and meditation becomes spiritual bypassing.

For related concepts, see The Eight Limbs, Yamas and Niyamas, The Yoga Sutras, and Daily Practice.