Ahhh, relationships. The word immediately conjures up images of romance, falling in love, chocolates (is that just me?), heartache, sad songs, movies about people who can’t stand each other learning that they’re soul mates (has that ever actually happened?).

In Yoga, relationships mean more than romance. We’re in relationships with everything—not just our significant others, but our families, friends, coworkers, the environment, the food we eat, the air we breathe, the world. We’re in a relationship with everything we interact with; the delicious fair-trade coffee you brewed at breakfast means that halfway around the world, a coffee farmer’s family has the money to afford dinner.

Thinking about our relationships with everything in the world can blow our minds. And maybe it should every now and then, so we mindfully decline the straw we sip from once but that ends up choking a sea turtle. But no mind-blowing right now; let’s focus on how Svadhyaya, or knowing yourself, and some of the Yoga tools I’ve been sharing with you can bring more to the primary relationships in your life.  

Friendships: Where would we be without our friends? Well, that depends on our relationships with them. Is there mutual give and take, or is one person doing most of the giving and the other doing most of the taking? Friendships are meant to withstand some imbalance; when one person is going through a crisis, the others become the support system.

The rest of the time, equal sharing can be maintained with Aparigraha, the Yoga tool of non-hoarding. My practice when getting together with one friend is “You go first,” where she talks and I just listen until it’s my turn. When it’s a group of friends, we go around the table, taking turns giving updates. That means no one person is hoarding time and attention, and everyone gets their fair share.

My practice when getting together with one friend is “You go first,” where she talks and I just listen until it’s my turn.

Romantic partners: It may sound counterintuitive to look at romance in business terms, but check this out: You start out as You, Inc. Then you fall in love with Him or Her Unlimited, and you both decide to create The We Corp. It’s easy to want to throw yourself completely into this awesome merger, but you don’t want to lose all the assets that made You, Inc. such an attractive commodity in the first place.  

To make The We Corp. really successful, you need to maintain some aspects of You, Inc., and let Him or Her Unlimited keep doing business, too. Your Yoga tool in this arena: Satya, or truth, as in maintaining your true identity. We’ve all had the friend who became a different person when she started dating someone with very different interests. (Yep, done that.) We don’t want to be her/me. So keep doing the things you like to do; get together with your friends; go for your goals. The We Corp. will definitely benefit.

Coworkers: There’s one key point about work relationships that will make your life on the job much simpler: Your coworkers—your boss, your office friends, your back stabbing colleagues, everyone you work with—are not your family. We mistake coworkers for family all the time because making things familiar (as in, “like family”) makes them less intimidating. Work can be stressful, so assigning familiar roles to colleagues seems, in our minds, to mean we’ll get along with this tribe better. Unfortunately, this usually makes everything much too personal; the boss yells, and it feels like a parent’s disapproval.

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How can you keep from taking work-related stresses to heart? Recognize that the family dynamic is Maya, an illusion. Your mind fabricated it to make you feel more comfortable, but it’s a falsehood that will bite you in the butt.  See what’s real—the boss is your boss, your coworkers aren’t blood relatives (though some of them may become lifelong friends). When your work relationships are in perspective, your job is less of an emotional rollercoaster.  

Family: Among our biggest and most important roles in this reality show we call life are the parts we play in our families—daughter, mother, sibling, and so on. We are who we are, or so we think; we become different people to our family members in different stages of life. A child taken care of by a parent may one day find herself parenting her now-childlike mother. Or the relationships change entirely: siblings who grew up very close find themselves on opposite sides of politics, turning Thanksgiving into a debate, or cousins you never had much in common with before are now your go-to parenting experts.

A helpful Yoga tool in family relationships is Ishvara Pranidhana, which translates to self-surrender. That doesn’t mean giving up who you are; it means letting go of old ideas that may no longer be useful to you. Ishvara Pranidhana helps you keep your mind open and see where a family relationship is today. That way, you can adapt to your changing roles, as well as those of your family members, and do right by yourself and them.

Yourself: It may seem like some kind of inverse geometric equation to be in a relationship with yourself, but it’s pretty simple. How much of the chatter in your head about yourself and your actions is encouraging, positive, optimistic? How much of it is hypercritical of things like mistakes or your body? Consciously observe your inner dialogue for a day and you’ll find out whether you are your own best friend or worst enemy.

If you found out that your relationship with yourself could use couples’ counseling, employ the Yoga tools Ahimsa (non-harming) and Maitri (kindness). Start by setting a Sankalpa, or intention, vowing to cause no harm to yourself today. If you catch yourself having negative thoughts like “I’m such a dumbass” or “I look horrible,” recognize that as harm. You wouldn’t inflict that on another being, so why inflict it on yourself? Then, enjoy a shot of Maitri with a kind thought about yourself: “I have awesome ideas.” “I’m a really good listener.” And my personal go-to, “The important thing is that my hair looks great.” This one-two combo of Ahimsa and Maitri will soon have you booking extra time with yourself because you adore your own company. Bonus: Others will want some time basking in your good vibes too.

We’ve reached the end of the GrokNation #SoulSelfie Series, but hopefully not the end of using the spiritual tools of Yoga that can make your life a piece of your favorite kind of cake, gluten-free, vegan icing, the works. Let me know how these tools worked for you and if you have any questions.

You are a divine light. Use these tools and you’ll shine brightly on this world, creating happiness and peace. 

Suzan Colón is the author of  Yoga Mind:Beyond the Physical: 30 Days to Enrich Your Practice and Revolutionize Your Life From the Inside Out