The Ethics of Yoga Wear
When I learned that the fashion industry is responsible for wide-scale human, animal, and environmental injustice, I drew on my ten years of experience and connections as a fashion model to advocate for ethical style. As a student of yoga, I wanted to understand how the values and ethics of yoga could support me off the mat in making more ethical clothing choices, so I asked myself:
“Am I truly practicing yoga if I choose to wear clothing produced unethically?”
Like many other yoga practitioners in the West, I was introduced to yoga by performing asanas (postures), pranayama (breath work) and dhyana (meditation). Yet I was unaware that while these practices are integral, yoga is essentially the practice of ethics. The Yoga Sutra - written by Pantanjali almost two thousand years ago - features the practice of yama (ethics) as the first of eight limbs on the classical yoga path.
As the late yoga Guru B.K.S. Iyengar states in Light on Life: The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate Freedom: “The principles of yama are essential to evolution at every level...one cannot grow spiritually without increasing one's moral and ethical awareness. Yama is the foundation of yoga.”
Yama is a universal code of ethical conduct—transcending creed, country, age and time—to assist us in overcoming unnecessary suffering caused by emotions such as greed, desire, and attachment.
By practicing the five yamas—ahimsa (non-harming); satya (truthfulness); asteya (non-stealing); brahmacharya (energy moderation); and aparigraha (non-attachment)—we find union or harmony between our inner and outer worlds, expressed as personal fulfilment which benefits society and the natural environment.
“I’ve found it challenging to apply the yamas in my life, especially in making more ethical fashion choices.”
There have been many interpretations on how to understand and apply Patanjali’s ethical guidelines to our daily lives. However, society has become more complex since Patanjali wrote the ethical guidelines for yoga, and I’ve found it challenging to apply the yamas in my life, especially in making more ethical fashion choices.
The fashion industry supply-chain is globalised, complex and less transparent, making the seemingly simple task of buying, owning and using clothing in an environmentally and socially responsible way challenging, but not impossible.
Take ahimsa, the first and most important yama, which can be translated as non-violence or non-harming. When we are aligned with ahimsa, we cultivate a loving state-of-mind and intention by taking responsibility for our own harmful actions. We also attempt to stop any harm or suffering to other beings and the natural environment. Legendary human rights activist and yogi, Mahatma Gandhi famously stated that:
“There is no beauty in the finest cloth if it makes hunger and unhappiness.”
By applying ahimsa we can make choices that reduces the suffering in the fashion industry by ensuring that the people who made our clothing received a fair living wage and conditions (social responsibility); choosing not to support the killing and inhumane treatment of animals by refusing to wear brand new animal fur or leather (animal rights); and purchasing organic cotton that is naturally dyed so it is less detrimental on the environment (environmental responsibility).
I invite you to think about which values and ethical fashion principles appeal most to you and apply them in a compassionate and unique way. Because as Iyengar explains in his book Light on Yoga:
“Ignorance has no beginning, but it has an end. There is a beginning but no end to knowledge.”