An Invitation to Go Through, Not Around: On Yoga of Resilience: Embodying a Practice to Thrive Through Hardship by Kelly B. Golden

By Alyse Bensel

A Welcome to Tantra in Action

The Vira Bhava school now has a book. As Vira Bhava founder Kelly Golden writes, “Yoga as resilience is a practice that builds rather than reduces” (121). Amidst a wide offering of contemporary books on yoga, Golden’s Yoga of Resilience acts as kindling for a tantra practice, drawing from philosophy, psychology, and numerous thinkers and practitioners on yoga and tantra. Yoga of Resilience is situated within a lineage of tantra and Golden’s own journey and experience by offering an entry point to yoga through the many facets of resilience. She opens a compelling door and asks us to follow her across the threshold as she unfurls an intricate tapestry of practices for newer and experienced practitioners alike. 

This is not a self-help book that offers easy fixes or solutions. Hardship and grief are complex and difficult, and what is often viewed as failure and disappointment are often the very ways we find solace and healing during what initially appears to be insurmountable obstacles in our lives. Golden maps out a path that questions, that truly breaks down, why integrating yoga fully into our lives is necessary for resilience. Yet, as she notes, there is no perfect way to do this; the assumptions and judgments about the “correct” way of building resilience, which often lead to avoidance altogether, are often the most significant obstacles we face.

What Is Our Relationship to Resilience?

While resilience may appear to be an individual task, it is not one Golden advises going alone nor approaching with the idea that one day it will be complete. Within the first few pages, Golden emphasizes “Being resilient isn’t a finish line; it’s a state of being, a lifestyle” (13). These early chapters explore the requirements and deeper understanding of resilience and stress and their relationship to yoga. Most important is the firm belief that to be resilient to connect – with the self, others, and the broader world. In doing so, Golden challenges what safety and comfort truly are in these contexts, and how such challenges can allow us to attenuate, assimilate, and integrate obstacles rather than attempting to dismiss, deny, or ignore them. As Golden writes, such work allows us to “[...] show up in all aspects of our lives as resilient, vital, and compassionate human beings” (50).

This inquiring perspective also seeps into the idea of faith and truth, to which Golden applies the tools of surrender, trust, and truth that give us the understanding that “that which is bigger (macrocosm) expresses itself as the particular and unique beauty of the individual instance (microcosm)” (72). However, she cautions us against thinking we will be leaving anything behind through these acts, that we can, as the popular phrase heard in yoga goes, “let go.” Rather, surrender “is a way of entering, not leaving behind” (75). And in doing so, Golden is not offering some miracle or cure-all but action rooted in hope. While she writes many variations and elaborations on defining and explaining resilience, this one is by far a favorite:

“This is resilience: The refusal to hide away from the life that we cannot see or know, the willingness to resist the automatic reactions of protection and control, to take the chance to be hurt again and again, and to meet that with pain and hope every time” (78).

The way to meet resilience is through clarity in action: shifting our energy, clarifying our desires, recognizing the power in our wounds, and opening ourselves up to joy and its opposite, despair. None of these pathways offer bypasses or quick resolutions. The only way is through. 

A Time to Practice

Those familiar with Golden as a teacher and practitioner will recognize the fearless, thoughtful, and ultimately lived experience captured in this book. There is an array of concepts in tantra on display here, from embracing energetics to paradoxes to uncertainty and change. 

From Vira Bhava graduates to those intrigued by tantra practices, Yoga of Resilience offers an engaging entry point for those ready to arrive, wherever they are.