Kama: The Desire That Awakens the Soul (and the Hips)

“When you do things from your soul, you feel a river moving in you, a joy.” — Rumi

Desire often gets a bad reputation, especially in spiritual and wellness circles. Who has time to indulge in pleasure these days? But not all desire is something to suppress or fear. In the yoga tradition, desire is not just an impulse — it's a sacred energy. The Sanskrit word Kama refers to this essential human drive: the desire for pleasure, beauty, connection, intimacy, and creativity.

Kama is one of the four desires or aims of life, in yogic philosophy. Along with Dharma (purpose), Artha (material prosperity), and Moksha (liberation), Kama is seen as a necessary and worthy pursuit — provided it is skillfully navigated.

What Is Kama?

At its heart, Kama is the desire to feel deeply alive — to savor beauty, experience joy, cultivate sensuality, and engage with life through the senses. It's the spark that inspires us to dance, create, love, and connect with others.

When Kama is blocked or distorted, desire can show up as clinging, addiction, or frustration. Conversely, when it flows freely from the soul, as Rumi suggests, desire transforms into an inner current of joy — a river of vitality moving within us.

Physical & Emotional Signs You May Need to Reconnect with Kama

• You feel disconnected from pleasure or creativity.

• Your libido is drained or you feel fear of intimacy

• There’s a sense of numbness or rigidity in your body or in your relationships.

• You prioritize responsibility over enjoyment or have a consistently imbalanced work / home life

• You experience tightness or pain in your hips, pelvis, or lower back

• You have a lingering sense that life is passing you by, without savoring its beauty.

  
  

The Hips: The Physical Gateway to Flow

In the body, the hips and pelvis are intimately tied to Kama energy. This is our center of creativity, sexuality, and movement. The hips store emotional tension, especially when desires are unmet, repressed, or denied. When the hips are tight, the whole body can feel stagnant, and our capacity for pleasure and ease can diminish.

Practical Steps To Reconnect With Your Kama

1. Hip-Opening Yoga Postures: Poses like Pigeon (Kapotasana), Lizard (Utthan Pristhasana), Bound Angle (Baddha Konasana), Happy Baby (Ananda Balasana) and Goddess (Utkata Konasana) can help release stored tension, stimulate the parasympathetic nervous system (for relaxation and homeostasis) and create space for energy to flow.

2. Mindful Sensory Engagement: Invite beauty into your life intentionally — listen to music that stirs your soul, surround yourself with colors and textures you love, savor a meal slowly, or spend time in nature.

3. Creative Expression: Dance, paint, sing, write — not for perfection but for the pure joy of expression. Creativity is Kama in action.

4. Breathwork and Pelvic Awareness: Breath practices that emphasize the pelvic floor and lower abdomen can awaken subtle energies in the hips. Try deep belly breathing or pelvic tilts breathing "in" as you tilt your pelvis forward and "out" as you tilt the pelvis backward (flattening the lower back). You can also practice sitting on a balance cushion at work and gently rocking your pelvis or circling you hips. Exercises like these will bring awareness, improved circulation, and mobility to the region.

5. Exploring Desire with Curiosity: Reflect on the questions: What do I long for? What brings me genuine joy? What beauty have I been overlooking? Journaling or meditative inquiry into these questions can reconnect you to authentic desires. In his book The Four Desires, Rod Stryker presents a profound exercise: writing your own eulogy from the perspective of someone who deeply loves you and understands your innermost desires. Imagine you’ve lived the life of your dreams, and it has now come to an end. What would this person say to summarize how you pursued and embraced your true desires throughout your life?

   
   

Kama in Balance

When you attune to Kama skillfully, desire becomes a compass rather than a craving. It guides you toward what is life-enhancing, not life-depleting. Working with your body, especially the hips, can be a doorway to not just physical flexibility but to an inner flexibility with life itself — where joy, creativity, and connection can move freely.

So let the hips open, let the soul stir, and allow that river of joy Rumi speaks of to flow through you once again.