Wednesday, March 9, 2011

What is yoga?

Have you noticed how yoga has evolved in the last 10 years.  Once known as a practice for those who can only afford to fly to India is now a practice you can do anywhere you go including city parks.  Yoga can hlep you build cardiovascular fitness, strength, stamina, balance, flexibility, and peace of mind.  The only reason why we lose some of these important things about our bodies is because we become to complacent about growing old and then we quit moving.  We can prevent many of things that happen to our bodies which we blame on aging.  Yoga can offer many ways to stay young.
Yoga was originally designed 5,000 years ago by men in India that only wanted to find a way to ease the mind.  They created a way to use the body and the breath to quiet the mind.  Here in the west we have lost most of that tradition and turned yoga into a fitness class and not a mind and body class.  The breathing techniques have been removed along with sounding mantras and chanting.
You can still find some of the history on why we do yoga by reading about the 8 limbs of yoga.  A simple list of them includes the 1.  Yamas (morals guide) 2.  Niyamas (self growth) 3.  Asana (posture) 4.  Pranayama (breathwork) 5.  Pratyhara (sense withdrawal) 6.  Dharana (concentration) 7. Dhyana (meditation)
8.  Samadhi (union).
Next time you go to a yoga class, try to incorporate some of these practices into your class.

No comments:

Post a Comment