Yama and Niyama are popularly interpreted as social and personal codes respectively. Yoga is a holistic system and true to its meaning, it gives inputs to develop ourselves into holistic personalities by introducing us to the foundations of Yoga at the very start. Most of us associate Yoga with postures alone. But Patanjali in his …
Like how we need to choose or develop our own style of Yoga, we also need to customize the practice depending on our gender. Most of the Yoga classes available today conveniently oversee the ‘unique needs of women. Right from the choice of colors, perfumes, outfits, etc., there is a sea of differences in the …
The first element of any spiritual goal (Sadhana) is generally Asana. A trained disciplined mind is our greatest friend. An undisciplined and untrained mind is our greatest enemy. Sadhana is nothing but training and disciplining the mind. To train and discipline the mind we need to work on the mind. To do this we need …
Mantra is one of the most used words today. Not just in the field of spirituality (read Yoga) but even the corporate world and business writers have taken a special liking to this word. Maybe the core meaning of the word ‘mantra’ (means protection) inspired them to use it. Sanskrit is perhaps the only living …
Perhaps knowing fully well the vagaries of today’s life, Swami Satyananda gave us ‘Antar Mouna’ ie inner silence. This practice belongs to the 5th limb of Yoga, pratyahara i.e. withdrawal, but has the potential to lead us into deeper realms of meditation. If you say YES to one or many of the below, then Antar …
Right from schooling, most of us are trained to conform to group thinking. Rarely do parents or teachers allow their wards’ to express creativity or individuality. Questioning is not greatly encouraged though a minority of schools/teachers and parents permit so. When we grow up too, most of us wish to be taken care of by …
Yoga – A Traditional Introduction 1. One of the earliest Yoga texts is Yoga Yajnavalkya, a dialogue between Sage Yajnavalkya and Sage Gargi. 2. Yoga, like any other science, has reference texts for processes as well as guiding principles. The most referred Yoga processes texts are Gheranda Samhita, Siva Samhita, Hatha Yoga Pradipika, Hatha Ratnavali, …
