After reading our blog recently a friend asked, "So are you still doing yoga in India or are you guys just travelling now?" We are most certainly practicing and studying yoga - every day. But I realise that recent postings have focused on travel which may have been misleading. So, my next few postings are dedicated to yoga, the reason we came to India 3 months ago.
There is so much to write about yoga, and it is a deeply personal experience - which is probably why I have tended to write about other things. But here goes, without getting too deep or personal!
To many people, especially we westerners, yoga means getting yourself into strange postures and/or breathing deeply. In the West, yoga has largely become synonymous with physical exercise. That is certainly how Erik and I first came to yoga at World Class Fitness gym in Stockholm 3years or so. And yes, just that aspect has brought us great physical benefits. As a result of this "body" focus, all kinds of "physical yogas types" have sprung up - power yoga, vinyasa flow, bikram, and two from New York that made us smile... "rock your chakras" and "extreme Buddha!"
However, yoga is in fact one of the 6 orthodox philosophies of India with a far greater ambition than body strength and flexibility. It is described as a system, or a set of practices, to realise the true self as other than the body, mind and senses. In this broader view, the physical posture practice (or asana as it's called) is only one of the practices to master.
There are 8 parts, or limbs, to yoga that should be mastered in this sequence.
Over the last couple of years, we have become more interested in Eastern philosophies, how they might be relevant to us and which aspects we might integrate into our lives. So we've been studying the ancient Indian scriptures, reading modern interpretations of those scriptures that are popular in the west, testing some of the theories and practices and seeing what effects they have.
Just to be clear, we're not on some hippy trip, nor are we trying to "find ourselves." Rather we are opening ourselves to learning new things and doing some things differently. We are sure to change our views the more we learn. But hey, it's a journey. I'll stop there on the personal stuff, but I wanted to make the point that what we are doing here in India is lots of yoga, but it's much more than learning how to contort our middle-aged bodies into pretzel shapes!
But we do think it would be cool to do that!!!
There is so much to write about yoga, and it is a deeply personal experience - which is probably why I have tended to write about other things. But here goes, without getting too deep or personal!
To many people, especially we westerners, yoga means getting yourself into strange postures and/or breathing deeply. In the West, yoga has largely become synonymous with physical exercise. That is certainly how Erik and I first came to yoga at World Class Fitness gym in Stockholm 3years or so. And yes, just that aspect has brought us great physical benefits. As a result of this "body" focus, all kinds of "physical yogas types" have sprung up - power yoga, vinyasa flow, bikram, and two from New York that made us smile... "rock your chakras" and "extreme Buddha!"
However, yoga is in fact one of the 6 orthodox philosophies of India with a far greater ambition than body strength and flexibility. It is described as a system, or a set of practices, to realise the true self as other than the body, mind and senses. In this broader view, the physical posture practice (or asana as it's called) is only one of the practices to master.
There are 8 parts, or limbs, to yoga that should be mastered in this sequence.
- Yama - abstentions, moral restraints - how you should relate to others
- Niyama - ethical observances - how you cultivate your own lifestyle
- Asana - posture - preparing the body to sit in long periods of meditation
- Pranayama - breath control - fixing the mind on breath control
- Pratyahara - sense withdrawal - removing all engagement with sense objects
- Dharana - concentration
- Dhyana - meditation
- Samadhi - full meditative absorption - realization, or enlightenment
Over the last couple of years, we have become more interested in Eastern philosophies, how they might be relevant to us and which aspects we might integrate into our lives. So we've been studying the ancient Indian scriptures, reading modern interpretations of those scriptures that are popular in the west, testing some of the theories and practices and seeing what effects they have.
Just to be clear, we're not on some hippy trip, nor are we trying to "find ourselves." Rather we are opening ourselves to learning new things and doing some things differently. We are sure to change our views the more we learn. But hey, it's a journey. I'll stop there on the personal stuff, but I wanted to make the point that what we are doing here in India is lots of yoga, but it's much more than learning how to contort our middle-aged bodies into pretzel shapes!
But we do think it would be cool to do that!!!
Lovely post, Lisa. I'm constantly thinking about you and Eric as I try to do a better downward dog and look forward to some day in the distant future that I might achieve a crow pose :-)
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