What Is Yoga?
Yoga is freedom. It is love. It is natural, radiant, unobstructed joy. It
is pure attention, huge-awake and clean.
~ Richard Freeman, director of The Yoga Workshop, in Boulder, CO
Here inside the United States, on the cusp of 2006, just about anyone has heard the word "yoga." For many if no longer most, the phrase conjures pix of scantily-clad beings with increasing and twisting limbs: a nicely-worn "scene" in health clubs, retreat centers, and yoga areas during the u . S .. In other phrases, it brings to mind the exercise of asana ~ sequences of bodily movements and postures ~ which, because it seems, constitute just a tiny slice of the entire "pie" that is the Yoga Tradition(s) of the larger global (universe, cosmos). Now there's not anything incorrect with the exercise of asana (I do it myself, and discover it pretty first rate!), however it might be useful so that you can region this precise element of yoga onto its large "map" ~ to have a experience of the way of life(s) from which it arises and to which it returns, and to understand asana to be simply one of many viable access-points into this massive and exquisite territory. So permit's discover ...
The word Yoga originates from the Sanskrit word Yuj (actually, "to yoke") and is typically translated as "union" or "integration" -- to yoke, attach, be part of, or unite. The "union" mentioned here is that of the individual soul with the cosmos, the Supreme; of the small "self" of ego/character identity with the bigger "Self" or "Spirit" of which we'll all a component. But what does this mean? And how to we get there?! It is inside the quest to reply those questions that the numerous Yoga traditions have arisen.
Perhaps the broadest categorization in the global of Yoga is alongside the lines of the incredible non secular traditions of the world, and particularly, their mystical wings/branches: Those inside these traditions who become aware of as "mystics" are searching for yoga, or direct (unmediated) union, with the Divine. Examples of Yoga at this level encompass: Buddhist Yoga (e.G. The "six Yogas of Naropa"); Taoist Yoga (typically referred to as Qigong ~ the premise for all the martial & restoration arts with origins in China); and the Yogas associated with the so-called "Hindu" traditions of India.
The exercise of asana, as it's satisfactory known in this united states, falls into the closing of those categories: the Hindu Yoga traditions. But this lifestyle itself has severa elements. One manner of looking at it is thru the lens of "The Six Yoga Systems," which may be understood as six one of a kind doorways, access-points, portals, or vehicles via which a practitioner might method, have interaction with, and input the territory of Yoga.
The Six Yoga Systems
1.Hatha Yoga is the category under which asana falls. One manner of translating the word "Hatha" is to break it into elements: "ha"=sun and "tha"=moon. Sun and moon, in this context, refer to the 2 opposite currents that modify all procedures in our body: the "masculine" and the "feminine," or ~ in phrases of subtle anatomy, the pingala and the , the two nadis, or channels of power, whose union in the crucial channel of the shushumna nadi is ~ for those training on this lifestyle, the very definition of Yoga. Aside from being, in the manner described above, a automobile for mystical union, the asanas ~ on a extra mundane level ~ are amazing for improving fitness & strengthening the anxious system ... And this is understood to be the first and a vital step alongside this route. Forms of Hatha Yoga being practiced inside the United States today include: Ashtanga Vinyasa, Iyengar, Kripalu, Bikrams, and Anusara (to name only a few!).
2.Raja (royal) Yoga is often called the "crown of Hatha Yoga." What makes it the "crown" is its addition ~ to the bodily practices of Hatha Yoga ~ of a sort of mental training meant to enhance concentration to the factor at which it flows into meditation and, in the end, samadhi (that's, for this way of life, the final definition of Yoga). Raja Yoga is thought additionally as Ashtanga (eight-limbed) Yoga. These 8 limbs include:
1. Yamas, or Restraints (harmlessness, truthfulness, non-stealing, manage of senses)
2. Niyamas, or Disciplines (cleanliness, purification of body, mind and worried system, examine of metaphysical standards, contemplation on God)
3. Asanas or Postures
4. Pranayama, or Un-binding of breath and life-currents
5. Pratyahara, or Turning the eye inside, by means of reversing the float of the energy of the experience organs
6. Dharana, or Concentration
7. Dhyana, or Meditation, i.E. Extended intervals of perfect attention and contemplation
8 Samadhi, or Mystical Union
The exposition of Raja Yoga is contained, maximum famously, inside the sage Patanjali's Yoga Sutras.
3. Bhakti Yoga is the Yoga of Devotion, of love for the Divine in its embodied forms. Radha and the opposite Gopis are ~ of their dating to Krishna ~ the archetypal, necessary Bhaktas, for it is thru their love and devotion and pleasure inside the presence of Krishna that they come to recognize themselves as Divine. Selfless love, compassion, humility, and purity, along side this preference and critical aim to merge with God, are traits that are cultivated alongside this course. (Amachi, Shree Ma, and Karunamayi are three contemporary Teachers of this route.)
4.Jnana Yoga (the Yoga of Knowledge) is a Yoga that uses the mind as a device to remember the fact that our genuine Self is behind and past our thoughts. It is, in different phrases, a route which makes use of the strength of the mind to ~ in the end ~ unfastened us from conceptual elaboration of every kind, and permit us to relax inside the space past all standards of mind. For the purpose of this form of Self-discovery, Jnana Yoga probes the character of the Self thru the query "Who am I?" Thus Jnana Yoga is sometimes referred to as the Quest for the Self or the Inquiry into "who we are." (Shankara ~ a yogi "claimed" by the Buddhist in addition to the Hindu traditions ~ and, more lately, Ramana Maharshi are two famous practitioners of Jnana Yoga.)
5.Kriya Yoga is a yogic system masking a wide variety of strategies, together with mantras and strategies of meditation for manipulate of the existence-pressure (prana). The term "Kriya" is regularly used in reference to (supposed or spontaneous) moves which loose the frame and/or thoughts of obstructions. The purpose ~ as in all types of Yoga ~ is to unite with natural Awareness (God). Since pure Awareness is our original condition, it is also, within this device, referred to as Self-recognition. (Yogananda's Self-Realization Fellowship is one example of a cutting-edge business enterprise committed to this form of practice.)
6.Karma Yoga is the Yoga of work/action, of selfless carrier. Practitioners of Karma Yoga have interaction complete-heartedly in the "mundane" paintings of the sector, for the gain of all fellow human (and non-human) beings, and commit the end result in their labors to the Divine. In this motion of letting pass of desire/fear round destiny consequences, interest is introduced more and more completely into the present moment, which is the Heart of the Divine. And so in gifting away all end result of labor, the practitioner ~ mockingly ~ receives, constantly, the greatest of items, the finest wealth: the treasure-house called Yoga, the radiant "aliveness" of the Present Moment.
Yet some other way of dividing the Yogic pie (so scrumptious!) is into the 2 categories of (1) Yoga as course, which consisting of all of the various sadhanas (techniques & practices), faculties & ancient traditions; and (2) Yoga as fruition, which includes the various siddhis, accomplishments or end result, of exercise, as well as the last "fruit" of Mystical Union itself ~ the very last intention ~ which, once acquired, transcends even the path/fruition polarity. At that factor ~ the found out Masters inform us ~ one reveals oneself in a place both new and pretty familiar ... An area eluded to, possibly, by the Sufi mystic/poet, Jelaluddin Rumi, in this poem of his:
Out beyond thoughts of proper-doing and incorrect-doing,
there may be a area. I'll meet you there.
When the soul lies down in that grass,
the arena is simply too full to talk about.
Ideas, language, even the word every different
does not make any sense.
Hope this review (my Karma Yoga for the day!) is beneficial and/or thrilling to you ... And in case you'd like to examine extra approximately these and other Yoga Traditions, one notable aid is Georg Feuerstein's book The Yoga Tradition.
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