WHAT IS YOGA?

However, as an overview, yoga has been practiced throughout the world for some 5000 years, and is an active work-out that is essentially made up of a combination of positions, postures and poses. Taken together, these will improve your bodily strength and flexibility while serving to decrease stress levels at the same time by calming the ‘inner you’.

Although for the purposes of this article we are focusing on yoga as a form of exercise, yoga is, in fact, much more than that. It is a complete way of life, one that brings together man’s spirit, mind and body in a unified system of beliefs and actions.

There are several types or branches of yoga, with the exercises that we are going to look at (known as ‘Asanas’) being part of the yogic branch called Hatha Yoga (meaning forced yoga) which is especially popular in the West.

Yogic exercises are made up of many asanas, and they all have varying degrees of difficulty in physical terms. However, the physical degree of difficulty is only part of the story, because many yogic poses are focused less on the physical nature of the pose in question, and far more on the spiritual aspect.

For example, the pose or position that would appear to   be the least demanding from a physical point of   view   is the ‘shava-asana’ or corpse pose. This needs   the   student to lie still on their back, hands by their   side.

 In physical terms it could not be easier, but the point   is  that what is really being attempted is to make the   whole body and mind totally still and relaxed. Without   that total stillness, the ‘shave-asana’ is not actually   complete, according to yogic thinking.

 While keeping your body completely still may not be   that difficult, doing the same with your mind is far   harder, to the extent that many people would find it     all  but impossible. To attempt the ‘shava-asna’ is   therefore extremely easy, but to achieve it properly is   definitely not so.

At the other end of the scale of physical difficulty is the ‘vrischika-asana’ or scorpion pose, as illustrated on the next page.

Achieving this successfully is obviously difficult for anyone who is not extremely fit, strong and flexible, and this pose therefore demonstrates why yoga is such a great form of exercise.

Of course, this is an extremely demanding pose, one that you would probably not recommend to your Grandmother without a great deal of practice (if at all)! On the other hand, there are a great number of asanas and not all of them are as difficult as becoming a scorpion!

Even these easier poses are beneficial, and each one represents a tremendous way of increasing your bodily flexibility and suppleness through exercise.

For instance, the benefits of adopting the ‘ardha-chandra-asana’ (the ‘half moon pose’) are principally felt in the lower back, chest and abdomen.

While the ‘trikona-asana’ (the ‘triangle pose’) is great for stimulating blood flow throughout the body, especially to the head. It also assists your general physical condition by stretching and relaxing your shoulders, back, arms and legs, so the benefits are tremendous in comparison to the amount of effort and energy being expended.