What is Asana and yoga?

We refer asanas to “Postures” and they hold the Physical attributes of Yoga. We relate them to movements which flex and strengthen our muscles, balance our core, and finally make us to sit in a meditative state.

Asanas are being practised by well-renowned people around the world for many years. Asanas have great health benefits and they fine-tune our body and immune systems. They give solutions for problems such as obesity; diabetes and help people recover from many physical injuries and mainly to make the mind to sit.

Yoga means union, the union of inner-self with a deeper understanding of life and existence. Yoga is a combination of various physical, mental and spiritual activities that help us achieve physical and mental wellness. Yoga gives us the choice of selecting various combinations of activities to choose and execute from it, so that we can achieve the goals of life.

How does today’s world look at Asanas and yoga?

Many people around the world confuse themselves with asanas and yoga whenever the word “yoga” is being said. People do not realize that the two are different where Asanas are a part of yoga in which we practise physical postures whereas yoga helps us gain a holistic mind-body experience by practising all limbs of yoga.

Even some yoga instructors who teach Asanas daily cannot make their students realize the importance of yoga, which includes many aspects such as morals, values, discipline, responsibilities, and courage.

Nowadays, the world is full of people who focus on just physical health, fitness and outer appearance, they do not understand that it is important to take care of their mental health and other personalities. 

They turn to yoga asanas just to get fit, to look cool and get noticed by everyone. While there is nothing wrong about it, one should also understand that there is more in life than just physical beauty. The real essence of yoga lies within performing all aspects of yoga with a complete understanding of it.

There are many things that get missed out when we neglect other aspects of yoga, such as breathing techniques and meditation. Haven’t we noticed many people who suffer from frequent mood swings? 

Even you would know how often mood swings happen to you in a day. Frustration, irritation, sadness, and joy have become a part of our daily lives. But we have let our emotions take control of us instead we taking control over it.

Considering the scenario, breathing techniques and meditation introduce us to a different dimension that gives us the power of concentration power of will, power being centred, power of discrimination that allows us to handle our emotions properly.

Yoga through the various periods of time

In ancient time people were pure, honest and kind-hearted. They had awareness of all their five different Bodies, they mostly delved in their bliss body (Anandmaya kosha) and were able to control and coordinate the other bodies consciously.

They used them with the same ease as we do now with our physical bodies. They led very pure lifestyle and adhered to truth. Everything was transparent and visible and there was nothing to conceal. In this age people were full of kindness and open hearted. With a heart of gold, they were compassionate and soft hearted. 

Their physical bodies were lighter as they consumed less food, though food was abundant and no competition was there. The beings of this age existed entirely in the subtle planes, by the power of their thought, only when need.

The people in in this age obtained energy for their bodies directly from the subtle world instead of consuming gross food. As embodied beings, they were subject to the cycle of births and deaths, but lived longer for hundreds or even thousands of years as their subtle bodies lasted longer and suffered much less wear and tear.

In this age, men were truthful and free from the common vices like desire, anger, ego, greed lust and envy. Even animals lived together and in harmony with man. Nature was full of life energy (Prana), beauty and full of purity.

With well advanced Buddhi (intellect), mastery of their minds and bodies, and all the chakras active and prana flowing, they adhered to the moral duties as prescribed by the law of universe and had deep understanding of nature.

But nowadays, people have lost control over all their inner bodies but managed to retain some control over their mental and physical bodies only. At the beginning of this era, they had some awareness and control over their breath or Prana body, as they could sense the movements of breath in their bodies and the flow of energy through the various chakras.

But this ability was also lost as time went by and the bodies become increasingly gross to the point where the quality of purity became negligible while the quality of darkness or grossness increased in proportion, as a result the physical bodies of the beings in this age became denser and grosser while the senses turned completely outward and the mind became attached mostly to the sense objects.

The present age is truly the age of the physical body. Physical body is also known as the food body as it is made up of the food we eat. Food here is the only way by which the physical body can be nourished and sustained, its quality and luminosity depends to a great extent upon the type of food we consume and the qualities of the particular food item.

In this era, which is the current one, people are aware of their physical body yet little bit of their mental bodies too. They identify themselves with their minds and bodies and regard their material possession as an extension of themselves. They live for material things and physical pleasure, work for them and die for them.

The descent of the soul (consciousness) into the matter (nature) is said to be complete now. It manifests in the behaviour and attitude of the human beings and their total obsession with material things and objective reality.

Matter in all its form consumes their interest. They extend their interest, knowledge, study and research. Having lost the contact with their subtle senses and the knowledge of using them, they rely exclusively upon their physical senses and what can be perceived and experienced through them.

This can be understood as we have become so engrossed with matter and material things that now we have developed the ability to manipulate even Nature, create forms and shapes, split atoms, alter human cells and embryos and create highly complex machines.

It would not be long before our research in cellular biology and computing technology would lead to the development of vastly superior biological machines capable of programming themselves and performing routine tasks including space travel.

We can truly call this as the era of physics and physical laws wherein emotions and values have less implication on us. This age is full of materialism and ignorance. We have but limited awareness of the world in which we live and our connection with it.  Very little is known about ourselves and our potentialities.

We may dissect the human brain and understand how it functions, but we cannot control our thoughts. We may formulate numerous theories and complex ideas about our existence, but cannot control our thoughts, desires and impulses; we have expanded the horizons of our perception outwardly thought artificial means.

But have lost the ability to look within ourselves and find the transcendental knowledge which is locked up in our subtle bodies. This is the age of profound ignorance.

We have descended into our physical bodies fully, and identified ourselves with our lower nature. We fail to realise our selfish, self-centred and pleasure-oriented behaviour.

How to perceive yoga?

Now we know yoga is more than just a few postures. What is really yoga? Yoga is the union of body, intuition and true self-identity. Yoga is Samadhi.

The person whole-heartedly believes that asanas alone can cure it. But we should focus on curing the root cause of diabetes, such as anxiety, fear, overeating and depression. One has to understand that because of the wrong lifestyle, these diseases enter the body.

Here, yoga helps to understand the root cause of the disease. Yoga brings balance and harmony to our lives. It opens up the different dimensions of us which give the clarity in thoughts and discrimination.

Yoga is an ancient Indian science that is also an art form. We can term it as ancient science, which allows us to synchronize our mind, body, and emotions. It is also an art that can produce excellent results when practised directing the senses in a focused manner. 

When you harness the true power of yoga, you will bring a mutual harmony between the mind, body, and emotions. The combined power of the mind, body and emotions can unleash various potentials such as acceptance, positive attitude, efficiency, strong determination, willpower and concentration. 

The true real yoga experience is having a power of detachment from the diseases. It is not the curing of disease but the feeling of being detached from the disease. A feeling of segregating the thoughts and being able to say “I have this disease but I am not the disease.”

In the modern world, instead of being detached to the disease, they become attached to the disease. That is not the true experience of yoga. Identity of the real self and getting detached from the disease by taking help of self-identification is what yoga teaches the people.

Asana takes you to that level of another identity. Asana is more of a by-product of yoga. Other yoga practices such as Pranayama and Meditation also helps us to relieve from the attachment to the disease, helping us to recover from the disease much faster. 

This is from yogi360 point of view. We have put our 180 degree thought on it and left the remaining 180 for all of you. Let’s make it complete 360 from your inputs…

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