“Shiva Shiva Shiva Shiva Sambho, Mahadeva sambho.” This mantra was chanted by more than 500 people from various ethnic groups in Times Square, New York City on the morning of June 21, 2008. The summer solstice was a day of yoga in the heart of Manhattan, one of the largest and busiest cities in America. Read the rest of this entry »
The second annual offering of salutes to the Sun, known as “Surya Namaskar Yagna” successfully achieved its objective of promoting “Health for Humanity.” Surya Namaskar is a 10-step body conditioning method that uses the ancient Indian Yoga techniques. Each year Hindus worldwide celebrate January 14th as Makar Samkranti - the day the sun enters the sign of Capricorn or Makar, resulting in a change of season. Makar Samkranti brings in longer days, thus the festivity symbolizes sunshine in the life. During this auspicious time, Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh, USA (HSS) local centers, along with several Yoga groups and community organizations, actively participated at over 140 locations all across the U.S. in this unique public health awareness campaign that started on January 12th, 2008 and concluded on January 27th, 2008.
For the second consecutive year, Hindu Swayamsevak Sangh (HSS) announces offering (“yagna”) of one million Sun Salutations, known as Surya Namaskar, to create awareness among the people of the world about Yoga and its advantages in achieving a healthy body, mind and spirit.
Padmasana is a yoga classic and is one of the most recognized poses. Famous depictions of the lotus-posture include Shiva, the meditating ascetic god and Buddha. Padma means lotus in Sanskrit, in this asana the legs look like blooming lotus.
This asana has been given a great importance in the Yogashastra as it is best suited for Pranayam & Dhyana. BKS Iyengar has a 22-page chapter titled “The Art of Sitting in Pranayama” in his book Light on Pranayama. Of the 22 pages nearly 12 are devoted for explaining Padmasana. His instruction for doing Padmasana is excruciatingly detailed. Some of the details he highlights are as follows.
Ushtrasana, or the camel posture is a sitting yogasana, and is a culturing posture. Read the rest of this entry »
Yoga is becoming popular all over the world. While the term yoga brings to mind several postures to the most of us, yoga transcends twisting and bending, and is essentially a way of living. It is the means by which the individual self (Jivatma) expands from its narrow constricted personality to the all pervading, blissful state of existence, or the Paramatma. Thus, Yoga (yuj) joins Jivatma with the Paramatma. While there are four streams of Yoga, namely, Raja Yoga (path of will), Bhakti Yoga (path of devotion), Jnana Yoga (path of knowledge) and Karma Yoga (path of action), the yogasanas that we are familiar with fall into the path of Raja Yoga. Patanjali’s Ashtanga Yoga is the 8-limbed yoga which discusses in detail the various yogasanas amongst others like pranayama, dhyana and dharana. Yogasanas, or yogic postures. The various Yogasanas that exist are either sitting, standing supine or prone postures, and are either cultural, because they culture the body, relaxing, or meditative. Ultimately, the goal of yogasanas to bring harmony and calmness at the Annamaya Kosa (body level), and in turn create calmness and peace at the mind level. Read the rest of this entry »
Swami Vivekananda was one of Bharat’s most influential spiritual leaders and thankfully for us a prolific writer. In his book Raja Yoga he gives a very rational and inspiring explanation of what is also known as Ashtanga Yoga. Below is an excerpt from his book where he explains the concept of Prana, which is central to what separates Yoga from contortionism. Read the rest of this entry »
This article is an excerpt from the ‘International Journal of Integrative Medicine - September/October 1999’. It is written by Dr. Vimal Patel and is reproduced here with his permission.
For the last three to four decades, there has been growing concern about the appropriateness of the technology-driven modern healthcare model for dealing with chronic disease. There is widespread recognition of the need for a less fragmented, more participative, and humane healthcare approach to address the growing financial, social, and personal costs of chronic disease management. This shift in attitude is reflected by the increasing use of complementary/alternative medicine (CAM) modalities in the United States and around the world.
AyurVeda is the medical system of the Vedic Sciences that originated in Hindusthaan (present day India) approximately five thousand years ago. Since Vedic Science views the whole universe as a single organism (macrocosm) and everything in the universe as a miniature replica of the universe (microcosm), the foundation science of every branch of Vedic Science from AyurVeda, Suchi Karma, Vastu to Jyotisha are the same and therefore each branch of Vedic Science is complementary to each other.
AyurVeda is the medical/therapeutic or natural healing system of the Vedic Sciences which originated in India approximately 5000 years ago. AyurVeda comes from the root word “Ayu” which means life and “Veda” which means knowledge of. Hence AyurVeda means “science of life” in Sanskrit. Life here does not refer to life of an individual but to the life of the entire universe which the individual is part of. In Vedic science everything in nature is made of five elements of air, ether, fire, water and earth and the individual (microcosm) is a replica of the universe (macrocosm). The conscious that is present in an individual is the same conscious that is present in the entire universe. AyurVeda allows the individual to know their body, mind and soul at its deepest level and experience the wisdom of this consciousness to appreciate the conscious that is present in the entire universe.
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