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Return of the yogi

Last Updated 22 May 2015, 16:56 IST

BALANCE BECKONS Everyone, from corporate honchos to rockstars and tiny tots to ailing adults, is a yoga enthusiast today. Pragya Bhatt goes back in time to trace the centuries-old Indian practice to find its contemporary relevance.

In today’s day and age, it’s hard to come across someone who has a balanced opinion about yoga. People either swear by it, or they are vehemently opposed to including it in their daily workout. The mushrooming of yoga studios around the world has only contributed to the confusion surrounding this centuries-old practice. From being a practice largely associated with breathing techniques taught in temples and religious institutions to one practised at fancy five-star studios, it seems like yoga has gone through an intense metamorphosis.

However, serious yoga practitioners and scholars will tell you that yoga remains the same; it’s the packaging that has changed to accommodate the changing times and its corresponding needs.

Now, with the United Nations adopting June 21 as the International Yoga Day, the interest in yoga will only further augment. It’s impossible to date yoga’s origins. Most historians and scholars agree that yoga was being practised long before discourses such as the Hatha Yoga Pradipika and Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras were written. Over the centuries, yoga got sidelined from the mainstream to becoming an esoteric practice, fit only for dhoti-clad sages meditating in the Himalayas. However, a little known fact is that yoga was thriving in other places as well.

There were teachers such as T Krishnamacharya who were travelling through the country, giving lectures and demonstrations and generating awareness about yoga. He finally settled in the Kingdom of Mysore with the patronage of the then Maharaja and started teaching students in the ancient guru-shishya parampara.  It was here that he groomed the likes of BKS Iyengar, Indra Devi and K Pattabhi Jois. And the contribution of his students to the advancement of yoga is undisputed.

The cool mantra
Insofar as a means to attain better health is concerned, even up until 20 years ago, people still turned to morning walks, running and the gym as a way to keep fit.  Yoga’s reach only extended to the elderly and the infirm, and that too mostly as a means to meditate or, at best, do breathing exercises. It was with the rising popularity of Baba Ramdev through mass media that yoga caught the collective attention of the nation at large. This was in tandem with yoga’s rising popularity in the West. All of a sudden, there were numerous yoga classes, yoga studios, celebrity yoga teachers, celebrities endorsing yoga, even magazines exclusively for yoga.

In India, Bollywood celebrities started attributing everything from weight loss to their personal Zen to yoga. Everyone who was anyone had a yoga instructor on speed dial. The number of yoga institutes around the country started growing.  Yoga classes were bursting at the seams to accommodate all the newbies and yoga teacher training courses started to multiply.

Currently, there is no typical profile of a yogi. Everyone, from corporate honchos to rockstars and children to grandparents, are waxing eloquent about yoga. Clearly, there are many takers for yoga, but is this just a fitness fad? Not really, because yoga’s fundamentals are not rooted in cholesterol levels, waist-to-hip ratio or clear skin. It is rooted in the idea of balance. Balance in the mind and balance in the body. And finally, balance between the mind and the body.

Patanjali’s foremost sutra states sthira sukham asanam. Loosely translated, this means that an asana should be performed with ease and comfort, along with mental and emotional stability and steadiness.

Unlike in other forms of workouts, where the focus is on intense calorie-burning movement, a movement is only an asana if your mind and your body are in sync. Yoga stresses that balancing on one leg is not only about the strength of the leg, but also about the stability of the mind and its ability to focus.


This sort of mind-body connection is imperative in a time when multitasking is the order of the day. Yoga’s popularity amongst the upwardly-mobile professionals can, perhaps, be attributed to this. Every yoga class stresses mindfulness. This mindfulness is then extrapolated in the daily lives of busy bodies and they are able to keep their head together in the face of the daily stress and strain of work.

Never too early
Yoga has grown popular amongst school and college-going kids as well. Very few students can escape the stress that is an inherent part of an exam-based education system. The number of suicides because of performance-related stress has risen considerably in the last few years. The nervousness, fear and apprehension related to exams and important career-related decisions can be counterbalanced by daily yoga practice.


Pranayama and meditation help in relaxing young minds and enhance their ability to concentrate and focus. Also, a regular asana practice helps in negating the effects of incorrect posture. Diseases such as Polycystic Ovary Syndrome (PCOS), which have become prevalent in young girls, can be prevented by regular yoga practice. It can also help prevent migraine, hair loss, weight gain, depression, anxiety and a whole range of lifestyle-related issues. When yoga is practised during the formative years, it also has a positive effect on bone health, density and growth.

Over the years, the amount of time children spend on physical activities and play has significantly decreased. Now children are glued not only to the TV, but to mobile phones and tablets as well. Whereas just a decade ago children had to be coaxed to come home from the playground, nowadays children have to be bribed to tear themselves from technology and head out for some fresh air.

This change in lifestyle has serious repercussions. Cases of childhood obesity are on the rise; children now have less interpersonal skills, and display more violent and anti-social behaviour. However, when children are enrolled in a yoga class, they benefit from the human to human contact. They learn to follow instructions and respect other individuals. Unlike in a school classroom-like environment, in a yoga class, children gain confidence because there is no right or wrong answer. When yoga poses are taught in a fun manner, children feel encouraged to try and push their limits, and their minds are engaged inwards. This helps them in dealing with physiological and psychological changes that they are bound to experience as their bodies and minds grow.

Bend it like her
As our lifestyles become more sedentary, women find themselves unable to
conceive, and once they do conceive, many experience high-risk pregnancies. This is evident in the rising number of caesarean sections. Women are now advised to maintain optimal health before, during and even after the pregnancy to ensure good health for the baby.

Going for regular walks is simply not enough to combat the effects of a poor lifestyle. The breathing techniques and stretches that are an integral part of any yoga class are incredibly useful during the entire process of planning for a pregnancy and finally delivering the baby. Yoga stretches, particularly for the hips, enables women to cultivate a strong lower body, which eases the process of child bearing and delivery.


Breathing techniques help the mother to stay calm and focused during labour. Many first-time mothers are a bundle of nerves and get jittery around their due date. A consistent yoga practice helps a mother prepare – mentally and physically – for the new phase of her life. Also, there are many ‘mother and baby yoga classes’ available post delivery, which increase the bonding and understanding between the mother and the child, and help to de-stress and have fun at the same time.

Although yoga is usually clubbed under the heading of ‘workout’, time and time again, yoga has proven to be much more than that. The benefits of yoga for the human mind-body complex are phenomenal. Yoga can be practised at all ages and phases of life. If assimilated as an integral part of daily life, yoga enhances the living experience and increases longevity. Do we need any more reasons to practise yoga?
(The author is a Bengaluru-based
yoga instructor)
 

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(Published 22 May 2015, 16:56 IST)

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