What is the point of doing Yoga?
Every person will, of course, have their own reasons for doing Yoga, but to give it some context I can relate it to my passion for running. I ran from the day-to-day pressures, as a release and escape into a place of calmness and on occasion a meditative state. This meditative state was not a constant though, so I needed to look at why I felt like this sometimes but not always.
Yoga is underpinned by the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali and, without getting too heavy, the second verse defines Yoga as the 'controlling of the activities of the mind' or in my plain English, shutting up the grasping monkey that keeps chatting to me about all the things I need to do, or role playing how I am going to deal with life's daily problems.
So the calmness I experienced whilst running is something I can bring about through the physical process of Yoga, the coordination of the breath and associated relaxation techniques.
The first verse of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras is an introduction and is generally translated to 'now the teachings of Yoga begin' but it is often missed that the first word 'now' can be looked at as 'being in the now' or being mindful. Mindfulness is 'now' very popular in modern society!
So, who does not want some inner peace? I certainly need respite from the information overload I am exposed to everyday and I need to keep my body in a functional state, so Yoga provides me and those who practice regularly with tools to create a little inner peace and escape the never ending avalanche that is considered to be normal daily life in the West.
