Ayurveda Living

Wall Painting – Montreal Krishna Temple

From time immemorial, India has been a supplier of riches to the world and the pearl of these riches is wisdom.  The West came in contact with yoga a long time ago.  Greek philosophers like Plato and Aristotle were largely inspired by Indian philosophy.  Even Cicero in his Tusculanum’s writings about happiness mentioned those strange healing  practices observed in people that he called barbarians.

India has always exerted a strange fascination and  been trendy so to speak as well as a source of inspiration to mankind at different ages.  Looking for a new spice road,  Columbus landed in America.  Modern came to America about 500 years later when Swami Vivekananda addressed the Parliament of Religions meeting in Chicago in 1893.  In the last century,  yoga masters began to travel to the West attracting attention and followers.  Each guru, swami or acharya brought with him chunks of Vedic wisdom.  Many of them built strong organisations who are blooming today.

The West is rajasic in essence, likes action.  There are many forms of yoga.  Outside of Hindu culture, in the West, hatha yoga is the most popular form of yoga. Hatha yoga is, however, a particular system propagated by Swami Swatamarama, a yogic sage of the 15^th century in India who penned Yoga Pradipika.  .

While in India, yoga is a spiritual practice akin to religion, most Westerners  have taken a more secular approach, as an overall fitness progoram..  Yoga is  gradually perceived  as an holistic well-being regimen. Urban yoga   focuses on the asanas (body postures), pranayama (breath control)) and lately meditation which is taught for its therapeutic properties.

Some may disagree about  this turn of events and see yoga disfigured when divorces from its spiritual goal.  Slowly and gradually, yoga is getting  acceptance  in matters related to health,, happiness  and spirituality.   Yoga has  rightfully become fashionable indeed. Many people are healthier and happier through their yoga practice and experience some form of spiritual awakening.  It is a way of life for many and it leads to Ayurveda and conscious living.

In the export process yoga may have somewhat deviated from the original model.  So what.  Everything in this Universe is in perpetual movement and it is called evolution …