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Knoxville Yoga

Posted by Santosh on March 3rd, 2008

Knoxville, Tennessee is home to a growing community of yoga enthusiasts, including many excellent yoga teachers.

This is great news whether you’re an advanced practitioner interested in trying out different yoga … Read the rest of this entry »

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Beginner Yoga Class Checklist

Posted by Santosh on January 31st, 2008

If you’re new to yoga, you might not know what to expect when you walk in the doors of a beginner’s yoga class for the first time. You might not even know how to start in choosing a beginner’s yoga class to attend. Here’s a “how to” checklist.

1. Nail down your goals and find the right style for you.

Everyone comes to yoga for different reasons. Sometimes these differences are slight, other times they’re vast. … Read the rest of this entry »

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Bring your beliefs to yoga

Posted by Santosh on November 6th, 2007

You can bring your religious beliefs with you to yoga class, whether Christian or Hindu, Jewish or Buddhist, Agnostic or Muslim.

Though Classical yoga (a.k.a. Raja yoga or Pantanjala yoga) is considered one of the schools of orthodox Indian philosophy, therefore a member of the philosophical wing of Hinduism, Hatha yoga is not.

Hatha yoga has its roots in Classical yoga, to be sure. But the Hatha yoga system developed out of great changes that took place during the medieval period and the tantric heresy. Hatha is not considered one of the branches of orthodox Indian philosophy and therefore is not “Hindu” per se.

That’s the opinion of the author.

I see Hatha yoga — and the Kripalu Yoga approach to Hatha — as a spiritual tool, or system of tools, rather than a system of beliefs. Various forms of yoga exist within several different religions: Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, and Sikhism.

But you certainly don’t need to be a member of one of those religions to participate in yoga, or to benefit from the transformation (physical, mental, emotional and spiritual) that occurs during the practice of yoga. You can bring your beliefs with you to yoga class. And you can take the spiritual awakening that occurs through the use of the tools of yoga with you to the religious life of your choice.

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Knoxville meditation groups

Posted by Santosh on October 2nd, 2007

Here are links to meditation group web sites in the East Tennessee area. If I missed one, please add it in the comments section. Comments are moderated.

Knoxville Interfaith Meditation

Ananda Marga

Losel Shedrup Ling

30 Good Leaves

There are other groups without web sites. Meditation group organizers are invited to contact me with their information.

If you would like to learn the basics of relaxing meditation or insight meditation, I make house calls and office visits. Please contact me for details.

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Hein Braat, not H.H.

Posted by Santosh on August 31st, 2006

So just an update on that mantra I posted a little while back…

I got an email…

Hallo,

the source of the Maha Mrityunjaya mantra
seems to be […] Hein Braat.

namaste,
munish

So there you have it. No more mystery. The next mystery is, who is Hein Braat? Hard to find info on the guy…

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Sluggishness in practice

Posted by Santosh on August 21st, 2006

Feeling rather lethargic today. Procrastinating doing my work, and procrastinating my yoga practice because I have too much work to do.

It’s times like these that it’s best to walk away and do some yoga then come back to my desk. Of course, when I start doing yoga, sometimes I never make it back to my desk.

Survey: Do you use spirituality as an escape, and how?

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