Do you do Yoga? Many people do physical exercises and think they are doing Yoga. They perform breathing techniques and consider this to be Yoga. But this is not Yoga. Hundreds of Yoga institutes advertise that they will teach Yoga, the union of the body and mind or body, mind and Soul. All they teach is Asana, physical exercises or some kind of Pranayama, breathing techniques.
Unfortunately, we have not understood the true meaning of Yoga. Yoga is not the union of body, mind, and Soul. What will happen if we do some physical exercises? While it is healthy to stretch our body and good to practice postures, this is not Yoga. The word Yoga means Yuj or union. Physical exercises are definitely good and stretching the body in some Asanas, is sure to build flexibility and a healthy body. But to call it Yoga, is wrong.
The breathing techniques are referred to as Pranayama. We focus on our breath - we breathe in and breathe out in different ways. It momentarily helps us to focus our mind on our breath. It makes the mind still, but does it create Yoga? Does it unite us with the Divine? To believe that it does, is wrong.
Yoga, as stated above, means Yuj. Yuj means union. What is this union or Yoga in reality? Those who Realize the Truth, realize that the goal of Yoga is for us to become a Yogi – one who is ever united with the Supreme Immortal Power. Yoga is all about transcending the body, mind, and ego, which we are not, and living with awareness as the Divine Soul, our true identity.
A Yogi is detached from the material world. He is unaffected by passions and pleasures. He has attained that state of Yoga or union with the Lord. He is completely disconnected and detached from the material world, which is an illusion. He has Realized the Truth and lives in that state of Enlightenment. The Yogi may or may not do Asana and Pranayama. It hardly matters. True Yoga is about being in silence, in meditation. It is reaching that state of thoughtlessness or mindfulness in which one experiences the Consciousness of the Truth. In that Divine state of bliss, one becomes conscious of their true existence as the Divine Soul, not the body that needs to be stretched, nor the mind that needs to be silenced by the breath.
Yoga unites us with the Divine and liberates us from all misery on earth. It makes us live as a manifestation of the Supreme Power. When will we overcome the myth of doing some physical exercises and breathing techniques and think we are doing Yoga? We can't do Yoga. We must be a Yogi, one who is always in Yoga.
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