GHOSH YOGA

  • Home
  • Teacher Training
    • Hybrid 200 Hour Foundational
    • Online 200 Hour Foundational
    • 300 Hour Advanced
  • Immersions
    • How to Live: Yogic Ethics and Beyond
    • Travel to India
    • Practice Week
  • Class Videos
  • Schedule
  • Blogs
  • Store
  • About
    • About Scott & Ida
    • What is Ghosh Yoga?
    • Women of Yoga
    • Postures of Ghosh Yoga
    • Samadhi paper
    • Bose Conference Call
  • Books
    • Foundations
    • Intermediate
    • Advanced 1
    • Therapeutic Exercises
    • 26+2 Modifications
    • Strong Woman Reba Rakshit
    • Yoga Cure
    • Muscle Control
    • Dr. GSM
    • Buddha Bose
    • 26+2 MODIFICAÇÕES
    • Calcutta Yoga
  • Contact
  • Refund Policies
  • Home
  • Teacher Training
    • Hybrid 200 Hour Foundational
    • Online 200 Hour Foundational
    • 300 Hour Advanced
  • Immersions
    • How to Live: Yogic Ethics and Beyond
    • Travel to India
    • Practice Week
  • Class Videos
  • Schedule
  • Blogs
  • Store
  • About
    • About Scott & Ida
    • What is Ghosh Yoga?
    • Women of Yoga
    • Postures of Ghosh Yoga
    • Samadhi paper
    • Bose Conference Call
  • Books
    • Foundations
    • Intermediate
    • Advanced 1
    • Therapeutic Exercises
    • 26+2 Modifications
    • Strong Woman Reba Rakshit
    • Yoga Cure
    • Muscle Control
    • Dr. GSM
    • Buddha Bose
    • 26+2 MODIFICAÇÕES
    • Calcutta Yoga
  • Contact
  • Refund Policies

Yoga In the World: Part 1

9/10/2020

0 Comments

 
Picture
Many of us believe that yoga is a reprieve from the hectic outside world. Our outer lives are fast and stressful while the inner yogic world is calm and peaceful. But yoga is a system that has real-world consequences. You may have noticed that your thoughts, beliefs and actions have changed since you began practicing or studying yoga. And when our actions change, consequences change. 

​As such, yoga has a long history of interaction with social and political issues. It will be useful to examine some of yoga's core tenets, because they inevitably have an impact in the real world.  

​We want to examine the real-world impact of yoga in three articles. This is the first. Here let's look at some of the fundamental tenets of yoga philosophy: non-violence & truth.

NON-VIOLENCE
​A central belief in yoga and much Eastern philosophy is non-violence. At its heart, this is based upon the belief in karma: every action we do will come back to us later as a consequence. So if we harm someone else, that deed will return to us thanks to the universal law of cause and effect. We cannot possibly commit any action without reaping the consequences upon ourselves. In this way, we avoid violence as a form of self-protection.

This belief is somewhat in contrast with the Western view of violence. We protect ourselves, our families, our possessions and our ideals with violence if necessary. Violence is justifiable in self-defense. Violence can even be morally encouraged if we think that the loss of 10 lives will save a million. 

Admittedly, this is complicated. It can be difficult to assess what we believe as individuals. But it is worth considering the varying viewpoints and their consequences. The yogic view, which avoids violence at literally all costs, has the possible repercussion of allowing the dominance of others who are willing to resort to violence. If I will not fight back, I will probably lose every battle I fight with someone who will. On the other hand, the self-preserving view, that permits violence in self-defense, encourages a highly-developed sense of identity and ego. It also encourages strenuous adherence to systems of belief, which can develop into violent action to defend those beliefs. 

TRUTH
A yogic ideal with far less complexity is the idea of honesty or truth. To our knowledge, every culture encourages honesty. Our parents warned us from a young age, "Tell the truth! Don't lie!" The reasons why we choose honesty or lying are far more interesting.

Most interesting are our reasons for lying. Ask yourself: "Why do I lie? When is it justified to avoid the truth or misrepresent it?" 

The reasons for lying can be distilled down to one word: power. We lie because it gives us power. When my boss asks why I'm late, I lie and say I got a flat tire. I have more power than I would if I told her the truth, which is that I slept through my alarm. Lying forces my boss to accept my version of reality, which allows me to dictate the consequences. Of course, this only works if my boss doesn't have access to other sources for the story. In that case, I don't have power over her version of reality. 

This is the great lesson of lying. It is only as powerful as its ability to bend the listener's view of reality. When someone lies to us and we believe it, we are completely under their power. However, if they lie to us and we do not believe it, they have no power over us whatsoever.

Why does yoga encourage truth? Because it aligns us with reality. Every time we lie, we fracture ourselves from reality. If it is 2 o'clock but I say it is 10 o'clock, I have essentially separated myself from fact. I have constructed a small alternate universe and isolated myself from the real one. If we lie frequently, we remove ourselves from reality and increasingly exist in a bubble of our own making. 

Yoga's goal is to reverse this process and gradually place us firmly and directly in reality. Not our own thoughts or beliefs, but reality itself.

Try it for yourself. Next time you are tempted to tell a lie, no matter how small, tell the truth instead. Your individual sense of power will decrease, but this is only a false sense that is driven by the ego. What improves is your connection to truth, which actually makes you immensely more powerful.

IN CONCLUSION
The way in which we relate to the world has real consequences. This includes how we think of ourselves and our beliefs. Are we willing to fight for them? Who are we fighting and why? Is violence justified by its outcome? Does the end justify the means? 

Will we lie to protect our identity, possessions or power? Will we accept the lies of others to do the same? 

Yogic philosophy answers these questions in specific ways. But that is not terribly important here. What is important is that we consider these questions. And realize that how we answer them will have real-world impact. 
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Picture
    Beginning Manual
    Picture
    Intermediate Manual
    Picture
    26+2 Modifications

    AUTHORS

    Picture
    Picture
    Scott & Ida are Yoga Acharyas (Masters of Yoga). They are scholars as well as practitioners of yogic postures, breath control and meditation. They are the head teachers of Ghosh Yoga.

    POPULAR

    - The 113 Postures of Ghosh Yoga​
    - 
    Make the Hamstrings Strong, Not Long
    - Understanding Chair Posture
    ​
    ​​- Lock the Knee History
    ​- It Doesn't Matter If Your Head Is On Your Knee
    ​
    - Bow Pose (Dhanurasana)

    - 5 Reasons To Backbend
    ​
    - Origins of Standing Bow

    ​- The Traditional Yoga In Bikram's Class
    ​
    - What About the Women?!
    ​- Through Bishnu's Eyes
    ​- Why Teaching Is Not a Personal Practice

    Categories

    All
    Anatomy
    Book Excerpts
    Breathing
    Current Topics
    Hatha
    History
    Injuries
    Personal
    Philosophy
    Practice
    Science
    Teaching
    Therapy
    Women Of Yoga

    Archives

    May 2025
    April 2025
    March 2025
    February 2025
    January 2025
    December 2024
    November 2024
    October 2024
    September 2024
    May 2024
    April 2024
    March 2024
    February 2024
    January 2024
    December 2023
    November 2023
    September 2023
    August 2023
    June 2023
    May 2023
    April 2023
    March 2023
    February 2023
    January 2023
    December 2022
    September 2022
    July 2022
    June 2022
    May 2022
    April 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    December 2021
    October 2021
    September 2021
    August 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017

    RSS Feed

© COPYRIGHT 2015-2025 BY SLIP MEDIA, LLC . ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.