There is an ancient way of expressing the goal of yoga practice. It is part metaphor, part instruction. When we hear the word ‘heart’ in ancient yoga texts and the Upanishads, it does not refer to the physical organ pumping away inside our chests.

Yoga is something you do for yourself. No one else can do it for you, nor can you do it for someone else. In essence, it is an intensely individual pursuit. To this, add the fact that no one person is exactly like another in body and mind, and...

Yoga is a pathway to positive changes in body and mind. But most people practise it not because they have a specific transformation in mind but simply because yoga makes them feel good. Not all positive change in life necessarily feels good at the outset.

Yoga has come a long way from its ancient roots. The milieu in which we practise nowadays is vastly different from that of a thousand years ago. In the olden days, the yogi was practising alone. Now people practise in groups.

All the practices of yoga are directed towards the attainment of a steady state of mind. Transition to such a state of mind is not possible for ordinary people like us in whom the compulsion to act is deeply ingrained. Since we cannot stop acting, we must enter the...

Is a teacher necessary to learn yoga? Before answering that question, let’s ask this first: what are you learning? If what you are learning is unsound, it makes no difference whether you learn it under the personal guidance of a guru or from a book.

Ancient Indian logic makes the straightforward postulate that there is no effect without a cause. There may be occurrences whose causes we are unable to learn, but a cause must still exist in reality even if we do not see it. However, there is a difference between proximal and...

All experiences are internal. The objects that we experience may be outside, but the experience takes place in our mind. Yoga being a mental state, is also an experience, but unlike other experiences, it is the wholly internal experience of simply being.

The worldview derived from authentic yoga is that the world is divided into two parts: an unchanging, peaceful part that pervades everything, including humans; and a messy, changeable part that includes the world as we experience it every day.

All living beings undergo transformation in six stages. For example, a tree first exists in its potential form as a seed. When the seed sprouts, it is born, this is the second stage. In the third stage, the sapling grows into a tree.