By Vaidyar Mani and Nicky Hewett, Ancient’s Best – Ayurveda & Yoga ‘Ayur’ in Sanskrit translates to mean Life or Longevity, and ‘Veda’ to mean Science, Knowledge, or Understanding. Simply put Ayurveda is ‘The Science of Life’ or more specifically ‘The Science or Understanding of how to live your Life based on your Uniqueness’. Ayurveda is the ‘Yoga of Life’ and its aim or goal is to help us utilize our Body and Mind to achieve Yoga or Self Realisation. Ayurveda is not all that widely … [Read more...]
What’s the Difference Between Modern and Traditional Ayurveda and How Does it Relate to Yoga?
By Vaidyar Mani and Nicky Hewett, Ancient's Best - Ayurveda & Yoga The word Ayur-Veda specifically means the “Science or Knowledge of Life or Longevity”. In other words, it means ‘how we are to live and manage our life’. An appropriate term to describe Ayur-Veda is ‘The Yoga of Life’. It is a system that - when correctly understood, applied and practiced - leads one to Yoga, our ultimate goal or Dharma. It is a wholly Spiritual system and discipline. As Kara-Leah wrote recently when … [Read more...]
E=MC2 for Yogic Inspiration
by guest author KateMcLeay, Flow Yoga What has the most influential scientist of the 20th century got to do with yoga? Albert Einstein, the German physicist who revolutionized scientific thought, developed the Theory of Relativity and opened the gateway for the creation of the atomic bomb, remains prolifically quoted and what he says totally speaks to my yogic psyche. When I think of Albert Einstein I think of crazy hair, a towering intellect and wise words. Many of those wise words sound … [Read more...]
The meanings we give to work
By guest author Brook McCarthy, 30 Steps I was your typical baby hippie. I grew my armpit hair, ate lentils, chanted Hari Krisna, and choose my university subjects by how I perceive they’d help with the old “meaning of life” conundrum. My late teens and early 20s were spent meditating, chanting, teaching yoga and travelling. I became a tour leader because I didn’t like having to return home in between travels to make more money to travel again. For two years, I took small groups … [Read more...]
The Unbearable Lightness of Being: Yoga, weight, body image and weightlessness
By guest author Nanditha Ram, author of Blissful Mom, Blissful Baby I have borrowed the title of one of my favourite novels to serve as title of this article. It's a post modern philosophical product of the 1980s, The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera. I've borrowed it because it brought to my mind, in a round-about sort of way, a connection with yoga and weight... and our modern day crisis of how we view the self. Yoga is a great weight busting practice. A truly reliable way to … [Read more...]
Sacred Feminine and Yoga: Practical Tools. Part 4
by guest author Swami Karma Karuna, Anahata Yoga Retreat There are more practical tools than can be described belonging to tantra and yoga that are beneficial for a woman’s body, mind and support the connection to the inner sacred space. The practices all work in different ways with the ultimate goal of helping one to reconnect with their higher self or the inner Shakti, which in fact is the sacred feminine. Shakti is the life force. When it is blocked or out of balance, physical and … [Read more...]
A young man, a desire to meditate, and India circa 1979
By guest author John Guthrie April 1979, Kundabodha, a Meditation hermitage in Sri Lanka. This young man had been travelling for some time. Having already begun to learn the disciplines of Hatha Yoga, he now had a burning desire to learn meditation. In particular Buddhist meditation had an appeal to him. What drugs could not do, then no doubt meditation would succeed. After all, in much of what he had read in those recent times, the authors wrote that the illusory nature of mind … [Read more...]
The great debate – Which is better, Yoga or Pilates?
by guest author Jude Mahood, Suburban Yoga, Dunedin I recently heard someone describe Yoga/Pilates fusion (or Yogalates as it is often called) as the coming together of natural soul mates. I couldn’t agree more. But there are still many people out there who think that bringing Pilates principles into their Yoga is somehow tainting or contaminating. There is nothing wrong with being purist in our thinking, but it’s also important to maintain an open mind. When we close our minds, we close … [Read more...]
Yoga: Contortions, distortions and misunderstandings
By guest author Nanditha Ram, author of Blissful Mom, Blissful Baby I recently read an article in The New York Times about the dangers of yoga entitled How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body. Let me play devil's advocate for a second and say, "yes, it can". Indeed, anything taken to the extreme, has the seeds of the opposite sown in it. And so it is with yoga too. Too much of a good thing... Still, the very idea that yoga is dangerous is preposterous. That said, the way in which we practice an age … [Read more...]
Sacred Feminine and Yoga: Honouring the forces within. Part 3
by guest author, Swami Karma Karuna, Anahata Yoga Retreat All cultures of the ancient world worshipped the principles of the Mother, Shakti or Devi. Although it may have been called by different names, the concept of a force which bestows life, nourishes, loves, comforts, supports and transforms has always been present. In Christianity, we know her as Mother Mary. In Japan, she was Amaterasu, the sun-goddess; in Greece, she is Demeter, the corn-goddess, Aphrodite, the goddess of passion and … [Read more...]