What is Yoga

Yoga is the science of union. It reunites everything that appears to be separated. It balances everything that appears to be unbalanced. It heals everything that appears to be ill. It is the last stage of human evolucion, which permits every person to return to the origin of creation.

Yoga is the key to real, lasting freedom. Free your body from needless pain. Free your mind from useless worries. We give free yoga lessons in Panama's underfunded public schools and in public parks.

The Benefits of Yoga

Yoga offers physical, mental and spiritual benefits.

Among the physical benefits are, a stronger, more toned and more balanced body that is free of pain. In addition, yoga prevents and cures innumerable diseases including stomach acid, cancer, heart problems, anaemia, appendicitis, arthritis, asthma, backache, high or low blood pressure, loss of memory, breathlessness, bronchitis, broncho-pneumonia, cold, cough, colic, colitis, constipation, coronary thrombosis, diabetes, diarrhea, dilation of heart, dysentery, dyspepsia, epilepsy, fatigue, flatulence, gastritis, gout, halitosis, menstrual disorders, migraine, nervous debility, obesity, polio, paralysis, piles, pleurisy and pneumonia, rheumatic pains, sciatica, sterility, thrombosis of the legs, tonsilitis, tuberculosis, tumour of the stomach, gastric and duodenal ulcers and varicose veins.

As for the mental benefits, yoga eliminates stress and leaves you relaxed so that you can live and sleep in peace.

The final goal of yoga is the most profound benefit, that of final union with God and all His creation.

Yogis, instructors and masters

A yogi is someone that is searching to know himself more deeply, such that he is able to unite his body, mind and spirit.

An instructor is one that helps another in the search for CONSCIOUSNESS. Every yoga instructor is also a yogi or a seeker until the moment he attains the final goal, the moment that he becomes a yoga master.

A yoga master is one that has attained the final goal of total illumination and total oneness with God and with the entire creation. A master is able to guide yogis to the final goal using proven methods, and by suggesting new methods specially adapted to eliminate the specific blockages in the path of the individual yogi. Although realized yoga masters are few and difficult to find, each one of us has a yoga master deep within ourselves.

The many paths of yoga (ways of getting closer to oneness)

Any method or system is called yoga when it helps a yogi to develop consciousness, such that he can better know his true essence, where his body, mind and spirit are one.

There are many known yoga systems for getting closer to the final goal. But it is always possible for someone to reach the final goal through dedicated work in one's self-invented system, which should be considered a "new yoga" from the moment of the achievement. (A pure heart with faith in the Lord "Ishvara" would be necessary.)

The following fields and disciplines are some of the known yoga systems:

Karma Yoga

Karma is the law of action/reaction. It is impossible to avoid karma because every action generates at least one reaction. Good actions lead to favourable reactions. Giving and receiving are inseparable. The yogi that gives unselfishly generates good karma.

Bakti Yoga

Bakti means devotion (to God, to the Lord, to one's guru, etc.). Religious persons (of any religious belief) frequently practice bakti yoga, although they may not call it by this name.

Jhana Yoga

Jhana Yoga includes meditation and mantras.

Hatha Yoga

Hatha Yoga is a system of bodily postures and breathing techniques to heal and balance the body, which is the vehicle for the soul.

The asanas or postures at once stretch and strengthen all of the muscles while purifying them of toxins.

The breathing exercises help the yogi to control her or his energy level since the air is charged with prana or pure energy that we can store for later use.

Hatha Yoga can be gentle or intense to adapt to the level of each individual. The practice implies the observation of both extremes of the duality of tension and relaxation. That is to say, that the yogi achieves the desired relaxation through the excercises that stretch and tensn the muscules.

Ashtanga Yoga

Ashtanga Yoga is an eightfold path that includes the disciplines of hatha yoga (asana and pranayama), and six more disciplines: yama, niyama, pratyahara, darana, dhyana and samadhi.

Yama means control or observation (of universal laws like peace and sharing).

Niyama is personal discipline which includes personal hygiene and purifying the body and the mind by eliminating physical toxins and emotional toxins like hatred and pride, passion, anger, greed and delusion. The yogi observes that these emotions are useless and hurtful and replaces them with a greater dedication to that which brings wellbeing and happiness.

Asanas and pranayamas are as mentioned in the section above, hatha yoga.

Pratyahara is the condition of being disconnected from five of the six senses, namely, touch, sight, hearing, smell and taste, such that these do not dominate us through their frequent requests and complaints. The pleasure that we receive through these five senses is temporary and therefore these senses represent traps in the path towards perpetual joy. (The sixth sense, intuition, does not require disconnecting.) The yogi finds within himself a joy to which he or she always has access, including when the five senses would otherwise signal a lacking.

Darana - concentration.

Dhyana - meditation.

Samadhi - superconsciousness.

Kundalini Yoga

Kundalini Yoga is a system to awaken and to raise the energy up along the spinal column. The practitioner feels a strong and unique sensation each time the energy bursts through another chakra.

Where to practice yoga

You can practice yoga on your own at any time, or practice with me personally in Anton's Valley.