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Awareness Newsletters Our monthly Awareness newsletter is packed with interesting bits of information. We look at a different yoga pose each month, provide practical information about yoga for harmony and wellbeing in daily life, give you something to chew on in the Food for Thought section and you can contemplate on a quote coming directly from the timeless Vedic scriptures. The newsletter also includes news of Lotus Room events, such as workshops or festivals you can attend. Subscribe to the Awareness newsletter if you would like to receive it on a monthly basis, and do contact us should you wish to receive any back-issues. Hatha Yoga for Harmony & Wellbeing This section of our Awareness newsletter emerges from the frequently asked questions by students during classes. Here we aim to give you the practical knowledge you seek on how yoga practise can change the way you feel and think. A new tip is published online every month, so this section shows the items from the latest three issues of our newsletter. Beating Stress Much of the time, stress is seen as something negative. However, stress may be managed in such a way as to help keep a person alert and motivated, and may be the driving force to accomplish more than one would otherwise. We are all individual creatures and what is distressing to one may be a joy to another. Stress can be created by various demands from the external environment, such as relationships, work and daily routine, or even by our own expectations of ourselves. In order to treat stress, one should not eliminate it, but learn how to manage it and how to use it to one's own advantage. Yoga postures, meditation and breathing can help stress affected persons in many ways. Stressed out individuals have a great deal of physical tension in their bodies, which can naturally be unblocked by yoga postures. When one rests between postures, it promotes deep breathing and abdominal tension is released from the body. Yoga practise improves muscle tone, flexibility, strength, stamina, concentration and creativity while it reduces stress, tension, and helps in the cure of depression by boosting self-esteem in patients. Yoga helps us in regaining self-control and inspires a sense of well-being and calm. Why Me? Anyone and everyone can benefit from yoga. However regular practise is necessary for good results. There are a wide variety of hatha yoga techniques and a good teacher will help you discover what is most suited to your individual needs. A housewife, a child, a diver, a student or a factory worker have very different lifestyles, while different people have different innate tendencies and personal preferences, yet all can be fulfilled by either of the several styles of yoga developed until this present day. Everybody wants harmony and well-being in life. Yoga allows us to fulfill our role in life more efficiently while maintaining inner calm and stability. The 8 Limbs of Yoga by Patanjali Patanjali is an evolved soul who lived sometime between about 500 and 200 B.C., but the exact date is unknown. Patanjali, often called 'the father of yoga,' chose to write on three subjects: grammar, medicine and yoga. He is the author of the Yoga Sutra, where he describes the ways of overcoming the afflictions of the body and the fluctuations of the mind: the obstacles to spiritual development. There is more to yoga than postures and breathing, hence the development of the eight limbs of yoga: Ashtanga Yoga. These are Patanjali's suggestions for living a better life through yoga. The works of Patanjali are followed by yogis to this day in their effort to develop a refined language, a cultured body and a civilised mind, which in turn will assist their spiritual development. The eight limbs of yoga by Patanjali, which were described in detail in our Awareness newsletters, are: Yama – Behavioural principles (in external dealings) Niyama – Moral observances (within) Asana – Physical Postures Pranayama – Regulated Breathing Pratyahara – Sense Control Dharana – Concentration Dhyana – Meditation Samadhi – Superconscious state of absorption in the essence of God To receive past issues of the Awareness newsletter, send us an email with your request on info@lotusroom.org Food for Thought The Food for Thought section of our Awareness newsletter is compiled from excerpts from books published by Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math, the international bhakti yoga organisation with which the Lotus Room is affiliated. A new snippet of wisdom is published online every month, so this section shows the excerpts published in the latest three issues of our newsletter. Father, brother, son... When a man is working, his manager will see him as a worker; his child will see him as a father, and his wife will see him as a husband. His servant will see him as master. Dogs and other animals will view him in another way. The same person will be seen differently according to the relationship between seer and seen. Similarly, Krsna - the Supreme Personality of Godhead - appears differently to those who view him according to their respective rasa (mood). In this way, the differentiated character of the Absolute is revealed according the soul's subjective qualifications. Excerpt from Subjective Evolution of Consciousness by Swami B R Sridhar A Simple Way to Health and Happiness One who is conscious of the organic whole is in the most healthy position. That is proper adjustment, and maladjustment is the cause of our present diseased condition. Adjustment is life; it is liberated life, and to be the prey of maladjustment is to approach pain and misery. Everything within the environment is all right; the only difficulty is found in the conception of selfish special interest. Our aversion to the universal interest is the cause of our detachment from the conception of the whole and from happiness and health. Excerpt from Subjective Evolution of Consciousness by Swami B R Sridhar About philosophy, science, consciousness and... love! Philosophy is the attempt to understand the nature of existence by logic, while science is practical analysis and conclusion by proven method. While Bhakti yoga is often called the science of self-realisation due to its effective process or abhidheya, and it employs a logical approach to the knowledge of what is what known as sambandha jnana, it considers knowledge a tool whereas attainment of Divine Love, prema, is considered the ultimate goal of human life - prayojana. A higher consciousness makes us aware of our relationship with the Absolute, and since relationships are based on deepening degrees of love and intimacy, therefore the highest consciousness allows us the greatest capacity for selfless and unconditional love. Edited from Bhakti Yoga, an introductory pamphlet by Sri Chaitanya Saraswat Math, Nabadwip, India Selected Verses This section is compiled from the Quote of the Month section of our Awareness newsletter. A new sloka – Sanskrit for verse – is published online every month, so this section shows the slokas from the latest three issues of our newsletter. yoga-sthah kuru karmani, sangam tyaktva dhananjaya siddhy-asiddhyoh samo bhutva, samatvam yoga uchyate (Srimad Bhagavad Gita 2:48) O Dhananjaya, give up the ego that you are the doer, and be equipoised in success and failure. Thus stand firm in the plane of yoga and do your prescribed duties. Such a state of balance is indeed known as yoga. ascharyavat pasyati kaschid enam ascharyavad vadati tathaiva chanyaha ascharyavach chainam anyah srinoti srutvapy enam veda na chaiva kaschit (Srimad Bhagavad Gita 2:29) Some see the soul as astonishing, some describe it as astonishing, some hear of it as astonishing, while others, though hearing about it, know nothing of it. kamasya nendriya-pritir labho jiveta yavata jivasya tattva-jijnasa nartho yas cheha karmabhih (Srimad Bhagavatam 1.2.10) Life's desires should never be directed toward sense gratification. One should desire only a healthy life, since a human being is meant for inquiry about the Absolute Truth. Nothing else should be the goal of one's works.