WHAT IS YOGA?

And above all, what is so special about it that attracts practitioners of all ages, races, cultures, religions, social backgrounds and even becomes one of the Intangible Heritage of Humanity?

Yoga is a path of self-knowledge and realization consisting of a series of physical and meditative practices. These practices have been handed down through the millennia, in oral form, from master to disciple. As practitioners we walk towards physical and inner territories that are often completely unknown, discovering everything that identifies us as human beings. On this path we are led, encouraged and protected by a teacher who has walked the same path and encountered the same difficulties.

In practice, exercises involving the body, breath, images and sounds alternate. Through constant practice we develop a deep knowledge of ourselves that allows us to identify and remove the physical and mental elements that hinder a harmonious and meaningful personal growth. Slowly we become an active part of our physical, mental and emotional well-being: the opportunity comes to us precisely from the positions of the body (ASANA), from breathing and concentration exercises (PRANAYAMA  and DHARANA), meditation (DHYANA), visualizations (YOGA NIDRA), sound vibrations (MANTRA) and gestures (MUDRA)  which are our tools for expanding consciousness. Over time we become healthy and strong, full of energy, positive, purposeful and joyful.

The  yoga is a powerful antidote to human suffering, a real elixir of happy life. We perceive that we have embarked on a direct path towards happiness from the first lesson, when, moving a bit clumsily on the mat, that sensation of completeness and contact with our deepest part emerges, the sensation of being immersed in a sacred dimension and full of possibilities. And even if the muscles will hurt us until the next lesson, an ancient curiosity is triggered: it is the desire to know and to know each other, to answer the big questions about life and above all to be happy. We feel that somehow happiness is there, in the increasingly elegant and confident movements, in the motions of our breath, in the subtle vibrations that reverberate in all cells and  in the mind that for a few moments, finally, is silent.  

Mental clarity is another focal point of yoga: "Yoga is the arrest of all modifications of the mind", quotes the most important of Patañjali's aphorisms.  (Yoga Sūtra  I.2). Self-knowledge and personal fulfillment become possible when a greater mental clarity is affirmed that like a lantern allows us to see our inner tangles, but also our numinous side, our inner strength and our possibilities. With practice we discover that the limits to happiness reside in the mind, that in the shadow of a block there is a potential, that behind a suffering there is some form of joyful drive that is just waiting to be released.    

Yoga leads to the discovery of the essence of which every individual is made and this is the reason for so much interest on the part of all: as human beings we share the same drives and the same fears, we all want to be happy and we all deserve the necessary inner peace. to express the best of us. Is there a better heritage of the means to achieve happiness? The invitation is one and only one: to practice with joy and constancy, without expecting anything but cultivating the intimate certainty that everything will come because yoga is the key that opens the casket in which our light is kept.     

by Rossana Dall'Armellina