Chapter One: What is Hatha Yoga?

Main Idea - Concepts

The yoga of physical well being, hatha is a branch of yoga that deals with the physical body – its care, its well being, its health, strength and all it takes to maintain a healthy body in as natural as state as possible.

• The body is like the temple for the spirit – the healthy body is the ultimate instrument for the spirit to “be”
• This book is not designed as a “doctor’s manual” but does touch upon important functions of the body – to provide reference to the “western” terms and diseases. The goal of hatha yoga is to venture back to the natural state – and to conquer illness/disease in such a way. No specific cures are mentioned only the concept that the body is eager to return to its natural state.
• It’s believed that what will keep a healthy man healthy will also turn an unhealthy man healthy.
• The following chapters in this book proceeds to detail what hatha yoga is – on the philosophy that any man or woman can follow the hatha yoga path to bring their body to a naturally healthy state. Entrusted is also the idea that if we observe a healthy man or woman’s habits – how they are as healthy as they appear, how they have combat illness – then we too can try to do the same.

New Concept:

There are such radical perceptions of the yogic lifestyle and how people define a “yogi”. Understandably yoga may appear as “foreign” to many westerners, but in India, the birthplace of yoga, there exist “yoga freaks” so they could be named. Those who pose as hatha yogi’s but do not have the slightest conception of the underlying principles of the yogic lifestyle. Gaining muscle control over the digestive organs – inserting objects in the anus to reverse the peristaltic action of the bowls – completely reversing the action of digestion. This is just one example of the fanaticism of these “false yogi’s pitied by real yogi’s who value the principles of hatha and include them in their life’s philosophies.