Friday, September 30, 2022

Changing to Accommodate

I had obstacles to overcome with the Yoga Centre I joined. The style did make a few minor adaptations for Western tastes. Like moving breathing exercises to the start of classes, so people didn’t just leave after the “exercise”. And charging, because there weren’t enough people from the community willing to finance the centre. 

The school was conservative, and on the surface seemed religious. I was told Yoga was not religious, but it looks, swims, and quacks like a duck? There are people who treat it like a religion, and the Vendantic philosophy has big overlaps with Hinduism. Again, there are many who will argue that Hinduism and Buddhism were philosophies, not religions. That is not something I understood. I am from a Christian background, which despite the multiple and expanding versions (with a long history of schisms) still (as I understood it) argues that there is one fundamental truth... even if there is disagreement about what that is, you have to wrestle with it. 

That always worried me. If we can’t come to an agreement, we have to go our separate ways. Fortunately, the yoga centre was “holistic”. I could ignore lots of the pageantry, and focus on the practical bits. Proper breathing, diet, exercise, relaxation and mental health. Five basic points to return to whatever you are struggling with.



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