Yoga Meditation

The SOAS Centre of Yoga Studies is delighted to host a series of online seminars with leading scholars at the heart of Philosophy and Yoga Studies. Please join us for this opportunity to go deeper into the material with researchers, graduates in the academic study of yoga and students of yoga more broadly. Sessions will be held over Zoom. Spaces are limited to facilitate exchange of ideas and participants are asked to register in advance. Readings will be shared prior to the sessions. Timings are British Summer Time. To register email Ruth Westoby at [email protected]. Please include a short description of your area of related research or study.

Mindfulness-Meditation is just one of todays’ many researched meditation techniques. Current clinical studies conclude that meditation is not only beneficial for health and wellbeing but also for brains of all ages. Mindfulness-Meditation has been found to reshape the brain’s gray matter and white matter thickness, concentration and density. The brain’s fibers and connectivity change through the use of meditation and may be a helpful technique to mitigate the deterioration associated with an aging brain and cognitive defects found in children who experience neglect. Mindfulness-Meditation changes brain structure and function, while changing the perception of anxiety, depression, increasing task effectiveness, attention, concentration and clinical diseases such as; PTSD, ADHD and personality disorders. Mindfulness-Meditation may prove to be a vital part of stress management, benefiting brains of any age.

We are organising a 2-day symposium on yoga and the body to be held at the Australian National University, Canberra.

Here is the link to register: http://chl.anu.edu.au/news-events/events/658/yoga-and-body-past-and-present-symposium

Here is the link to download the flyer and schedule: https://drive.google.com/open?id=0B0ONiOO-EUx-c0w1ZnFQZ0pnWFE

Представлене видання дає можливість сучасним дослідникам і практикам йоґи глибше зрозуміти йоґічну медитацію — дг’яну. У монографії досліджується процес становлення й розвитку філософських засад дг’яни в історичній перспективі. Автор ретельно вивчає та ілюструє різноманіття поглядів та визначень, що формують поняття «дг’я- на» у ведійський, епічний, класичний та гатха-йоґічний періоди. Для відображення уявлень кожної із зазначених епох, уперше зроблено український переклад нових фрагментів санскритських першоджерел. Показано, як зміни в значенні поняття «дг’яна» впливали на розвиток вчення йоґи, практику йоґінів та по-різному формували уявлення про таке звичне для сучасної людини поняття, як «мислення».
Монографія, як ґрунтовне комплексне дослідження, спонукає до подальшого вивчення інтелектуальних тенденцій у розвитку йоґи та її взаємодії з іншими філософськими та езотеричними вченнями. Книга адресована науковцям, викладачам, аспірантам, студентам, усім, хто цікавиться історією індійської та західної філософської думки, прак- тикам йоґи.

За останнє сторіччя Йоґа як і пов’язані з нею практики медитації, психотехніки стали невід’ємним атрибутом західної культури. Десятки мільйонів людей практикують асани й пранаями, беруть участь у йоґа-семінарах, навіть, не помічаючи цього, використовують терміни йоґи в повсякденній мові. Однак, будь-яка популяризація має й зворотну сторону — спрощення. На жаль, цей процес повною мірою торкнувся і Йоґи. У свідомості західної людини терміни Йоґи втратили свою початкову глибину, Йозі приписали масу поглядів і концепцій, породжених швидше західною, а не індійською культурою. Сама Йоґа стала сприйматися як канонічне, монолітне вчення, позбавлене відтінків, історії, внутрішньої динаміки. У зв’язку з цим виникла потреба в справжньому науковому осмис- ленні Йоґи, яка й привела в останні два десятиліття до появи Yoga-studies у провідних світових центрах наукового сходознавства. Одним із піонерів цих досліджень у нашій країні став Дмитро Данилов — автор цієї монографії.
Книга написана в дуже сучасному жанрі історії та деконструкції ідей. Об’єктом досліджень став термін «дг’яна», який, як показав автор, покриває безліч досить різнорідних психопрактик, і неодноразово змінював своє значення. Таким чином, і це дуже відрадно, досліджуючи це вчення, Дмитро виходить за рамки сприйняття Йоґи як чисто тілесної практики й звертається до її глибини. Думаю, ця монографія буде цікава не тільки сходознавцям, але й філософам, психологам, а також усім, хто дійсно глибоко цікавиться йоґою. Андрій Сафронов. Президент Української федерації йоґи

Свого часу М. Еліаде відніс йоґу до одного з чотирьох базових і взаємозалежних понять, до однієї з чотирьох «кінетичних ідей», які ведуть в осердя індійської релігійно-філософської думки. Минає понад півсторіччя і в світі з’являється різнопланове зацікавлення йоґою, а індійське явище стає впливовою і помітною світовою тенденцією. Уявити сучасний глобалізований культурний, релігійний
і науковий ландшафт без йоґи вже неможливо.
В останні роки історико-філософські дослідження йоґи не тільки істотно пожвавились, а і стали помітним напрямком в індологічній гуманітаристиці. Активно розвивається і міждисциплінарне (трансдисциплінарне) осмислення феномену йоґи. При цьому підвищене зацікавлення спрямоване не тільки на індуїстську йоґічну думку, а і буддійську, джайнську. Водночас не вся основна йоґічна термінологія, включаючи дг’яну, встигла стати предметом окремих розвідок. Тому запропоноване Дмитром Данило- вим монографічне видання, присвячене окремо узятому поняття, тобто дг’яні, є беззаперечно актуальним та відо- бражає світові тенденції в сучасних студіях з індійської філософії.
Автору вдалось не тільки зосередитись на одному з ключових понять йоґічної думки, а і належно проаналізу- вати його трансформацію, залучивши для цього необхідне коло першоджерел. Саме дослідження побудоване так, що аналіз вживання дг’яни здійснюється у досить широкому часовому діапазоні: від ведійських витоків (наприклад, Ріґведа cамгіта, Каушитака, Шветашватара, Майтрі упа- нішади) й епічних текстів (наприклад, «Мокшадгарма», «Бгаґавадґіта») до йоґа даршяни (наприклад, «Йоґа-сутри» Патаньджалі) і середньовічних гатха-йоґічних текстів (на- приклад, «Гатха-йоґа-прадипіка»). У результаті, вдалося помітити важливі трансформації в розумінні дг’яни, які відбувались у різних площинах: гносеологічній, сотері- ологічній, трансцендентній, тілесній. При цьому аналіз поняття дг’яна здійснюється у контексті, який передбачає звернення до різних даршян, включаючи неортодоксаль- ні. Це дало змогу доречно вказати на ті конкретні впли- ви у змінах значень дг’яни, які мали місце в індійському діалогічному історико-філософському процесі. У разі необхідності, Д. Данилов обстоює свої погляди, дискуту- ючи з провідними дослідниками йоґічної філософської спадщини (не тільки згаданим раніше М. Еліаде, а і Дас Ґуптою, Дж. Маллінсоном, Ф. Маасом та іншими).
З позиції історико-філософської індології в Україні запропонована монографія Д. Данилова зберігає не тільки вищеокреслену актуальність. Вона вирізняється ще і но- ваторством, оскільки є першим завершеним досліджен- ням, присвяченим історико-філософським аспектам йоґи. Завдяки автору до вітчизняної науки і культури вводиться не тільки цікава та значуща проблематика, а і відповідні фрагменти санскритських текстів у перекладі українською мовою.
Будемо сподіватись, що монографія знайде свого заці- кавленого читача і сприятиме відновленню та пожвавлен- ню вітчизняних досліджень, присвячених непересічному феномену йоґи.
Юрій Завгородній, доктор філософських наук

The Tamil Śaiva yogi Sri Sabhapati Swami (b. 1828) has had a substantial impact on nineteenth- and twentieth-century South Asian and Western occult movements, yet with a few exceptions he has been overlooked by authors writing on modern yoga. His writings survive in multiple languages, including English as well as highly Sanskritised dialects of Tamil, Hindustani, and Bengali, and also include elaborate visual diagrams. This chapter first summarises Sabhapati’s relevance to the field of Yoga Studies. It then offers an overview of Sabhapati’s life based on North American and European archival sources as well as new textual and ethnographic sources from the author’s field work in Tamil Nadu. Finally, the chapter analyses the cross-fertilisation of Sabhapati’s teachings in the Theosophical Society and Aleister Crowley’s (1875–1947) Thelema.

This contribution to the Common Knowledge symposium “Fuzzy Studies” explores the boundaries between religions by exploring the ambiguous place of yoga in various religious traditions, both modern and premodern. Recently, certain Hindus and Christians have tried to argue that yoga is an essentially Hindu practice, making their case by appealing to the Yoga Sutras, a text by the Sanskrit author Patanjali. However, on closer examination, the Yoga Sutras seem to exist in a fuzzy, indeterminate space that is not quite “Hindu” in the way the word is understood today. For instance, other Sanskrit authors of the first millennium CE criticized Patanjali's yoga teachings for not being properly theistic and for having strong affinities to Buddhism and Jainism. Yoga was also integrated into at least one of the “religions of the book” in the medieval period: in India in the second millennium, yoga was practiced widely among Sufis, who adapted it in surprising and idiosyncratic ways to make it compatible with their own Islamic philosophies. Nicholson concludes with an appeal for a more nuanced understanding of religious contact that goes beyond the pejorative term syncretism to acknowledge that religious mixing has been a central force in the development not only of Hinduism and Islam, but also of Christianity.

As the founder of a global movement of spiritually-oriented and socially-minded intellectuals, artists and writers called Renaissance Universal, Prabhat Rainjan Sarkar (1922-1990), a spiritual teacher (also known as Shrii Shrii Anandamurti) and social philosopher, describes the interrelationship, clashes and inter-mixing between the indigenous people of early India with their Tantra-based civilization and the Aryans who migrated into India bringing their Vedic civilization. This spoken discourse was given in May 1959. It is one of a series of remarkable semi-annual Renaissance Universal discourses given by P. R. Sarkar after the founding of the Renaissance Universal movement. The discourse presents a strong challenge to traditional thinking about this important topic -- Richard Gauthier, Department of Chemistry and Physics, Santa Rosa Junior College, Santa Rosa, California, USA, 13 September, 2020.

The writing of this paper was prompted by the discovery of several manuscripts of mediaeval yoga texts which contain lists of more than eighty-four āsana-s, a canonical number mentioned in several yoga texts.  Until now, lists of eighty-four āsana-s have been found in only two recently published yoga texts, namely, the Haṭharatnāvalī and the Jogapradīpyakā.  The manuscript evidence presented in this article indicates that these published texts are not isolated accounts of mediaeval yoga systems with many complex āsanas. In fact, it is clear that more than eighty-four āsana-s were practised in some traditions of Haṭha Yoga before the British arrived in India.  The majority of these āsana-s were not seated poses, but complex and physically-demanding postures, some of which involved repetitive movement, breath control and the use of ropes.  When the āsana-s in the sources which I shall analyse in this article are considered in their totality, antecedents can be identified for many non-seated and inverted postures in twentieth-century systems of Indian yoga.

Rita D. Sherma (Routledge London, Copyright): This volume marks the first wide-ranging and multi-vocal academic survey of the major types and categories of Hindu contemplative praxis from a breadth of scholarly viewpoints that reflect both (a) the variegation in types of contemplative practices within the Hindu traditions and (b) the use of Hindu internal hermeneutical perspectives for expanding the concept of contemplation beyond definitions that-though incrementally enriched by content from Buddhism-are still normatively constrained by Christian understandings of the concept. Part of the reason that the field remains fairly unrepresentative of the breadth of religious lives across cultures lies in the dearth of academic works, from scholars of diverse religions, on the subject of contemplative studies. Contemplative Studies, as a discipline, 1 can be approached via several avenues: (a) a rigorous focus on religious practices of contemplation, their history, and function within the context of one or more spiritual traditions; (b) the secular and interdisciplinary field of the study and pedagogical application of contem-plative practice and experience which may include methods extracted from religions or developed in engagement with other areas of inquiry; (c) neuroscientific approaches that analyze the effects of contemplation, and (d) its study and therapeutic applications in the health sciences. Finally, there are programs, which call for a transdisciplinary research methodology, 2

In this chapter, I focus on phenomenological reduction and reflective meditation in the Advaita Vedānta system. Many Advaita Vedānta traditions and texts guide meditation, but here I discuss only one 14th-century text, the Dṛgdṛśyaviveka: An Inquiry into the Nature of the 'Seer' and the 'Seen' (Vidyāraṇya 1931), hereafter "DDV", primarily because it gives a clear summary of the traditional approach within Advaita Vedānta and facilitates the intended dialogue. The objective is not to explore the scope of phenomenology, nor to address meditative techniques and philosophical arguments in Advaita Vedānta, but to develop a conversation between phenomenology and Advaita Vedānta. Phenomenological reduction was introduced by Husserl and later discussed by Fink, to liberate one from dogmatic convictions, to discover the essence as it is. This is a method of returning to 'the thing as such', free from conceptual parameters. For Husserl, scientific inquiry demands an investigator bracket all the imposed factors to be isolated from the pure world or 'things themselves' (1998). This process is one of going back to the world free of contamination by assumptions and methods, whether scientific or psychological. Significant to this are the moments of epoché or abstention, and of the reduction proper, a process that brings the inquiry back to consciousness. Husserl sought here to overcome the chasm between consciousness (subject) and world (object), without requiring this to be mediated by categories, as with Kantian epistemology. The process culminates in exposing the state where no distinction remains between consciousness and object, noesis and noema. This erasure of the gap led some to equate systems like Advaita and Yoga with phenomenology. Our openness to comparing the systems stems from the conviction that even when philosophies differ, their scientific methods can overlap, and sometimes, a comparative approach makes exploring the nuances easier. Though systems remain separate, dialogue among them is promising for future philosophy. Just as there are objections to phenomenological methods being unable to serve as a bridge and remaining Cartesian, similar objections can be made to Advaita taking arguments too far, to solipsism and subjective illusionism. The scope of this paper, again, is to explore the philosophy of meditation as championed by Husserl and Śaṅkara (8th-century ce India), relying on a secondary text, DDV, to synthesize the system of Śaṅkara, who may be considered the Classical Indian period equivalent of Greek

This article is an overview of a study conducted at the Nova University Biofeedback Lab, resulting not only in a new approach to stress reduction, but also an innovative method to "exercise" our right brain hemispheres promoting its rightful and equal dominance with the left. Doing so results in an increase in creativity, mindfulness, and a higher degree of empathy towards others and the earth. In short, increased right-brain holistic thinking would improve our world-view to be more inclusive of both our bio-sphere and our human-sphere, and reconnect us with our essential creative and loving spiritual selves.

简要回顾独特的美国神秘阿迪达(弗兰克林·琼斯)的生活和精神自传。一些版本封面上的贴纸上写着"有史以来最深刻的精神自传",这很可能是真的。我70多岁,读过许多由精神导师和灵性的书,这是最伟大的之一。当然,这是迄今为止我所见过的启蒙过程最全面、最清晰的描述。即使你对人类最迷人的心理过程毫无兴趣,它还是一个惊人的文件,揭示了很多关于宗教、瑜伽和人类心理学的信息,并探讨了人类可能性的深度和局限性。我详细地描述了它,并将他的教学与当代印度神秘奥修的教导进行比较。
那些希望从现代两个系统的观点来看为人类行为建立一个全面的最新框架的人,可以查阅我的书《路德维希的哲学、心理学、Min d和语言的逻辑结构》维特根斯坦和约翰·西尔的《第二部》(2019年)。那些对我更多的作品感兴趣的人可能会看到《会说话的猴子——一个末日星球上的哲学、心理学、科学、宗教和政治——文章和评论2006-2019年第3次(2019年)和自杀乌托邦幻想21篇世纪4日 (2019)

Addressing the Yogasūtra योगसूत्र, or 'the point of view' codified in the Patañjali system, is a difficult task. We are faced with an Opera written in a sacred language, to which we approach with due respect. The text is hermetic, as it is typical of the writings of every initiatory Tradition, where the 'transmission' takes place exclusively through the direct relationship ('mouth-ear') between Master and disciple. Like all the writings of Tradition, the language used is highly symbolic, therefore a vehicle of multiple meanings, the decoding of which is almost impossible if you do not have the opportunity to make them "living them from the inside". Taken alone, it remains a text whose understanding is not only inaccessible for a layman, but also substantially indecipherable for the specialists of the academic world themselves

Affrontare gli Yogasūtra योगसूत्र, ovvero ‘il punto di vista’ codificato nel sistema di Patañjali è impresa ardua. Siamo di fronte ad un’Opera scritta in una lingua Sacra, alla quale accostarsi con il dovuto rispetto. Il testo è ermetico, come peraltro è tipico degli scritti di ogni Tradizione iniziatica, dove la ‘trasmissione’ avviene esclusivamente mediante il rapporto diretto (‘bocca-orecchio’) tra Maestro e discepolo. Come tutti gli scritti della Tradizione, il linguaggio utilizzato è altamente simbolico, quindi veicolo di Significati multipli, la cui decodifica è pressoché impossibile se non si ha la possibilità di realizzarli ‘vivendoli dall’interno’. Preso da solo, resta un testo la cui comprensione è non solo inaccessibile per un profano, ma anche sostanzialmente indecifrabile per gli stessi specialisti del mondo accademico.

This first article traces some of the lesser known roots and branches of Yoga and how they weave into modern neuroscience and psychology, melding with integration science. The second article will review in more detail the research evidence for the broad-ranging benefits of Yoga to the body, mind, and spirit, gathered from diverse fields such as epigenetics, immunology, clinical psychotherapy, cardiovascular disease, multiple sclerosis research, aging, and mental health. The third paper will outline the framework the author has developed for Yoga as applied to neuroscience, illustrating with case studies drawn from her clients, students, and postgraduate yoga teacher trainees.

“Human beings do the actions, and the results come according to the law of nature – the Lord has nothing to do with it. So when people are in trouble, they say: “Oh God, what have You done to me? What put this into Your mind?” But the fact is that Náráyańa, God, has done nothing, and had nothing in His mind. You have done something and are suffering the consequences. You are in trouble and you are crying out. Many people are like this. But Náráyańa has done nothing. As you have sown, so you now reap. This is the plain truth,” explains Shrii Shrii Ánandamúrti. “So before doing anything you should think carefully, because the action is in your hand, but not the result – that is in the hand of Prakrti (God’s Cosmic Operative Principle – the law of nature). Náráyańa neither performs the action nor administers the results. He simply gives Prakrti the opportunity to work within Her own limited sphere; Prakrti does Her duty accordingly. She does not aim to satisfy either your mind or the mind of anyone else. She only aims to please the mind of Náráyańa. Whatever work Náráyańa has given Her the right to do, that is what She does. She has no right to do more than that.” Shrii Shrii Ánandamúrti (1921-1990) was a Tantric guru in the tradition of Shiva and Krishna. He introduced the empowered universal spiritual mantra “Baba Nam Kevalam”, composed a collection of 5018 spiritual songs called Prabháta Saḿgiita, and founded the socio-spiritual movement Ananda Marga (“the Path of Bliss”).  –  Richard Gauthier, Department of Chemistry and Physics, Santa Rosa Junior College, Santa Rosa, California, USA, August 6, 2021.

Yoga implies various things to various individuals. This subject spotlights on a sort of yoga called Hatha yoga. One of the advantages of Hatha yoga is that it can ease pressure and help you unwind. Yoga incorporates breathing, contemplation, and activities, considered stances or represents that stretch the body. You can do yoga to help you unwind. The objectives of yoga incorporate improved physical and emotional well-being and furthermore "unity" with a higher being, oneself, or some type of higher mindfulness. In any case, yoga shouldn't be a profound practice for you to get the advantages.

Stress is a common condition, a response to a physical threat, psychological distress and mental tension that generates a host of chemical and hormonal reactions in body. In essence, the body prepares to fight or flee, pumping more blood to the heart and muscles and shutting down all nonessential functions. When the stress reaction is prolonged, however, the normal physical functions either been exaggerated/shut down. Yoga, physical postures and breathing exercises improve muscle strength, flexibility, blood circulation and oxygen uptake as well as hormonal function. Yoga, it is much more effective in treating and preventing stress, improving quality of life in physical, emotional, intellectual, social and spiritual aspects.

Allopathic medicine not necessarily cure all the patients of all the diseases. The left out patients or let out diseases may have some underlying problem which was not caught by these allopathic medicines. So to bridge this gap, there is a need to know and explore the hidden underlying problem and hidden potential to solve it on scientific basis. Proper mind management can lead to endorphins release which intern strengthen immune system.  Nowadays there is an urgent need to encourage researches in this area on mind management and yoga practice as it will be not be just a need but a necessity for everyone to save one self and this world. So yoga and meditation should be included in day to day life style to deal with complexity of modern days. And it is also necessity to include this spiritual science with modern medicine to compliment modern medicine. So everyone should practice yoga not only for the sake of self development and self spiritual enrichment but also for world harmony and preservation of society.

La Via tradizionale richiede di essere direttamente sperimentata come processo evolutivo concreto, del quale abbiamo testimonianze precise:
“..vi sono sempre stati e vi sono degli esseri che hanno svelato, in quanto lo vivono, e non teoricamente o illusoriamente, questo asserto di verità tradizionale, cosicché la verità è provata sperimentalmente.”
La grandezza dell’Opera è anche l’essere uno strumento a disposizione di tutti coloro che intraprendono la via dello Yoga:
“L’insegnamento della Gītā può essere valido ed essenziale per tutti: occorre meditarlo profondamente, perché lo Yoga di qualunque  forma e grado non può prescindere dalla meditazione. Dalla  corretta meditazione nasce il riconoscimento della retta azione.”
Via di illuminazione dalle molteplici prospettive contenute Tradizione, :
“La Gītā costituisce una Dottrina sintetica (non sincretica) che conduce dalle tenebre alla luce, dalla morte alla vita, dal divenire all’essere, dall’avidyā allo jñāna, dal relativo impermanente all’assoluto incondizionato, dall’apparenza a ciò che é.”
Da cui il sottile ma saldo legame che unisce gli Yogasūtra alla Gītā visibile se ci si pone in modo fattivo nella prospettiva dell’insegnamento tradizionale:
“La Tradizione, con le sue varie scienze, indica la via dell’assoluto e degli universali che va investigata seriamente ed esperita. Lo Yoga è scienza e filosofia, è teoria e pratica, è mente e azione.”

This paper will include an organizational problem of workplace well-being, principles, ideas, questions, methods and theory for stress reduction and ideas for improving well-being in the workplace organization for employers and employees. This paper will also identify various stakeholder groups which will benefit from having a staff well-being in the workplace with utilizing focus groups who would complete questionnaires or surveys as a tool for further research utilizing the UK as a workplace/organization model. This paper will hopefully motivate stakeholders to participate and might influence the strategy looking to engage in the well-being process.  Finally, this paper will motivate to participate for a variety of good reasons to cut down on the absenteeism, illness and well-being rate within the organization.

The Shroud of Turin, Christianity's most precious relic is firmly linked to its foundational doctrine: Jesus's miraculous resurrection from the dead. This well defended connection limits Shroud research to the investigation of the mechanics of image formation, the underlying cause (the cause of the cause), being a foregone, non-debatable conclusion; it was a miracle. The miracle status limits the investigation because otherwise it would infringe on foundational doctrine. Advances in science, scholarship, observation and experience since the Gospels were written reveal a natural explanation for what actually took place on the first Easter Sunday and, thus, the cause underlying the cause of image formation. Arriving at this conclusion requires outside the box thinking: looking beyond the Bible into other religious expressions for answers, engaging in non-literal interpretation of the Bible, invoking principles of quantum science and inserting the role of human consciousness into the investigation platform.

Yoga, Meditation and breathing exercises are considered to be a holistic healing method to overcome anxiety and panic attacks, to be more particular about instant relief from anxiety and panic situations initially pranayama and breathing techniques can swiftly help to calm and relax. Amid such incidents, we all have to pledge to remain positive while remaining alert. To win the Covid’19 war, from today onwards, let’s take a pledge to adhere the preventive guidelines of government to remain safe and positive, we can also make yoga and meditation a part of our regular lifestyle to keep ourselves and other family members free from stress, anxiety, panic attacks and also strengthening the immunity system which is required to fight internally against infectious diseases like Corona virus.

The cognitive and somatic benefits of a Kundalini yoga intervention to treat anxiety and OCD (Shannahoff-Khalsa, 2006) was evaluated with 44 mental health consumers. Ratings were assigned for (1) initial meditations/postures, (2) asanas/kriyas, (3) mantra, and (4) extended meditations. Pre-post ratings included subjective distress (SUDS), blood pressure/pulse, and Gunas (lethargy/Tamas, mental clarity/Sattva, and agitation/Rajas). Significant pre-post differences were found for blood pressure, SUDS, Tamas and Sattva. Participants prescribed psychotropic medications reported less benefit from extended mediation and lower post-session mental clarity/Sattva. Clinician derived DSM-IV diagnoses revealed practice benefits were significantly greater for participants diagnosed with anxiety. Severity of anxiety and depression at the initiation of the intervention were related to significantly lower benefit from subsequent yoga sessions. Severity of depression was correlated with fewer sessions completed.

A realizar inmediatamente después del solsticio, o uno o dos días después. No realizarla justo antes del solsticio porque la energía está muy desordenada. Los días entorno al solsticio de invierno forman la época más desordenada del año, la que tiende a la dispersión. No es extraño que la mente divague y se agolpen pensamientos inconvenientes y emociones poco beneficiosas. Incluso observar los pensamientos y las emociones, y en general la mente, se vuelve más difícil. Y más difícil aún es justo antes del solsticio, por lo que recomiendo se realice esta meditación justo después. Sentarse con el frente del cuerpo mirando al norte, que es donde en este momento está el máximo de energía. Relajarse y entrar en meditación. Esto es: centrarse en la respiración, luego la concentración incluye a todo el cuerpo y se dejan pasar los pensamientos. Una vez lograda la calma, enfocarse en el Norte. Siente la fuerte energía que viene de los 0º sobre el horizonte. Es energía joven, acaba de aparecer. Es la que será el orden del nuevo año (que se manifestará claramente el 4 de febrero, punto medio del solsticio y el equinoccio). Ahora asistimos a su concepción. Es una energía hermosa. Disfrutarla aunque ahora sea invisible en el entorno, pero que a partir de este momento prosperará y va a crecer hasta dominar por completo en febrero. Lo que sientes es la semilla de la energía del nuevo año, que está ya en desarrollo. Luego se dirigen las palmas de las manos hacia Tierra. Sentir en el entorno que hay energía desordenada (estamos en el máximo yin del año, por eso es desordenado, porque falta yang, que es orden). La superficie de la Tierra también hay desorden, el del viejo yin. Pero en profundidad, sentirlo, al fondo, como en el centro de la Tierra, hay un punto de luz; o si se prefiere una superficie de luz muy tenue. Es la semilla de la energía del nuevo año. Irá creciendo y ascendiendo, acaparando toda la profundidad, hasta aflorar a la superficie y ser dominante y