Good yoga book

Creativity Books
#1

I want to get another yoga book and if anyone has any experience on something that would suit me please feel free to let me know. What I am looking for is one that would discuss what we should use to cook, sleeping postures that are good for our body, things we should use to clean ourselves and how we should clean ourselves, what we should do to get ready for our postures. Basically I see a lot of books talk mostly about postures and a little about the rest of yoga. I want to know why yoga/yogis do what they do and the reasoning for it. I dont want a sugar coated book to fit our modern socioty, I want the age ole wisdom

any ideas?
thanks
seeker

#2

does the spam ever end?
I was looking for someone with personal experience on a good book

#3

Hi Tube
Let me know what it is you plan to gain from the book…Because I believe you are looking for books on 4-5 varied subjects.

  1. What we should use to cook (Buy Harish Johari book… He explains how yogic principles/ayurvedic cooking principles can be applied to the food we eat)
  2. Cleansing (Are you talking about Jala neti, Nauli, Bhasti Kriyas??)
  3. Ready for postures (How about Swami Vishnu Devananda’s Book??)
  4. Sleep Postures (hmmm…doesn’t shava asana cut it for you brother?? ).
  5. Yoga and the reason behind it (Swami Vishnu Devananda’s Book, BKS Iyengar Light on Yoga and Light on Pranayama…Infact a lot of reasons are given even for the way the names of yogic postures came into existence)…

satisfied??:cool:

#4

Well i ordered a couple of books and a friend is giving me one as well. in the last few days I started reading a book and it takes care of number 2 on the list you made, I will look into number 1, 3, and 5 so thanks for that. On number 4 I was kind of looking for what did yogis think of sleep, what did they sleep on, and what did different postures while sleeping accomplish
thanks for your help :slight_smile:
Seeker

#5

hmmm…what did yogi’s think of sleep…lemme scan my little brain…
Here are a few things that I know of, from an occidental standpoint…Evolutionary scientists believe sleep is a vestige function left over from our primate life. Because you couldn’t hunt at night, there was no point of wasting energy, so the best thing a primate could do was sleep and conserve energy…A few other scientists believe sleep is a function to slow down our metabolic rate and give organs a resting period (although it is speculated other than your heart, every other organ functions equally exhaustive tasks)…A few other scientists believe sleep is a psychological response to reduce nervous stimulation that happens during the day (although if you take dreams into account, there is a lot of nervous activity that goes on)…

Now what do Yogi’s think of sleep…I know very little…but if you are a determined sadhak. It means you are wasting time sleeping…Coz the desire for sleep is never reduced during your life time…(think about it)…Yogi’s believe a few hours of sleep coupled with a few hours of meditation should do the trick (it has been proved scientifically, that even though you sleep like 8 hrs, only 2 hrs of alpha/theta/whatever waves is sufficient to feel deeply rested and the rest of 6 hrs is wasted in getting into and getting out of these alpha/theta states…So when you practice meditation before sleep, you should be able to achieve those states much faster there by requiring less sleep)…From a totally different few point, sleep is viewed a very important aspect of Sadhana, because that is the only time your astral body gets a chance to move out of your logical environment shackles…

now you know all I know about sleep…

Yours truly
Viraagi

#6

thank you very much for taking your time. I will continue to look into it further in my journey, but for now you have given me some food for thought, contemplation, and a starting point of looking into it.
enjoy the journey
seeker