After reading some interesting posts I’ve come to he conclusion that I will never be able to memorize everything regarding yoga! There is just so much to remember. I can’t keep it all straight. It’s overwhelming me. I have only the forum for info and I have never had the desire to practice within a group so a teacher is out of he question. No one else I know does yoga so…I’m on my own so to speak.
[QUOTE=AmethystDaisy2;72167]It’s overwhelming me.[/QUOTE]
How to eat an elephant?
One bite after the other.
Why do you feel the need to memorize? Yoga is a lifelong journey - enjoy the ride!
You don’t need a group to get the benefits of a teacher! I’m a big advocate for one-on-one sessions. When I first started doing yoga I had three one on ones with a teacher and it was the best thing I ever did! It’s hard to learn anything in a group when you’re just starting out, so getting that direction right at the beginning meant that I could get more benefit during group classes.
Just a thought anyway
Remembering anything about yoga is un-yogik, if you will; like you dont have to remember that darkness will be followed by daylight. Only that yoga is true which is an interiorized truth. Rest is mind-game.
Yoga need not begin in a yoga studio, nor be confined to it. Yoga the union happens all the time whenever you perceive any object. Your desire to perceive is greeted by the object’s gunas that send back vibrations causing perception. It becomes yoga, when you become conscious of the process.
Breath is ordinarily autonomous. By paying attention to it, you are doing another yoga, breath energy uniting with mind energy.
That’s how yoga can begin and allow you a variety of unions to take place at various levels and depth of subtleness. Remember to do this and there will be no need to remenber anything else.
Yoga is about 10% theory and 90% practical. So you really don’t have to go around memorizing truckloads of information. Just have a basic understanding of why you are doing the practice and how Yoga actually works.
As you indicated in your other thread you want to reduce your anxious thoughts. Yoga can definitely do that. It works by removing afflictions(kleshas) from your thoughts, your anxiety, addiction, fear, complexes, identification, ignorance etc The basic practice of Yoga is witnessing. You need to learn how to watch your thoughts in formal meditation sittings without getting involved in them, by simply witnessing them like this, they begin to lose their power over you and weaken. So suppose such and such thought makes you anxious whenever it comes e.g., “Oh no, there is an exam tomorrow, what if I fail” this kind of thought may immediately trigger anxious emotions in you. However, when you learn to simply witness it whenever it arises without getting involved, it will gradually start to lose its power to trigger anxiety. Eventually, it will lose all its power.
However, this power of witnessing does not come straight away(I make it sound easier than it really is) It is especially not easy for somebody who is already anxiety-prone, because whenever those thoughts come, anxiety is triggered automatically by the nervous system. Thus the nervous system needs to be purified through Patanjali’s Kriya Yoga of 8 limbs(yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyhara, dharana, dhyana and samadhi) and your power of witnessing will become stronger as you progress.
It is experiential not memorized.
It is in the heart center not the mental center.
It is felt, not thought.
Just practice.
I will chime in here - like everyone else said - yoga is about practice more than theory. Keep practicing and your inner wisdom will connect to all that is important - don’t over think it.
a blind man walks up to an elephant and says, “it smells very dirty”
a man with out a sense of touch goes to the same elephant and exclaims “it feels dry and rough”
a man lacking a sense of smell says, “it is very grey”
a man who cannot hear anything says, “it tastes like dirt”
a man without a sense of taste is startled by the loud noise it made.
they all walked up to the same elephant.