Where would we be if Tina Turner never wrote that hit song in the ‘80’s? She was the first - but not the last - to wonder what (the hell) has yoga got to do with enlightenment?! If one does enough tree poses, does a blinding light flash from within, signalling one's arrival ?
Well, the answer is something like this:
- Yoga clears blockages that have accumulated from incorrect posture, and over-all physical misuse or apathy.
- Yoga helps to balance the organs, specifically the way energy flows through these systems (the five elements).
- Yoga enhances the ability our body has to accumulate prana (life force) energy.
It’s because of these benefits that students on the path to enlightenment take up yoga, or an equally powerful physical practice such as Tai Chi, Falun Gong, Qi Gong, and martial arts such as Kung Fu.
Patanjali, a yogic philosopher who lived before Tina Turner, said that yoga is practiced to make stillness of mind and freedom from oscillations and various mental processes more possible.
Mastery over stillness is fundamental in the pursuit of enlightenment, and anybody who’s tried to sit in meditation for longer than twenty minutes will know how difficult it is to be still, both mentally and physically.
Breathe deeply and consistently in yoga, as in, not only in the beginning. Over time, your your ability to store pranic life force energy becomes efficient. Open and extend the body by practicing asana postures which, un-coincidently, charge the meridian and nadi chanels. It’s like we go up a battery size.
Energy has everything to do with enlightenment. From many living accounts of people who have witnessed someone actually attain it, they describe the person vibrating or almost glowing with light or energy.
It’s not hard to consider that when one transforms their mortal form to one that is in step with all things celestial, the significant difference can be described in terms of their capacity to contain energy.
If yoga allows our body to withhold more pranic energy, and be comfortable in stillness, regular practice can take us closer to spiritual fulfilment.
So, what has yoga got to do with it?
It’s a tool we can use to upgrade the machine. So to speak.
