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Final Journal Write up

    I want to start off by talking about my expectations for this class, before I started. I was expecting to do in person classes, however the pandemic stopped that real quick. Unfortunately, I had to attend online classes, which in my experience, limited the classes capacity to actually teach its students. I expected to practice more physical yoga, than learning about the history of yoga. It is a college course, so I really did not mind all of the writing, since it is a very diverse topic to teach.     This course provided me with a reliable journal to reflect back to, whenever I need. I also was able to see my growth throughout the semester, which was pretty interesting. I started my weekly journals with a observation post on yoga and provided my background and experience with yoga. The class was taught in a way, that corresponds to what I needed to write about in my weekly journals. It's also interesting to note, that the content of each weekly journal, should be used to corr
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Yoga Practice: Week 14

     In mostly every yoga practice I took, the teacher pushed the idea of spiritual awareness, in some wort of way. Some teachers sang and some chanted, which is seen as a ritual practice. Ritual practice is commonly seen throughout religion, since it adds to the spirituality aspect that attracts people to practice. The most common ritual practice performed throughout mostly every yoga practice is, meditation. Meditation can be used to increase mind to muscle connection or "kinesthesia".      I watched a YouTube video called "Grounding into Gratitude", which focused on root chakra yoga. The practice included focusing on '"chakra" points, specifically, the root chakra, which is the pelvis. This type of yoga involved meditation and stretches designed to relieve pressure from the pelvis area. The idea of focusing your energy on these chakra points, is right up the alley of spirituality. I mean, this is what spirituality is all about.      The video expr
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Yoga Practice: Week 13

     In most spiritual practices, the body is seen as a vessel that gives the soul a place to manifest itself into an individual. Some argue that this individual, is an already "connected" being with the higher power that gave their vessel life, some think that, the vessels need to learn how to become connected. Yoga introduces powerful movements, that allow people to connect more with their bodies, ultimately, improving their connection with the higher power. These movements provide the vessel with the ultimate divine experience, that makes one feel as if, they are the universe.      Most practices treat the mind, body and soul, as three different components. Meditation is used to connect mind with soul. MPY is used to connect mind to body. When the mind is connected to the body and soul, the practitioner will experience total bliss and divinity. This experience is determined, solely on the practitioners will power to follow through with the practice. The person must also ha
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Yoga Journal: Week 10

           This class introduces me to all the different ways Yoga could be interpreted as. It is interesting to see how the philosophy behind yoga, can be used in so many different context's. I like to follow the idea of Yoga as a science, which is a body of techniques that lead us to consciously connect with ourselves and with life. As yoga is a science, there is no dogma or belief system attached to it. Yoga simply tells us to do a certain practice and to feel the effect of that practice. For example, if we breath slowly in a relaxed manner we will slow our heart rate, and if we focus the mind we will develop mental peace and deep insight.          To go off of this idea, I watched a YouTube video that had a lot of meditation and postures that require muscle endurance. The video is off of Yoga with Adirene's youtube channel called, Yoga For Concentration and Mental Focus , and then watched, Meditation For Inner Peace. The practice alone, was able to give me a stronger,
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Yoga Journal: Week 8-9

     Traditionally, yoga was really only practiced by aspiring yogi's, and they were considered outcasts. The transition of yoga, from east to the west, is when yoga really took off into the mainstream empire that it is today. I truly think that Americans are easily persuadable, especially to the idea of yoga and all of its claims regarding its life changing qualities.      In my opinion, If yoga is said to "heal" most of your problems, then it should be considered a necessity to healthcare, and should be free. Hospitals should adopt their own style of yoga, that is backed by science, and offer it to patients who suffer from all of the disorders yoga claims to heal: low back pain, depression from pain, anxiety, stress, high blood pressure. Instead, yoga in America become a commodity. People started to figure out ways to brand yoga and turn it into an empire.      I mean, the perfect example of this was Bikram. He changed the way people viewed yoga, as a way to "kill
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Yoga Journal: Week 7

      This week, for my yoga practice, I watched a youtube video on Ashtanga yoga. I really focused on this weeks journal theme while taking the class, which was; Yoga as a healing (medicine). From the start of the class, I can tell the teacher used a calm tone to try and create a sense of relaxation. Relaxation, alone, is a great way to relieve stress from the body, so it makes sense if people treat yoga as a medicine. This teacher also mentions the importance of linking breathe to movement and that practice will keep your mind and body healthy.      She also starts out with an invocation to show gratitude to the practice and gratitude to the teacher. This invocation creates a sense of spirituality, in a way, and is basically a form of 'praying' to the people who created this practice, which creates a feeling that these teachers are above you and are here to show you the path to enlightenment, through their practice. To me, this is manipulation at its finest. The manipulation
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Yoga Practice: Week 3

 i s yoga framed as more than exercise? In what ways is it suggested at your practice space that yoga can "empower" you? Why not run, or do zumba?       This week I had the very special opportunity to do Bikram Yoga and it was very challenging to say the least. I had a hard time keeping up with the teacher and trying to copy the poses. Once I got into the rhythm of the flow, I was loving it. The poses in Bikram yoga are a great stretch for your entire body and my body was feeling it at the end. I also was sweating immensely. The challenging nature of the poses gave me a tremendous workout too.      Personally, I treat yoga as a workout and a meditation practice, however, it is traditionally framed more as a lifestyle. Yoga is seen as a way to empower you to become a better person by doing hard practices and preforming austerities. In today's society, in the west, at least, yoga is framed as just an exercise. I can see how yoga can empower people though. After a hard pra
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