Health: Clearing Misconceptions in Yoga

There were paradigm shift and changes made on the perception of Yoga and the lifestyle of Yogis particularly in the past couple of decades due to changes made in the West, particularly in the United States.

In the Ancient world for the past centuries, the view of Yoga is spiritual in nature compared to the health and fitness purpose of modern Yoga. Attaining enlightenment through the path of sexual ecstasy—in which the male and female aspect of the universe merged in oneness. In fact, the word Yoga means “Union”.  Hatha yoga as “violent union.” The originator of sexual rites is called Tantra. The Yogis involved in orgies under the context of spirituality and sacred sexuality. Their sacred book Hatha Yoga Pradipika gave lavished attention on body parts  that includes penis, vagina, scrotum, and anus.

The Old Yoga gave emphasis also on the miraculous where the yogis where hailed as miracle workers. Sacred literature in India had portrayed yogis as able to fly, levitate, stop their hearts, suspend their breathing, vanish, walk through walls, project themselves into other bodies, touch the moon,survive live burial, make themselves invisible, die at will, walk on water, and—like Jesus of Nazareth—bring the dead back to life.

Myths

Myth 1: The Idea that an individual absorbs larger quantities of oxygen during the Pranayama is a myth.  Gune found that fast breathing did little to change the amount of oxygen that the bloodstream would absorb and determined that such vigorous efforts actually made their biggest impact by blowing off clouds of carbon dioxide.

Myth 2: Some Yogis could stop the heart.

Bagchi discovered that the heartbeat was diminished. But even a quick glace at the tracing paper showed that the beat was still there, even if reduced and too faint for a stethoscope to pick up. The heart was still thumping away inside, blip, blip, blip

Myth 3: Live burial for forty days and forty nights

Myth 4: Yogis could live for as long as two centuries

Myth 5: Yogis can make themselves invisible

Scientific truth

Scientists have found that physiological slowing from yoga can

(1) reduce stress

(2) reduce the heart rate

(3) reduce blood pressure,

(4) help to boost immunity,

And (5) prevent diseases.

Myths about the benefits of Yoga were transmitted through oral and written literature. It was a product of imagination and experience trying to uncover the mystery where science can help to validate the claims. But there are truths about Yoga that science can’t explain or answer. 

References

Broad, William J. The Science of Yoga: the Risks and Rewards. London: Simon & Schuster, 2013.