Dive into Yoga, Unveiling Its Transformative Health Benefits and Exploring the Path to Discovering the True Self

Practitioners, and their search for the true self. A thousand years before the birth of Christ and for

five subsequent centuries, it has been theorized that yoga flourished in cities known today as

India and Pakistan (Chaline, 2001). People practiced yoga to become closer to God. Yoga

literally means to 'yoke' or to be in union (Satchidananda, 1990). According to the Yoga Sutras

of Patanjali, yoga is the "science of the mind" (Satchidananda, 1990, p. xi). Richard Freeman, a

student and teacher of yoga for 38 years, in an interview with Bonnie Horrigan (2004), describes

yoga as "a meditative discipline and a way of gaining insight into the nature of the mind and

reality." He believes that "yoga is ultimately freedom or liberation, and its benefit is much more

than simply good health" (p. 65). According to Freeman, yoga is the undoing of the harm people

do to their bodies as a result of modern living. He states that "we often hold the body or posture

the body based on past experiences" (p. 66). Yoga can assist in reversing this postural

conditioning.