India has given a positive message to the world about yoga: Nivedita Joshi

India has given a positive message to the world about yoga: Nivedita Joshi

On International Day of Yoga on 21 June, Firstpost caught up with Nivedita Joshi at her institute, Yogakshema in Delhi

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India has given a positive message to the world about yoga: Nivedita Joshi

The story of Nivedita Joshi has been part of the Indian Yoga legend for quite some time now. However, what makes it inspirational even today is the fact that she is the perfect example of how the ancient Indian healing wisdom of yoga can bring back a person to full vitality, who had been bed-ridden and invalid for eight long years due to slip disc cervical spondylosis and had been given up by the cream of the global medical fraternity.

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Joshi, a microbiologist and an ardent disciple of noted yoga guru Padma Vibhushan BKS Iyengar, after recovering from her ailment at his Pune ashram, decided to dedicate herself to teaching yoga. Her institute, Yogakshema in Delhi, is the only one accredited by Iyengar Yoga Centre, where she follows the principles of her ‘Guruji’.

As the need for daily yoga practice was underscored with the celebration of the International Day of Yoga on Tuesday, 21 June, Firstpost caught up with Joshi at her yoga centre.

Excerpts from the interview:

The world celebrated the second International Day of Yoga on Tuesday, for which credit goes to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who had outlined the vision in 2014 at the UN General Assembly. Has the initiative paid off?

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Of course, it’s a very good effort and India has been successful in giving a positive message to the world about yoga. Who would tell the world about this ancient practice, if not India? Yoga took birth in this country only. Had not India taken this initiative, some day we would have seen some other country taking a patent on yoga!

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Nivedita Joshi. Image by Naresh Sharma/Firstpost

What does this often said statement — ‘yoga is not just about fitness but it’s a way of life’ mean?

In fact, what we see — the asans, the physical form of exercises, etc are by-products of yoga. The main product or the ultimate goal of yoga is self-realisation. Soul resides in a body and by practising yoga, you prepare your body for a higher goal in life.

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Yoga has become a generic term and people use it in common parlance to describe yoga asans and pranayams as yoga. What is the difference?

There is a misunderstanding about yoga. Yoga means union of the soul with the Supreme Being (Atma with Parmatma). There are eight organs of yoga as enumerated by the greatest exponent of this science, sage Patanjali in his Yoga Sutra thousands of years ago — Yama (universal morality), Niyama (personal observances), Asanas (body postures), Pranayam (control of life - Prana - through breathing exercises), Pratyahara (control of senses), Dharana (concentration by cultivating inner perceptual awareness), Dhyana (meditation through devotion) and Samadhi (union with the Divine). In India, Yama and Niyama are a part of our life and we grow up learning these. Pranayam is not just a breathing exercise. Yoga is a holistic system and not just about physical and breathing exercises. To master yoga, one needs to graduate step-by-step to reach the ultimate eighth step.

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Can practice of yoga make life better, especially when people are highly stressed including school-going children due to various factors, and suffer from life-style diseases?

I would quote Patanjali, who in the 16th sutra of the second chapter said, “Even if a person of lowest level practices Kriya yoga, benefits will come to him”. Yoga acts both as preventive and curative, and if a patient, who is non-curable, will sail through by practicing yoga. In today’s atmosphere, if one practices yoga regularly, one is bound to be benefited both physically and mentally.  Guruji said, “Yoga teaches us to cure what need not be endured, and endure what can’t be cured.”

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People have been found to be advising every other person to do yoga or pranayam, especially when that person suffers from an ailment. Is it so easy or does it require specialised treatment through yoga based on medical findings?

It is wrong to advise any patient to do yoga in a generic manner. In a medical case, we need to know which asan will be the right one for a particular patient, timing, duration of doing a particular asan and in a specific order (sequencing). It’s a holistic process and only after following it, one gets result. Just reading about asans and doing them is dangerous.

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Similarly, people also advise others to do meditation to get rid of tension and stress. What’s your take on this?

It’s again a myth. Meditation is a state of mind and it just can’t be attained by sitting silently with closed eyes. Sitting in silence doesn’t mean meditation. Thinking is also silent talking. It needs a lot of hard work and practice to reach the stage of meditation.

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How can you even concentrate, if your body is not prepared to sit comfortably for a period of time and feels uneasy?  Here the eight organs of Patanjali matter. Unfortunately, the word meditation has become a common jargon.

A lot of politics happened around yoga, especially when the NDA government started propagating it in a big way during the first International Yoga Day in 2015. Is yoga restricted to Hindus alone or does it have any Hindutva element? Can a non-religious, non-spiritual person or one from any other faith practice yoga?

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There is a small group that criticises yoga due to vested interests vis-à-vis the large following it has. This is a common human trait, whenever something gains popularity, criticism becomes a part of it. Without knowing yoga and tasting its fruits, some people try to create a negative perception. Had yoga not been of such importance, the UN General Assembly wouldn’t have endorsed it as an International Day. And the practice of yoga has nothing to do with any particular religion. Doesn’t a non-Hindu suffer from ailments or mental stress? Doesn’t one like to live a happy and healthy life? Branding yoga as a Hindutva element is wrong, though it’s a fact that it was codified by sage Patanjali into 196 Sutras, based on Lord Brahma’s concept. Anyone who wants to live a healthy and good life can practice yoga. Had it not been the case, people from the West wouldn’t have been gaga over it.

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Can yoga be helpful in de-addiction given the fact that there is a tremendous rise in consumption of alcohol and drugs even among teenagers in our country?

It has been proven time and again through medical research and the results are in public domain. Medical research in the US shows that drug addict teenagers, who were treated with medicines and yoga responded much better and permanently than those who took only medicines. If children in India are properly exposed to yoga in schools, there would be a decline in addictions and negative emotions like anger, hatred, jealousy, etc. Because, yoga helps one to systematically get rid of it, as Patanjali said yoga purifies the mind and brings contentment.

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What is the specialty of Iyengar school of yoga, which you follow in your institution? 

Guruji (Yogacharya BKS Iyengar) without diluting the yoga sutras, improvised and simplified the asans. Keeping in mind the physical conditions of medically ill people, who can’t perform exercises, he invented props and equipment, and became the first one to do so. Like in my case, my limbs couldn’t work, but I was made to do asans through improvised methods. Instead of performing Trikonasan on standing posture, Guruji improvised it on a lying posture. Effects are the same in both the methods.

Do terms like ‘power yoga’, ‘hot yoga’, ‘soft Hatha yoga’, etc really exist in our yogic practice?

It’s absurd and a joke. Yoga itself is powerful as it unifies soul with the Supreme, consciousness with super-consciousness. So why prefix ‘power’ or ‘hot’?

Is the western world more aware and takes initiative in the practice of yoga compared to India?

In the west, they use yoga for physical fitness not for spiritual fulfillment. But they are aware of the benefits of yoga. For Indians, yoga is a medium that unites the cells of soul and cells of skin with the higher state of cosmic energy.

Are you working on any book, besides teaching yoga?

I already have a book ‘Yogikasparsh’ for visually-challenged students in Braille for teaching yoga. This manual was prepared along with 11 scientists from IIT using tactile technology. I’ll start working on a new book after I get back to India from a two-month educational and training tour.

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