Shailesh Basani

Namaste, we started discussing the concept of vegetarianism in relation to the first yama – Ahimsa (Non-Violence). Should a yoga practitioner be vegetarian? There are different schools of thought on this, but, generally most gurus recommend a wholesome and nourishing vegetarian diet, which assists you in deepening your sadhana as you move towards meditation. You can find a lot of literature on the Internet arguing for and against a vegetarian diet in general. Our Guruji gives the following four important reasons on why one should choose a vegetarian diet: 1. An average vegetarian can survive (over lifetime) with 1.5 acres of land , while a non-vegetarian typically needs 12 to 15 acres of land . Why should I be such a big burden on this environment? Couple of facts to ponder: a) According to soil and water specialists at the University of California’s Agricultural Extension, it takes 5,214 gallons of water to produce one pound of beef , but only 23 gallons to produce a poun...

Namaste - we started studying Yamas, the first limb in Ashtanga Yoga, in our classes recently. Yamas are the great, mighty, universal vows unconditioned by place, time and class (religion) – PYS 2.31 . There is still a myth that ‘Yoga is religion’, while we can see that Patanjali begins yoga instruction stating that the first limb is universal in nature and beyond any religion. One of the first definitions of Yoga can be found in Vedas: “ Tam Yogam iti manyante stiram indriya dharanam ” - Controlling all of the senses, including the steadying of the mind, is known as yoga. The term ‘religion’ became popular only since 2000 years ago when Christianity came into existence, while Vedas existed for several hundreds of years prior to that. I recently had an opportunity to visit a beautiful yoga center that embodies this universal nature of yoga. This is Paramahansa Yogananda’s center. Paramahansa Yogananda brought yoga to the West in 1920s and has profoundly impacted lives of millions...