How did you come to yoga?

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Permalink Reply by Ted Doras on March 6, 2008 at 9:54am

My best friend in Junior High School had a brother who was deep into yoga and meditation. This was in the mid-60's and there was alot of "Flower Power" energy going on which attracted me. I had already became interested in comparative mysticism and was studying allot about Buddha, Carlos Castenada, and reading Alan Watts.
I had very bad allergies at the time and started a disciplined regimen of pranayama breathing. My allergies cleared up and have never returned. Also, I am 6'6" and had neck and back pain from slumping over. The yoga and stretching cured me of this and led me to Modern Dance and Tai Chi which further helped my posture and allowed me to start circulating the energy. By the 80's I was studying with a Taoist Master (Mantak Chia) and learned "Taoist Yoga" and Chi Kung (qigong) from him. I became an instructor and in the mid 80's taught yoga and specialized in teaching children. It was very blissful.

Ted Doras 03/06/08

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Permalink Reply by Jayanta on April 26, 2008 at 3:24pm

Hi Andrea,

Thanks for posing the question (pardon the pun).

I was on the business development team that created and launched the BlackBerry in Waterloo, Canada. After that enormous success I acquired a technology company in Korea and teamed up with some financial types to help with the financing. I ended up in a very difficult situation that lead to the bankruptcy of the company. The stress was incredible and my coping skills were minimal. I started practicing yoga to help relieve the stress of running a failing public company. Not only was my stress relieved in those first classes but I was nearly overwhelmed by a sensation of bliss and ecstasy that left me very curious. As an engineer I was very interested in understanding this yoga technology and went on my first yoga teacher's training with the Sivananda organization. My experiences of bliss deepened and my interest in the world, my friends, my professional relationships even my family began to wane in favour of yoga practices, meditation and service activities. I began teaching yoga and met a man who had been a Franciscan monk for over 30 years. He was in charge of the interfaith activities for that Catholic Order of monks. When the Dalai Llama visited Canada, this man made it happen. The church also funded his own interfaith exploration that included a meditation retreat in a cave in the Himalayas and trips to meet with Tibetan masters. When I met this man he seemed to vibrate at a frequency of love that affected everyone in his presence. He had left the order but remained a monk outside the confines of the Catholic church. He told me he was a teacher but had a Guru that was as deep as the ocean and she lived in Sebastian, FL.

I knew that if this saintly being had a teacher he called Guru then I had to meet her. I visited Kashi in November, 2000 and had an around-the-world ticket that included a stop in India. I chose to move to Kashi and never went on that trip. I continue to study Kali Natha Yoga with my Guru and live in an interfaith community that is dedicated to compassionate service. For me yoga is much more than a physical practice, it is an approach to life that is rooted in awareness and compassion. It has brought me closer to my Christian heritage and given my life a new depth and meaning.

Thank you for posing the question.

Love and Victory,

Jayanta

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Permalink Reply by Leslie Maloney on July 11, 2008 at 1:03pm

When I was around 14, my mom bought a book on yoga that I happen to pick up. As I read it, something resonated within me and I knew that the information in the book had great wisdom. At that point, I filed the information away for future use!

My actual practice began almost 18 years ago while pregnant with my son. I showed up at the Yoga Shakti Center in Palm Bay and started attending their classes. Since then, I have tried many different styles in various studios and I have developed my own home practice when time doesn't allow for outside classes. Yoga is wonderful on so many levels-mentally, physically and spiritually. I find it to be a part of my life that helps me stay balanced. Some time down the road I would like to become a certified yoga teacher so I can study it with even greater depth.

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Permalink Reply by Linda Joyce Hayden on July 11, 2008 at 3:41pm

I offically came to yoga in Atlanta, Georgia during my second pregnancy (1967).I say "officially" because in truth, I began the discipline of yoga and channeling at age 6,when my inner teachers guided me to find a man who would teach me to work with the baton and music. I soon realized, that this was to become my current lifetime expression of the use of the wand or staff and as I did so many past life experiences with masterful and not so masterful "times" with my Conscious Space (aura) and channels (chakras as portals for the "colored" RAYS of LIGHT) would surface from deep within me for either "healing" and/or reasserting my LOVE of self.

Wing Chung Budda Hand resurfaced as a memory of previous life mastery and served to provide health and wellbeing of a movement type. Raja Yoga resurfaced as a Beloved practice and Kundalini Yoga helped me design my first four day workshop and business enterprise. To avoid ego intervention, I was guided to create the business as a non-profit (501c3) and named it "Pied Piper Pecptions, INC. The workshop was called Mind/Brain Consciousness & Body Electronics. The work itself represented many forms of psychic sensitivity training , always the goal was to assist others to remember their mastery and know that what was called "paranormal" was indeed quite normal and would very quickly proove to all of us here that we were here to demonstrate "The Second Coming" as we aligned with our Highest aspects of OurSelves and alllowed those Aspects of OurSelves to choose whether to walk the planet Earth fully Ascended and/or step backfrom the physical/emotional realms and consciously co-create with Mother/Father GOD litterally "New Universes". Consequently, I see the populating of the new universes Conscious Living Space, Helloworld.com/ascensionteams and VMdirect.com/ascensionteams as a new YOGA (process).

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