Satisfy Your Yoga Book Obsession

Today was a great day because I finally received my latest yoga book order from Amazon.com.  Took almost two and a half weeks.  Luckily (?) I’ve been busy enough that I didn’t really notice the delivery delay.  I’ve sort of been stocking up on my yoga books since I’m heading to Japan for a few years.  Of course I’ll be able to order books in Japan as well, but it’s a convenient excuse for now.  I don’t really need much of a reason to buy new yoga books…

I’ve also noticed a trend with yoga books lately.  The history of yoga seems to be all the rage, especially yoga’s journey into the American mainstream.  Not that all the books in my latest order reflect this trend, but I’m definitely looking forward to summer book releases about yoga luminaries Sri K. Pattabhi Jois (Guruji: A Portrait of Sri K. Pattabhi Jois Through the Eyes of His Students) and Krishnamacharya (Krishnamachary:  His Life and Teachings).  I’m also very likely to succumb in the near future to The Great Oom:  The Improbable Birth of Yoga in America as well as The Subtle Body:  The Story of Yoga in America.

Anyhow, here’s a few photos and links to the new books on my shelf for your viewing pleasure.

Yoga Bookstack

Yoga Body:  The Origins of Modern Posture Practice by Mark Singleton

Click here for a positive review of Yoga Body

Yoga Beneath the Surface by Srivatsa Ramaswami

Click here to visit Srivatsa Ramaswami’s website

The Yamas & Niyamas by Deborah Adele

Click here to visit Deborah Adele’s blog or click here to discuss The Yamas and Niyamas on Facebook

Ashtanga Yoga by John Scott

Click here to visit John Scott’s website

IMG_4879

Click here to visit Judith Lasater’s website or click here to follow Judith on Twitter

The Inner Tradition of Yoga by Michael Stone

Click here to visit Michael Stone’s Centre of Gravity website

Now that I have all these crisp, new yoga books lining my bookshelf, my wife informs me that I also need to read them, so I best stop blogging and get reading…  Any suggestions on which book to start with?  I’m leaning towards The Inner Tradition of Yoga.

The Yoga Sutra of Patanjali — Sanskrit-English Translation & Glossary (trans. Chip Hartranft)

The Yoga Sutra of Patanjali — Sanskrit-English Translation & Glossary (trans. by Chip Hartranft)

The Yoga Sutra as Practice – an Interview with Chip Hartranft

It’s Time to Recycle Your Old Yoga Journals

Every few years I find my stack of yoga magazines piling up.  Eventually I convince myself to pull out the scissors and cut out my favorite yoga articles, which I then place in three-ring binders for reference.  I recycle the rest of the magazine.  It’s a bit painful to chop up the magazines, but it certainly proves a useful exercise in non-attachment…

Happily, I recently discovered that every single page of Yoga Journal, all the way from issue number 1, which was 10 pages and cost 75 cents back in 1975, to the glossy-covered December 2008 issue, are chronicled on Google Books for our reading pleasure.  Hundreds of issues available at the click of a button.  The entire issue, for free!   Certainly makes the eventual separation from the physical copy less difficult.  I highly recommend checking out Yoga Journal on Google Books and enjoying a veritable journey through the history of yoga in the United States over the last 35 years.  It’s definitely interesting to observe the evolution of the magazine cover.

Self-Discipline and the Yogi

Excerpt from The Shambhala Guide to Yoga by Georg Feuerstein.

In order to gain the unsurpassable bliss of the Self, the yogin willingly adopts a life of strict discipline.  The aspirant begins by carefully regulating his or her moral behavior.  This forms the bedrock of all types of Yoga.  Reduced to its bare bones, yogic morality is the recognition of the universal Self in all other beings.  The various moral rules expounded in the Yoga scriptures are a symbolic bow to the Self within the other person.  Thus Yoga morality is inseparable from Yoga metaphysics.  In their moral conduct, the yogins aspire to preserve the moral order of the cosmos within the limited orbit of their personal existence.  In other words, they seek to uphold the ideals of harmony and balance.  This endeavor is by no means unique to Yoga.  Rather the moral code followed by its practitioners is universal and can be found in all the great religious traditions of the world.

As the American social critic Theodore Roszak correctly understood, the yogin’s first step must necessarily be a moral one:

“[H]igher consciousness is born out of conscience.  ‘Consciousness’/'conscience’: the very words are related, reminding us that we cannot expect to expand spiritual awareness unless we also expand our moral awareness of right and wrong, good and evil.  Later perhaps there will be ecstatic harmonies beyond the description of words in which the good and the evil of the world will be revealed as, mysteriously, the two hands of God.  But only the soul that has honestly cast out violence, greed, and deception may begin the ascent to that lofty vision…

“Surely too many Western practitioners of yoga are playing trivial games with the psychic and physiological spin-off of the divine science.  They learn to clearn their sinuses, to mitigate their migraine, to flirt with the joys of the kundalini.  Perhaps, besides achieving an enviable muscle tone, they even happen upon occasional intimations of samadhi.  But all these achievements become barbarous trifles if we forget that yoga, like all spiritual culture, is a life discipline and a moral wisdom.”

My Latest Ashtanga Yoga Goodies

Use LibraryThing to Virtually Organize Your Yoga Book Collection

I guess there could be worse things to be addicted to than books.  Every time I walk into a book store, the yoga section in particular tends to keep me occupied weighing the pros and cons of whether I need to buy another yoga book.  While I don’t think I’ve ever regretted purchasing a new yoga book, over time I’ve recognized that there are certain books I return to over and over again such as David Swenson’s Ashtanga Yoga Manual and B.K.S. Iyengar’s classic  Light on Yoga.  I can find answers to most of my yoga questions from those two books alone.  Even still, there are tons of other yoga books that I’ve enjoyed and am happy to include in my collection.

Although it’s nice to have the books sorted neatly on shelves at home, I’ve also found it’s nice to have them virtually organized on one of myfavorite book websites, LibraryThing.com.  I bought a lifetime membership to LibraryThing for $25 over three years ago (still the same price) and have happily enjoyed adding books to my virtual book collection ever since.   For book lovers, LibraryThing becomes an extra valuable resource after they’ve entered most of the books from their personal library, wishlists, library books read, e-books, etc., because of the powerful recommendation/anti-recommendation features LibraryThing incorporates.  Want to find a new book?  Look no further than LibraryThing to steer you in the right direction.

I love shopping for books on Amazon.com, but LibraryThing takes book hunting to a whole new level with its “will you like it?” feature.   For example, I ran across the book, Yoga for Wimps,” clicked on the “will you like it” button, and LibraryThing told me with a “low” degree of certainty that I will probably like the book.  From there I searched through the book recommendations on the same page, thought Donna Farhi’s book, Yoga Mind, Body & Spirit looked interesting, clicked on the “will you like it” button, and found out that I will love the book.  Hmmm…I might have to check that out next time I’m at a decent bookstore (as in, not in Iraq…).

So even though I love buying and reading new yoga books, I also love keeping them organized, recalling what I enjoyed about each book, and finding future reading material in a fun, simple manner.  LibraryThing has a ton of other features, and for the yoga book lover, or just plain old bookaholic looking for a little virtual book organization, I highly recommend LibraryThing.

Ashtanga Yoga First Series Video by David Swenson

I happily surfed my way into David Swenson’s Ashtanga Yoga First Series video on YouTube the other day.  The whole thing!  I enjoy reading  and practicing with Swenson’s Ashtanga Yoga book, — it’s one of my favorite yoga books of all time — but have never had a chance to preview his yoga videos.

I haven’t watched the entire film yet, but so far I have a very favorable impression of both the video and Swenson as an instructor.  That’s pretty much what I expected based on his book.  Nothing flashy, but Swenson is very easy to listen to and his knowledge and wisdom of yoga seems to just kind float out of his mouth in a humble, yet authoritative way.

If you enjoy this first clip of instruction on breathing and bandhas, check out the rest of the video here in one convenient location.

Book: Hatha Yoga Pradipika

Find out what Hatha yoga is all about by reading the Hatha Yoga Pradipika.

From Wikipedia

The Hatha Yoga Pradipika (Sanskrit: Haṭhayoga Pradīpikā) is a classic Sanskrit manual on Hatha Yoga, written by Svami Svatmarama, a disciple of Svami Gorakhnath. Said to be the oldest surviving text on the Hatha Yoga, it is one of the three classic texts of Hatha Yoga, the other two being the Gheranda Samhita and the Shiva Samhita.

The text was written in 15th century CE. The work is derived from older Sanskrit texts and Svami Svatamarama’s own yogic experiences. Many modern English translations of the text are available.

The book consists of four Upadeshas (chapters) which include information about asanas, pranayama, chakras, kundalini, bandhas, kriyas, shakti, nadis and mudras among other topics. It runs in the line of Hindu yoga (to distinguish from Buddhist and Jain yoga) and is dedicated to Lord Adinath, a name for Lord Shiva (the Hindu god of destruction and renewal), who is alleged to have imparted the secret of Hatha Yoga to his divine consort Parvati.

Read the e-book here…

Book: Illustrated Light on Yoga by BKS Iyengar

A little free yoga knowledge right here.

B.K.S. Iyengar: Light on Yoga

Yoga for Men

I love books! I especially love free books! If you don’t mind reading books in PDF format, I ran across Yoga for Men by Thomas Claire on Scribd. It’s probably not the top book on my list of places to start reading about yoga, but it’s pretty hard to beat free! In perusing the book, I was surprised at how much information Yoga for Men contained, especially concerning different styles of yoga. While some of the information is targeted towards men, most of the book just deals with yoga subjects that would appeal to anyone interested in yoga. One of my favorite parts of the book was the depth of resources the author provided for further study. If you’re looking for a good list of yoga books to read, I highly recommend checking out the additional resources at the end of each chapter.

There are quite a few books uploaded on Scribd (some yoga related), making it a decent place to look if you want to preview a book.  I also found Paramahansa Yogananda’s Autobiography of a Yogi, one of my all-time favorites.  If you’ve never read it, you’ll eventually end up buying you’re own copy.  I like the Scribd version because I can put it on my Pocket PC for reading late at night in bed.  Good stuff!

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