Body--Mind--Intellect Complex and Yoga for Their Harmonious Healthy Functioning

 

Body-Mind-Intellect Complex and Yoga for Their Harmonious Healthy Functioning

[Compilation for a discourse at Sri Ganesha Temple, from different authors, Upanishads and Gita by N. R. Srinvasan, June 2021]

Body, Mind, Intellect and Spirit

You have heard people talk about the connection between the body, mind and spirit. Many people have a hazy interpretation of what it means, but it simply pertains to an individual’s   physical, mental and emotional/spiritual health.

You have likely noticed that when something is troubling you mentally or emotionally, you actually begin to manifest symptoms physically. Your heart starts racing, you may sweat more than usual, you have a hard time sleeping because you keep thinking about the problem – and you begin to feel lethargic and fatigued. This is when the  Body-Mind-Intellect are out of balance.

However, when your mind is at peace, you are more likely to be happier, kinder, and more grateful, because you’re not so embroiled from within. Physically, you are relaxed and ready to take on whatever life throws your way.

MNU say:  Our Self is five-fold comprised by the sheaths of Food, Breath, Mind, Intellect and Bliss--Annamaya-Praanamaya-Manomaya-Vijnaana- maya-Aandamayam Aatmaa.   

The Connection between Mind, Body, and Spirit, a Westeren Thought

Dealing with struggles is a part of life that cannot always be avoided. Strengthening the connection between body, mind, and spirit takes effort, so here is how these three factors work together to benefit your overall health:

A Healthy Body

A healthy body is free of disease and illness, and it is not riddled with pain. Bodily health is also made possible by a healthy diet, good nutrition, and regular exercise. A healthy body naturally wants to move and seeks activity. Maintaining physical health also includes keeping regular checkups with your primary care doctor in order to prevent illness, or to detect it and treat it right away if a disease does exist.

A Healthy Mind

Someone with a healthy mind keeps the brain exercised regularly, and stress and worry are kept at bay by choice. Positive thoughts, gratitude, and a feeling of joy are present, and there is a thirst for knowledge and learning. Just like the brain requires sleep every night, the brain also requires things to think about and to ponder.

A Healthy Spirit

Being spiritual is being centered and having an understanding that you are part of something much bigger than yourself. Facilitating a healthy spirit includes being part of a community to share yourself with others, and to give without expecting anything tangible in return. A healthy spirit requires love.

Holistic Healing and Pain Relief Treatment  

It’s true that it’s not possible to be truly healthy if there is an issue with the mind, body, or spirit. The kind and compassionate Western Healthcare Holistic-healing providers utilize alternative, integrative, holistic, and traditional forms of pain-reducing therapies to patients.   Their team approach is   integrated approach focused on body, mind and spirit.

But doctors who practice Ayurveda, an ancient system of medicine recommend Yoga for holistic healing.

RAJA YOGA, HATHA YOGA, ASANA

“Raja Yoga commonly refers to the royal or higher Yoga of meditation. While the term is not specifically mentioned in the Yoga Sutras, the Yoga Sutra tradition has been commonly called Raja Yoga over time. Raja Yoga is an ancient term found in the works of Adi Shankara. It aims directly at a change of consciousness, and relates to the control of the mind and the cultivation of Samadhi, the state of unitary awareness. 

Hatha Yoga as a term is also mentioned as early as Shankara, though its components like Pranayama and its examination of the subtle energy body are as old as the Vedas. It is mainly studied through Shaivite texts like the Hatha Yoga Pradipika or Shiva Samhita and the teachings of the great Nath Yogis like Gorakhnath who lived over a thousand years ago. It reflects the older tradition of Pashupata Yoga through the great guru Lakulish going back to the Mahabharata. Hatha Yoga brings in asana as the first of its three components, working with prana as the second component, and Raja Yoga or non-duality as the third, so Hatha Yoga is often regarded as a preparation for Raja Yoga.

Asana as physical posture is one of the outer limbs of Yoga Sutras, Raja Yoga and Hatha Yoga traditions overall. Some people call modern Asana-based Yoga practices as Hatha Yoga because asanas are mentioned in more detail in Hatha Yoga texts. This is incorrect because Hatha Yoga includes pranayama, Kundalini Yoga and directs us to Samadhi. It is not centered on Asana but on Prana.

TYPES OF RAJA YOGA

There are several types of traditional Raja Yoga. Patanjali Yoga Sutras is one but there is also the Vasishta Samhita and Yogi Yajnavalkya, which are other ancient texts in the older Hiranyagarbha Yoga tradition that Patanjali is part of. The most important Raja Yoga text can be said to be the Bhagavad Gita of Sri Krishna, which emphasizes inner awareness and discernment and devotion, not asana or Hatha Yoga techniques, though it does mention these factors as well.

There are additional forms of the higher Raja Yogas including Siddha Yoga, which was the Raja Yoga that Shaivite Hatha Yogis aspired to. Gorakhnath teaches this Siddha Yoga as part of the higher teachings of Shaivite Yoga, including direct Self-realization and non-duality. It is reflected in the works of Abhinavagupta and Kashmir Shaivism, which has several levels of teachings from rituals, to asana, pranayama, mantra and meditation to direct Self-realization.

 We must emphasize the Advaitic or non-dualistic Raja Yoga as in the works of Adi Shankara like Aparokshanubhuti, in which Asana is defined as resting in the Supreme Brahman, not simply a physical posture but a steady state of higher awareness. Raja Yoga and Jnana Yoga or the Yoga of Knowledge cross over in many ways and cannot always be separated. In the Yoga Sutras the state of Kaivalya or the natural state of the Self (Purusha) is achieved by knowledge (viveka-khyati).

Bhakti Yoga or Devotion can also comprise a direct or Raja Yoga, as in the Ishvara Pranidhana, surrender to the Divine Self within as the main factor, emphasized in the Yoga Sutras but also in Vedanta. Similar devotional terms and practices are found throughout the greater Yoga tradition.

The ultimate goal of Yoga is Self-realization, whether Patanjali or Shankara, which is a radical shift of our awareness from its identification with body and mind to its natural state of pure consciousness detached from body and mind. This Self is the Universal Self, not the bodily self or mental self or the embodied self in any form.

 

THE UNDERSTANDING OF YOGA IN TRADITIONAL AYURVEDA

 

“In traditional Ayurveda as in texts like Charaka and Sushruta Samhitas, Yoga is not looked upon through the modern emphasis on asana and physical medicine, but through an emphasis on meditation, right living, psychological and behavioral medicine, such as is emphasized in the Yamas and Niyamas of Yoga Sutras.

 

This approach to Yoga is the primary focus of Ayurveda's psychological therapy. It is called #Sattvavajaya therapy or the treatment to increase #sattva guna, the light, clarity, calm and composure of the mind.

 

Ayurveda views the gunas of #rajas and #tamas, the energies of agitation and dullness in the mind, as the main doshas or disease-causing factors at a psychological level. Sattva guna is the main means of countering these. This occurs outwardly through dharmic living and karma yoga and inwardly through mantra and meditation. Pranayama and pratyahara also purify the mind.

 

That is why many traditional Ayurvedic texts do give prominence to not to asanas or to Yoga as a physical healing factor alone, but rather to diet, herbs, massage, pancha karma and right lifestyle. Yoga Sutras itself is a psychological approach that proceeds through mantra, meditation and samadhi, which is its main focus, with asana only addressed in three sutras as a support factor.

 

In Jnana Yoga, the Yoga of Knowledge, the approach is also psychological and even asana is often described as a state of mind for meditation, not merely in physical terms. Let us remember this connection of Yoga with meditation and psychological healing as its primary focus” David Frawley.

 

All Yoga is ultimately Raja Yoga, as Raja Yoga includes the outer aspects of Yoga among its preparatory factors, affording it an integral approach overall. Similarly, Jnana Yoga also includes Hatha Yoga and Karma Yoga as part of its preparatory practices.

Purification of body, prana and mind form an integral part of all Yoga paths, as we human beings have many karmic tendencies and pranic blockages that must be removed first so that the mind has the subtlety to reflect the higher Self. Without this preliminary purification, particularly for modern and western Yoga practitioners who may have physical toxins and emotional disturbances, there is not the inner composure and discernment necessary to approach the inner Self beyond the mind. These purification practices begin with the yamas and niyamas, and similar dharmic values and practices in our daily lives.

Yoga has many levels and practices. These are based upon the condition and aptitude of the individual, what is called “adhikara” in Sanskrit, or what we have the ability to accomplish based upon our degree of mastery of body and mind. There are individual differences of doshas, gunas and karmas to be carefully considered. The higher Yogas like Raja Yoga cannot be understood unless we remove the rajas and tamas, the arrogance and inertia from our own minds. Yet without entering into the Inner Yoga of Samadhi and Raja Yoga, we cannot realize the Atman/Purusha within, our true Self-nature. So let us follow the teachings of Yoga out to their ultimate goal and not stop short along the way!” writes David Frawley explaining Rajayoga of  Sankara that is  mentioned in MNU as Sanyasayoga of Yatis (Monks).

We celebrate World Environment Day Every year on June 5. What does that Environmental Means to a Spiritualist focused on Body-Mind-intellect-Spirit complex?

 “The entire universe is your environment pervaded by your own inmost consciousness; We need Environmental Awareness Every Day! Live in harmony with all!” says David Frawley speaking on World Environment Day reflecting on inner balance (Aatma santih) as well as external cosmic balance (Viswa santih).

 

Ancient Vedic Lifestyle and World View draws from the wisdom of the Rishi civilization even to this day and age and is experienced as the primal grace of connectivity between all beings and Maha Prakriti the Great Nature.

 

Connecting to the rhythms of the cosmic cycles must be experienced through being in sync with Mother Earth, Mother Nature, the Planets, stars and Nakshatras.

 

The intrinsic connect with the natural world, its animal kingdom and birds allows us to dive into our deeper wisdom and inner strength and conviction which becomes our guiding force for peace and harmony.

 

When we cultivate the seeds of positivity, compassion and nurturing, the mind becomes a powerful tool for harmonizing our existence.

 

The Yogic teachings express that to create a peaceful, harmonious, joyful environment in our community, at home, at work, or in relationships, we must first find peace within ourselves. By observing our inner nature and our reactions which have their habitual reactions and consequences, we can understand and learn to pause, step back and choose to respond in more peaceful and accepting ways.

Ancient Yogis related the practice of yoga with ahimsa, which is the practice of peace, inner strength and the power of mind and consciousness, not just physical postures but transcendent attitudes.

 

Yogic teachings encompass all eight limbs of Yoga, with the Yamas and Niyamas forming the most important, starting with the sacred art of ahimsa, peaceful, attentive and considerate contemplation.

 

The word Vedanta is composed of Veda – knowledge, as well as the name for   sacred scriptures of Hinduism, and anta – the end. It means ‘the end of Veda’ and might be said to represent essence of Vedic knowledge, supreme religious philosophy and wisdom. Philosophy of Vedanta is based on later Vedic texts, hymns and writings of which Bhagavad Gita is the most well-known.

 

In Chapter 6, Verse 6 of Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna makes the following statement about the mind:

“For him who has conquered the mind, the mind is the best of friends; but for one who has failed to do so, his mind will remain the greatest enemy.”

Uncontrolled mind has potential to mess up a person’s life due to following characteristics of the mind:

1.   It is full of likes and dislike

2.    It has a tendency to slip into the past or the future

3.   It generates endless desire

4.   It develops attachment to objects and beings.

 

The mind comprises impulses, feelings, emotions, likes and dislikes. If we are not in control of the mind, we will be controlled by the mind, having life full of endless stress.

 

Many people are living their lives in the past or in the future and are often faraway from present time. They are either worried about the past or anxious about the future. While preoccupying themselves with their past mistakes and loses or pondering about what will tomorrow bring and how will they survive in the future, they are missing to enjoy life in present time.

 

Whole our life style is a hoax, created to prepare us for something but that something never comes. We spend our lives running after something but we don’t know what that something is. We go to kindergarten which prepares us school, then we go to school which prepares us for high school, high school prepares us for university, university prepares us for work.

 

When we start working we are looking for promotion, one day when promotion comes or doesn’t come we dream about pension when we will finally have enough money and free time for those things we always wanted to do. And when we are finally in pension we are too sick and too old to enjoy life and we fill frustrated with our lives.

 

We are trying to make money and seeking higher social position. We suffer from desires and we are trying to satisfy them. Satisfying desires is impossible. Attempting to satisfy desires is like trying to put out the fire by feeding it more wood – it will just burn stronger. While satisfying desires is impossible, not satisfying them makes us angry, desperate, frustrated and stressed.

 

We come exhausted from work, we sit down and watch TV and brainwash our self with advertisement which are telling us that we are not good, that our clothes are not good enough, telling us we need newer and smarter smart phone, better car.   

 

We meet someone we think we love but we know so little about love. We get married we grow attachment for our spouse, we get children and we grow attachment for them, we buy a house and we are attached to that house. Out of attachment we start having fear of losing our dear objects and beings.

Love is not attachment. Love is understanding and sharing, it is feeling peace and harmony in the presence of our spouse. Love has nothing to do with falling in love although this falling in love is being sold to us through movies and literature as something we should strive for.

 

Learn to love your children like nurse in the kindergarten loves them – she is taking care of them, she is teaching them things, feeding them, making sure they are safe. But when the time comes that they move on, she lets them go. She loves them without attachment.

 

In short, living life while being under dictate of the mind, with all its faults, is slavery. While waiting and hoping for some better future to come, while constantly ‘preparing’ ourselves for something, we miss enjoying life. Life passes by us like water in the river is passing by the trees on its banks. We need to learn how to live.

Mind is being granted too much importance and attention. Countless therapies from psycho-analysis to all kinds of self-help practices are developed promising to improve our mind, rise our IQ, teach us how to achieve our goals and satisfy our desires, while the best thing you can do about your mind is to learn how to ignore it.

We are making great efforts to ‘improve our minds’ while totally ignoring our higher echelon of reason – Intellect. One of the smartest people I knew, my close relative, was alcoholic. He had brilliant mind, extremely high IQ, very creative professional respected by his peers. Of course he knew drinking alcohol in excess is not doing him any good, but he was drinking himself to death. Great mind, poor intellect.

 

While the mind is set of impulses, feelings and emotions, intellect is thinking, reasoning, judging. When intellect guides the mind, the person is considered as wise. Intellect is not intelligence as you can see from countless examples of intelligent people doing stupid things.

 

Nourish and cultivate your intellect and learn how to use it. Develop your intellect by observing the world and the people around. Never accept anything for granted. Learn to observe things and make your own conclusion. Don’t blindly believe everything you are being told in school or in your church, temple or a mosque. In Vedanta Sutra it is written: “In cases of Scripture conflicting with Perception, Scripture is not stronger. The True cannot be known through the Untrue.” 

 

While Veda represents holy text, revealed by supreme authority, Vedanta teaches us that even the Scripture shouldn’t be accepted, we find it to be contrary to our perception, to our common sense.

Collecting data and acquiring knowledge will not develop intellect. Nothing wrong with being knowledgeable and well informed, intelligence and knowledge provides you the means to make a living, but it will not develop your intellect. To develop intellect you need (Vijnana not jnana) to observe, question, think, reason and make judgments and conclusions for yourself. Never accept things for granted. Accept only the things that are logical and reasonable.

In living your life try to be objective, try looking things from outside and above, as impartial observer. Examine the motives of your actions. Are you acting based on your likes and dislikes? Desires? Learn to recognize chaotic impulses of the mind and stay above it, refuse to obey it. Ignore the noise which is telling you that you should be like everybody else. Do you really need the newest smart phone, is it a real need or is it created by advertisement which are everywhere around you?

Instead of setting up for yourself only material goals, try setting up for yourself an ideal of what you can be and try achieving it. Learn how to enjoy in life instead of running through it too fast to notice beauty around you.

In her discourse on Vedanta vision of Gita Jaya  Row says: “Krishna describes a sanyasi as one who does what one ought to do, fulfils one’s duties and responsibilities fully, without depending on the fruit of action. A sanyasi is not one without a higher ideal, nor is he an inactive person. Krishna then gives a masterful description of the three stages of spiritual evolution. From an active yogi to a meditative sannyasi and, finally, to the exalted state of a jnani, the enlightened One. He describes the three stages in terms of mental states rather than external appearances.”  Thus, one does not have to don ochre robes or perform rituals or deny oneself worldly enjoyments to be spiritual. All that is needed is a change in mindset guided by Intellect.

 

Meditation is more than just shutting one’s eyes and repeating a mantra or word symbol. It is the highest spiritual technique that needs to be practiced diligently and devotedly by qualified practitioners. The essential prerequisite for meditation is a calm mind. A mind burdened with desires and attachments is unable to take off into subtler realms of concentration and meditation. We need to transcend our mind sheath and focus on Intelligence sheath to attain the status of perennial joy.

 

 

We need to practice Sanyasa Yoga which is popularly called as Raja Yoga,   for   the progressive development of body, mind and spirit says the Mantra in MNU:

vedāntavijñānaviniścitārthāḥ saṁnyāsayogādyatayaḥ śuddhasattvāḥ .
te brahmaloke tu parāntakāle parāmṛtāḥ parimuchyanti sarve 

Having attained the Immortality con­sisting of identity with the Supreme, all those aspirants who strive for self-control, who have rigorously arrived at the conclusion taught by the Vedanta through direct knowledge, and who have attained purity of mind through the practice of the discipline of yoga and steadfastness in the know­ledge of Brahman preceded by renunciation, get themselves released into the region of Brahman at the dissolution of their final body.

This mantra also appears in Muṇḍaka III 2, 6.  According to Śrī Śaṅkarācārya, the goal of Vedānta is Paramātma-vijñāna or Self-Realization. The central theme of this verse is that this knowledge is attained through inner purity gained by taking to Sannyāsayoga.

A yogic way of life aims to increase the Sattva guna (suddhasatvah) to nurture consciousness via healthy body and mind. Foods we eat will impact us on the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual level. Diet plays a pivotal role to progress towards the realization of a spiritual path.

The food individuals eat influences their thought processes and nature and vice versa. The Chhāndogya Upaniṣhad also emphasises on satvik foods since eating such foods purifies the mind and becomes part of our pure consciousness.  “āhāra śhuddhau sattva śhuddhiḥ” (7.26.2) People with pure mind prefer pure sattvik food.

 

A Sattvik diet is a pure vegetarian diet which includes seasonal fresh fruit, ample of fresh vegetables, whole grain, pulses, sprouts, dried nuts, seeds, honey, fresh herbs, milk and dairy products which are free from animal rennet.  These foods raise sattva or our consciousness levels. Sattvik foods are cooked and eaten with love, gratitude and awareness. A sattvik person is calm, peaceful, serene, amicable, and full of energy, enthusiasm, health, hope, aspirations, creativity and balanced personality. An added advantage of sattvic diet -helps to keep the weight in check and very effective method of weight loss.  A sattvik food will become tamasic when over processed, kept for a longer period or deep-fried.

Sannyāsa implies renouncing worldly and religious work and preferring to remain forever steadfastly in the consciousness of Brahman. This is also yoga.

Those who perpetually strive to keep this spiritual state are called Yatis.

The last moment of life is called antakāla, end-time. Souls fated to rebirth confront antakāla repeatedly, but the soul that is illumined by the wisdom of Vedānta takes his last birth, and consequently he meets with his para-antakāla, final end-time.

“brahmalokeṣu”  in the plural  indicates the view-point of many liberated souls that  all merge into one Brahman. The word parāmṛtāḥ denotes the attainment of Immortality while one is living on the earth, and the verb parimuchyanti implies the merging of the individual Self then and there, at the time of death, into the Supreme Self, without leaving a trace of separate individuality—-just as the birds flying across the sky do not leave any footprint there or the fish moving in water leave no trail of a path. With the attainment of illumination, the aspirant becomes parāmṛtāḥ and at the fall of the body he becomes paramukta, no more to be born again.

Sanyaasyoga is to be understood as the mental sanyaasa, with all our emphasis in the internal attitude of the mind, rather than upon the external physical show or a sayaasa-garb and a sannyasi (Monk) status. Therefore, Sannyaasayoga--the “Yoga of Renunciation” indicates our mental renunciation of all the grossness and animalism in us. Renounce all the negative tendencies such as lust, greed, passion, appetites, egotism, vanity, cruelty, hatred etc., and replace them with their opposite good ethical qualities such as love, tenderness, mercy, tolerance, kindness, purity, nobility, patience, self-control, selflessness etc. This, in short, is the “Yoga of Renunciation” which modern Monks call as Raja Yoga.

“Worlds of Brahman” means only the spiritual centers presiding over every mass-of matter or every known thought or emotion.  

This mantra further says “At the time of death become fully liberated” practicing Sannyasa yoga. There are many who believe and declare that full and complete God Realization is possible   even here and now and a realized soul can yet continue to live enjoying the jivan-mukti status as we realize in the life of Ramakrishna Paramhamsa, Ramana Maharshi, Swami Sivanandam Chandrasekaharendra Saraswati, Chimayananda and others whom we often address as Bhagawan. These are perfect Gurus in our estimation. This makes us believe that Jivanmukti is possible in this very life, if not, we could not have a perfect Guru. But those are few in billions and trillions almost equated with Avatars!

AWARENESS BEYOND THE MIND

The human mind is a conditioned entity bound by karma, including physical, psychological and social compulsions, with yet deeper seated samskaras behind these. The mind is largely inattentive, unaware, or limited in consciousness, caught in external influences and internal compulsions that we fail to discern. The result is that our thought and action is caught in duality and ends in illusion.

 

The mind is not an instrument of truth perception but only of outer information and practical expression. To reach the enduring truth we must look behind and beyond the mind to the greater universal consciousness of which the mind is but an individual reflection. Yet letting go of the compulsions of the mind is not easy. Requires a relentless questioning of the mind's activity through waking, dream and deep sleep.

 

We need to cultivate an intelligence (Intellect) beyond the mind, which is to observe the mind from a higher state of Seeing. That is the Purusha, the Atman or Seer that is the basis of Yoga-Vedanta.

 

Please recall the following mantra from MNU that we discussed in the past. From food are produced vital airs (five pranaas) and sense of creatures. From Praanas mind, from mind (manas) Intellect (jnana) of the form of vivid perception of the intellect (vijnana), Supreme, and from such vivid perception or Vijnana, Brahman, the blissful, the cause of the universe is attained. .śānti in the following mantra means exclusion of all thoughts from the mind other than what is at the focus of attention, or firmly fixing the mind on the object of concentration. Gita also says: “na hi Jnanena sadrisam” There is nothing comparable to Intellect. Ignorance is the cause of our bondage driven by mind and knowledge or intellect is the cause of Liberation. Knowledge or Intellect comes from the mature state of wandering mind.

prāṇair balaṁ balena tapas tapasā śraddhā śraddhayā medhā medhayā manīṣā manīṣayā mano manasā śāntiḥ śāntyā cittaṁ cittena smṛtiḥ smṛtyā smāraɱ smāreṇa vijñānaṁ vijñānenātmānaṁ vedayati tasmādannaṁ dadan sarvāṇyetāni dadāty annātprāṇā bhavanti bhūtānāṁ prāṇair mano manasaśca vijñānaṁ vijñānādānando brahma yoniḥ 

When the life-breath is nourished one gets bodily strength. Bodily strength gives the capacity to practice tapas (yoga in the shape of self-control, religious fast, and so forth). As the result of such tapas, faith in scriptural truths springs into existence. By faith mental power comes. By mental power sense-control is made possible. By sense-control reflection is engendered. From reflection calmness of mind results.

Conclusive experience of Truth follows calmness. By conclusive experience of Truth remembrance of it is engendered. Remembrance produces continuous remembrance. From continuous remembrance results unbroken direct realization of Truth. By such realization a person knows the Ātman.

For this reason, he who gives food gives all these. For, it is found that the vital breaths and the senses of creatures are from food, that reflection functions with the vital breath and the senses, that unbroken direct realization comes from reflection and that bliss comes from unbroken direct realization of Truth.

Thus having attained bliss one becomes the Supreme which is the source of the universe.

I hope this compilation will help in developing your intellect, controlling your wandering mind with the help of Vedanta philosophy and learn how to live stress free and fulfilling life living in Peace but not Pieces in this life on earth and beyond.

CONCLUSION

We are bombarded today, through Zoom and Webinars, on the peremptory need for Yoga Therapy for Corona preventive measures, panacea for COVID 19,   after care to get back to mental balance and improve all kinds of health. It even calls for focus in kitchen with herbal products. Yoga therapy may be defined as the application of yogic principles to a particular person with the objective of achieving a particular spiritual, psychological, or physiological goal. The means employed are comprised of intelligently conceived steps that include but are not limited to the components of the spiritual teachings of Patanjali--yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara, dharana, dhyana and Samadhi.  Also included are the application of meditation, textual study, spiritual or psychological counseling, chanting, imagery, prayer, and ritual to meet the needs of the individual.

Yoga therapy with its universal appeal, respects individual differences in age, culture, religion, philosophy, occupation, and mental and physical health. The knowledgeable and competent yogi or yogini applies Yoga Therapy according to the period, the place, and the practitioner's age, strength, and activities. Yoga therapy is a self-empowering process, where the care-seeker, with the help of the Yoga therapist, implements a personalized and evolving Yoga practice, that not only addresses the illness in a multi-dimensional manner, but also aims to alleviate his/her suffering in a progressive, non-invasive and complementary manner.  Depending upon the nature of the illness, Yoga therapy can not only be preventative or curative, but also serve a means to manage the illness, or facilitate healing in the person at all levels. Yoga therapy aims at the holistic treatment of various kinds of psychological or somatic dysfunctions ranging from back problems to emotional distress. Both approaches, however, share an understanding of the human being as an integrated body-mind-intellect system, which can function optimally only when there is a state of dynamic balance within us just like the external cosmic balance need call on World Environment Day.