Sangha Yoga Montauk

Yoga: Divine union. From the Sanskrit root verb yuj (to yoke, join or unite.)

Yoga developed thousands of years ago around India although the exact origins are uncertain. Yoga is for every person in every age; therefore yoga keeps changing just as time keeps passing. What ancient yogis did in dark caves many years ago may not exactly be what we are doing today, and that’s o.k. What’s important is that the essence of yoga is still here. Yoga is and always has been a way to connect us to the source.

The teachings of Yoga are based on many different philosophies and religions, but, Yoga is NOT a religion, rather it is a discipline, one that leads to ultimate freedom.

Patanjali was the first to write down the teaching of Yoga in the Yoga Sutras. Each Sutra states in some way what Yoga is and how to attain that divine state. The clearest sutra that defines Yoga is sutra 1:2 Yogas Citta Vritti Nirodhah.

Yoga is the cessation of the fluctuations of the mind, or the restraint of the modifications of the “mind-stuff “is Yoga.

In clearer terms when you can control the rising of the mind you will experience Yoga or Union. So what then is really uniting? Well, the union ultimately happens between the individual consciousness (jivatman) and the universal consciousness (paramatman).

Yoga aims at changing the individual, (that is why our practice consists of asana, pranayama, chanting and meditation). Yoga does not bother much about changing the outside world. There is a Sanskrit saying, “As the mind, so the man; bondage or liberation are in your own mind.” So whatever you think, you manifest. If you think you are bound, you are, if you think you are liberated, you are! Things outside ourselves neither bind nor liberate us; only our attitude toward them does. The practice of Yoga brings clarity to the mind so that we can see and experience this. As Gandhi said, “be the change you wish to see in the world” for you cannot change the world if you cannot change yourself!

Shri Brahmananda Sarasvati defines Yoga as “a state where nothing is missing.”

In a way we are not trying to reach some supreme state outside of ourselves, for then we are saying we are not enough, but rather we are discovering that place inside ourselves where we feel complete.