Practicing Yoga in Modern Age Introduction Lord Narashima appeared in this world for two purposes.

One is to kill Hiranyakasipu, the father of Prahalad Maharaja and the other is to please Prahalad for his unflinching devotion to God. Actually, God need not have to appear as Narashima and show His anger just to kill Hiranyakasipu. God is all powerful that just by His wish the whole universe can be destroyed. He need not have to fight like an ordinary man to kill anybody. He need not get anger just like an ordinary man. The main reason why God appears in various incarnation is to please His devotees. One can easily note that Lord Narashima expressed His terrible anger. When Prahalad had unflinching love for God, inspite of all the tortures imposed on him by his father, God could not contain Himself without reciprocation of love and He expressed His love in the form of anger in that terrible form (half lion and half man). Thus anger is one of the extreme way of expressing love. All different qualities (rasas) in this world like anger, sorrow, joy, wonder, humour, etc. are emanations from God in expressing His love to His various devotees. When we experience these qualities in its proper perspective, it is all bliss. But in this world it seems to us that certain rasas induce happiness and certain rasas inflict sorrow and suffering on us. For example, humour in this world causes happiness, anger in this world causes hatred and sorrow. We face lot of problems in handling all these rasas with different relationships around us and most of the time we are put in to dissatisfaction. We loose all our peace and happiness and sometimes we blame God for different situations. We even go to the extent of considering all these rasas to be Maya (illusions). This is mainly because we do not link all these rasas in its true perspective. Yoga by definition is a linking process. For betterment of life many people turn towards various types of Yoga. In this essay, an insight in to Yoga, its variegatedness and the most suitable way of practicing Yoga in this Modern age is explained. Modern age problems: It is said in Srimad Bhagavatam(12.2.1) In Kali-yuga, this age of quarrel and hypocrisy, there shall be a waning of these qualities: religiosity, truthfulness, cleanliness, tolerance, memory, bodily strength, duration of life, and mercy. These are the human assetsqualities which make a human being distinct from animals. But these things will decline. There will be almost no mercy, there will be almost no truthfulness, memory will be shortened, duration of life shortened. It can be seen from various histories and Puranas that the people of those ages are saintly and followed the codes of God called religion. They were sharp in memory and had strong body. They lived a long life. Their merciful attitude can also be noted that previously, food was given only in charity, it was not sold anywhere in hotels. But now even water is being sold. In future people may have to buy in want of pure air. Even up to the recent past, during the time of industrial revolution in India, Lord Mc Caulay surveyed all over India and made a report to British government that I went north to south and east to west of India but I could not find even a single
1

beggar, as people there have abundant wealth that anyone who come to their house are treated as God. We cannot conquer India unless we systematically break their culture and make them subservient to our own culture. It is generally believed from modern science that human beings evolved from monkeys, so the puranas like Ramayana, Mahabharatha, etc which praises the ideal character of human beings of those ages are considered imaginary. It is also believed that such ideal human beings cannot exist as the modern science says; we evolved from monkeys. But it is not a fact. Darwin theory has been thrown away from various foreign school syllabuses because (1) it did not have a solid proof. (2) No monkey is becoming a human being now. (3) There are no trace of transition stages between monkey and man. (4) It psychologically affects the newer generation not to respect older generation and their values thinking them to be unintelligent as monkeys. It is not that problems exist only in modern age and not in the past age. The nature of this material world is to impose problems. Krishna says in Bhagavad Gita (8.15) Dukha alayam asaasvatham which means this material world is a place of miseries and temporariness. Everyone is trying to get away from these problems. But there are different approaches in facing this problem. Our ancestors adopted a method to improve ones own self with godly qualities to see the world as it is in its true sense. For example, a lady is seen by a tiger as an eatable and by a lusty man as a sense object and by a sadhu as a lump of flesh, bone, urine and stool, etc The world around us seems to us based on the level of our consciousness developed. One should not see the world in a way that it appears to us but in a way that it actually is. In animals the consciousness is not developed as much as human beings. The animals look everything around them in terms of food, shelter, enemy and sex. It cannot see more than these four things in the entire world. But the world is not just these four things. Human beings can see multitude variegatedness in this world. Human beings assume multiple identities than animals in relation to his activities and surroundings. For example a man can play the role of a father, husband, son, brother, employee, citizen, etc But this level of consciousness is also not final, because the problem still exists in day to day life. One can improve the consciousness further towards godly qualities and see the world in its original perspective. When we start seeing the world in its original perspective, the problems automatically vanishes. The problems will no longer appear to us as problems. The world originally is a happy place as we have seen in the introduction part that everything comes out from God as an expression of Love in His various dealings. Thus our ancestors solved the problems by improving the consciousness. The modern science approach wants the world to appear in terms of food, shelter, enemy and sex. It does not even leave one to have human consciousness as we can practically see this from the current problems of breaking relationships, divorces, disloyalty, cheating, bribery, etc constantly increasing with advancement in technology. It is not that technology is degrading human consciousness to animal consciousness, but it is the negligence to improve the consciousness to see the world as it is.
2

Modern science for a long time is trying to solve problems with newer and newer inventions, but it actually transforms one form of a problem in to another. The problems nonetheless appeared to have increased in a different way instead of decreasing. Clearly the modern science approach not only keeps the problem as it is in a different way, but also because of its negligence to improve the consciousness, it has degraded the human society to animal society. Previously cows were viewed by human beings not just as an animal but as ones mother because it feeds us with milk. Even its urine and dung are used to purify places, in medicines to cure chronicle diseases, as fuel for cooking, etc But now the cows are viewed as eatables and are sent to slaughter houses. One of the quality which distinguishes human beings from animal is mercy. We can clearly see from this that mercy is completely absent in modern man. Thus one cannot expect peace and happiness in a society of animals. It is worthless to say that Indian forefathers were fools and lazy that they have not developed technology as other countries. Indian forefathers gave importance to develop their consciousness which is more important than to develop technology and degrade to animal platform. In total they had adopted the principle of simple living and high thinking. Yoga and its varieties: Yoga as described previously is a linking process. It is a process of elevating ones consciousness with the Supreme. One cannot be in the animal platform and at the same time have link with God. One has to improve the consciousness to have link with the Supreme. There are different types of Yoga namely karma yoga, jnana yoga, bhakthi yoga, etc... Each yoga is executed to elevate the consciousness to the Supreme. Bhagavad Gita deeply discusses about all the types of yogic processes. Karma yoga means linking ones activities with the Supreme by renouncing ones fruits of action. Jnana yoga means linking ones knowledge with the Supreme by trying to view the world as not ones sense object. Bhakthi yoga is linking everything with the Supreme with full knowledge that Krishna (God) is the proprietor of this entire world. In all cases, service to the Supreme Lord is the same. But there is a difference in elevation of consciousness. For example Bhakthi yoga includes both Karma and Jnana yoga. One can elevate ones consciousness by mind control. Our mind behaves in a way in which we train it. When we keep some food stuff before a dog, it immediately starts salivating. Similarly a child immediately eats the foodstuff kept in open place, without any discrimination. But the food stuff kept in open place, before a sane man although he is hungry does not eat it without being invited to take it. Thus by Yoga one can train the mind to various levels. When Krishna spoke Bhagavat Gita to Arjuna asking him to control the mind by yoga, Arjuna plainly rejected by saying that the mind is turbulent, restless, obstinate and very strong, it seems to me more difficult than controlling the wind (B.g. 6.34). When person like Arjuna who is thousand times more qualified than the modern man, says that controlling the mind is difficult, it is not possible for an ordinary man to sit in a room and do show bottle yoga. It is said in Bhagavat Gita that to do yoga properly by means of hatha yoga, one has to go to a secluded place in a forest,
3

lay kusa grass, sit in straight posture, maintain brahmacharya, focus between eyebrows with half closed eyes. This is impractical in modern age as one has so many problems related to the age of Kali. Simply by breathing at different paces will not help to control the mind permanently. One has to link every activity to the Supreme Lord to control our mind and elevate our consciousness. As we have seen in the introduction part that every object and every quality has a blissful relationship with God, we can be engaged in all activities by understanding the true relationship of everything with God. This is bhakthi yoga. To execute bhakthi as mentioned in Bhagavat Gita (7.19) one need not go to forest to execute it. Hatha yoga as mention in (B.g. 6.34) is possible for Sathya yuga when people lived for 10,000 years. In Kali yuga people at the most live only for 80 to 100 years. So bhakthi yoga is more suitable for this modern age. This is practically demonstrated by Lord Shri Caitanya Mahaprabhu, who is Krishna Himself appeared in this world about 550 years ago. It is even currently demonstrated in His disciplic succession. Bhakthi yoga starts with linking oneself with hearing about the wonderful activities of the Lord. It is not that Gods activities are some stories. God executes many things by his one activity. It needs good brain and guidance to understand and relish each activity. One cannot understand completely even one activity of the Lord in millions of life times. It is very deep and full of pleasure. The next process in bhakthi yoga is chanting. Whatever we speak, we should speak in relationship with the Lord. Like this there are nine processes in bhakthi yoga. It is not possible for one to immediately look everything around us in relationship with the Lord. It necessitates constant practice to view the world in its originality. Bhakthi yoga is more practical for modern age and one is sure to see quick progress in the process of execution as compared to other types of yoga. Actually there is no comparison of bhakthi yoga to other types of yoga. The amount of potency available in bhakthi yoga is immense. Inorder to practice this yoga one need not leave their job or family and at the same time achieve the highest perfection of love of God as experienced by Prahalad Maharaj. Prahalad Maharaj was simply singing the glories of God. He was just a boy. Bhakthi yoga does not necessitates one has to be an adult. Even a child can relish the progress as achieved by Prahalad Maharaj. One need not rubber stamp by identifying themselves as Hindu, Muslim, Christian, etc God is not Hindu God or Muslim God or Christian God. God is one. Awaking the Love of God is personal, nobody can notice from outside and there is no need to be shy to take up the greatest gift, which is not available in any of the 84,00,000 species in this world. Once the Love of God is awakened, there will not be anything in this world to hate as one can truly experience each and every quality of God in loving exchange with God. Take to this easiest process of singing the glories of the Lord and get the highest gift of ones life.