I recently picked up the book American Veda by Philip Goldberg. In my opinion, there are as many “yoga” books for sale today as there are individuals looking for spiritual enlightenment, so I am discerning with all books that find a place in both my home and soul long after it leaves my hands. But, after reading an Elephant Journal review of Goldberg’s book, I was convinced to learn more about this man’s interpretation of American Yoga. Between Iyengar’s Light on Yoga, Yogananda’s Autobiography of a Yogi, Pantajali’s Yoga Sutras, and Ghandi’s interpretation of the Bhagavad Gita, I decided it was time to add some pop culture to my literary yoga wardrobe.
Within the first 2 chapters, I began to notice what Goldberg’s American Veda was all about: the American tradition of soul liberation. America is a melting pot of traditions, cultures, religions and lifestyles. But there is one distinction that seems to unite us all, and that is the idea of freedom. Is this a political concept or a deeply ingrained truth in our society? Perhaps freedom goes deeper than the surface of our history books and constitutions. Perhaps the concept of freedom is not that of being able to democratically do whatever we want, but a liberation of the soul to simply be.
Over the last 30 years, the practice of Yoga has become more than an American trend of pop culture. Yoga seems to have become a revolution of the soul. And all revolutions seem to beg for evolution, to break free from traditional nuances and cultural stigmas that have generated long-standing beliefs systems which are no longer necessary or useful. More people today are beginning to ask their yoga teacher for health advice than their doctor, and yoga classes have replaced the once popular jazzercise workouts. But what is it about yoga that has us so enamoured? Aside from the admiration of gracefully flexible yogini women and lean yet superman-strength men who can do an airborn salutation 20 times over, yoga is more than just a physical practice. Yoga is the language of the soul.
Yoga graces us with the ability to undergo both physical and mental stress and come out floating in the clouds afterward. For the majority of Americans, no desk job or laboring skill has ever been able to help us accomplish this unique state of bliss. Yoga teaches us to listen. Yoga teaches us to become aware of the subtleties that exist in one’s own reality, that reality being the imprints our experiences stamp on the body, the mind, and the soul. Yoga teaches us to be mindful, to walk the middle path between impulse, instinct and intuition. Yoga teaches us to act from our integrity, to engage from our high state of consciousness, to develop our prefrontal cortex skills as the next stage in our soul’s development and surpass the honed and mastered limbic brain system. Yoga teaches us to be our own truth, to accept our challenges and our capabilities, and to simply be.
I have yet to finish reading American Veda, but without knowing what Goldberg’s interpretation of American Yoga is, I can tell you that American Yoga is the path of one’s own truth and the liberation of the soul. It seems there are as many yoga styles today as there are dogmas and karmic paths. American Yoga embraces each one, for each is truth. Even though America is far more youthful than the ancient and profound sutras of Indian texts like the Rig Veda, our yoga revolution is the historical evolution of our collective soul. America IS many paths, one truth.
“In Man the perpetual progress is from the Individual to the Universal, from that which is human, to that which is divine.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson
Within the first 2 chapters, I began to notice what Goldberg’s American Veda was all about: the American tradition of soul liberation. America is a melting pot of traditions, cultures, religions and lifestyles. But there is one distinction that seems to unite us all, and that is the idea of freedom. Is this a political concept or a deeply ingrained truth in our society? Perhaps freedom goes deeper than the surface of our history books and constitutions. Perhaps the concept of freedom is not that of being able to democratically do whatever we want, but a liberation of the soul to simply be.
Over the last 30 years, the practice of Yoga has become more than an American trend of pop culture. Yoga seems to have become a revolution of the soul. And all revolutions seem to beg for evolution, to break free from traditional nuances and cultural stigmas that have generated long-standing beliefs systems which are no longer necessary or useful. More people today are beginning to ask their yoga teacher for health advice than their doctor, and yoga classes have replaced the once popular jazzercise workouts. But what is it about yoga that has us so enamoured? Aside from the admiration of gracefully flexible yogini women and lean yet superman-strength men who can do an airborn salutation 20 times over, yoga is more than just a physical practice. Yoga is the language of the soul.
Yoga graces us with the ability to undergo both physical and mental stress and come out floating in the clouds afterward. For the majority of Americans, no desk job or laboring skill has ever been able to help us accomplish this unique state of bliss. Yoga teaches us to listen. Yoga teaches us to become aware of the subtleties that exist in one’s own reality, that reality being the imprints our experiences stamp on the body, the mind, and the soul. Yoga teaches us to be mindful, to walk the middle path between impulse, instinct and intuition. Yoga teaches us to act from our integrity, to engage from our high state of consciousness, to develop our prefrontal cortex skills as the next stage in our soul’s development and surpass the honed and mastered limbic brain system. Yoga teaches us to be our own truth, to accept our challenges and our capabilities, and to simply be.
I have yet to finish reading American Veda, but without knowing what Goldberg’s interpretation of American Yoga is, I can tell you that American Yoga is the path of one’s own truth and the liberation of the soul. It seems there are as many yoga styles today as there are dogmas and karmic paths. American Yoga embraces each one, for each is truth. Even though America is far more youthful than the ancient and profound sutras of Indian texts like the Rig Veda, our yoga revolution is the historical evolution of our collective soul. America IS many paths, one truth.
“In Man the perpetual progress is from the Individual to the Universal, from that which is human, to that which is divine.” -Ralph Waldo Emerson
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