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Prior to the triumph of scientific materialism in the nineteenth century, when people lived rather closer to nature, both physically and culturally, the idea of a life force was a universally held assumption. How else did the plants grow? How did all living things flourish and multiply? The sheer extravagance of life was obvious, even to the casual observer. Our planet is today somewhat damaged, yet still gloriously fertile and alive. The invention of the microscope and the discovery of microorganisms reinforced this view. Life appears everywhere, including the most unlikely places. Dirty pond water teems with life. It’s on the roof of my house in the form of moss and lichen. In prescientific cultures it’s still a “given”. When this belief comes as part of a non-western “package”, like yoga, cultural relativism enforces a scientific indulgence. Isn’t a bit disrespectful to attack or ridicule someone’s cultural standpoint? When it tries to creep into the scientific realm through the backdoor, the scientific establishment reacts with irrational fury, like an angry householder confronting a burglar. I hope to show that, far from being just a mystical or philosophical concept, prana is a tangible force that we can feel inside ourselves and in the right conditions, observe. We cannot yet measure it objectively, though we can measure its fluctuations outside the organism, whether human or otherwise. It has also been demonstrated in the laboratory and lecture room by means of a soft blue glow in a vacuum tube, well away from any possible electrical connections.

The article below was written with yoga teachers and student teachers in mind. It was printed in “Yoga and Health” a few years ago and created something of a stir. I still occasionally get asked for copies. It has been updated slightly but is substantially unaltered.

Some contributors to yoga publications have expressed grave reservations about the way that yoga is being taken up by sports/fitness centres with the attendant risk of a degeneration into a form of “soft aerobics”. In this article I hope to address these entirely understandable anxieties and suggest ways that teachers can adapt to the rapidly changing society that we live in without compromising the essential spirit of yoga.

A few words about my own background and experience might not go amiss. I have been teaching for over a decade – a mere novice compared to some readers of Y & H, I suspect. However, for most of that time I have been (more or less) a full time professional, having given up my old work as a service engineer. The need to pay the rent has taken me into some unlikely venues and given me a lot of varied experience, often in difficult circumstances. My venues have included two prisons, a sports centre, two fitness centres; a special needs school (for the “stressed out” staff), our local civic centre and two community associations, as well as a number of adult education and private classes.

Yoga isn’t rocket science – anyone can practise it and get an enormous amount of benefit in terms of health, well-being and personal development. However, if you want to dig deeper, there is a lifetime of fascinating study available for the enthusiast.

A yogi or yogin is anyone who practises yoga, no matter what form or style. In the West, most yogins (but by no means all) practise Hatha Yoga, the physical yoga of postures, breathwork etc. In a weekly class, because of time constraints and other factors, posture work tends to dominate, with a relaxation session at the end and (often) at the beginning as well. It would be quite wrong, though to assume that Hatha Yoga is all postures and nothing else. There are many other physical practices (and many different styles), too numerous to describe in this short article.