By Paul Jerard, E-RYT 500

Iyengar, Bikram, and Sivananda may be common styles where you live, but they are sub-styles of Hatha Yoga. Hatha may be the most popular form of Yoga outside of India, but within India are many jewels. Now, let’s take a closer look at the first three of the nine main styles from the birthplace of Yoga.

Bhakti Yoga: Union through love and devotion. This is one of the four main branches of Yoga. Bhakti is the spiritual path of love, devotion, and worship. All of this devotion and love focuses on God, a specific deity, or one’s guru. The most popular form of Yoga, in India, is Bhakti Yoga, which uses mantra, japa, prayer, and songs of praise.

Hatha Yoga: The word “Hatha” originates from two root words, “ha,” which means sun, and “tha,” which means moon. Hatha Yoga can easily be seen as balancing opposing energies, such as male and female or yin and yang. Hatha makes use of Pranayama, asana, kriyas, meditation, and more.

All Hatha techniques work toward the complete health of mind, muscles, vital organs, skeleton, and nervous system. The body benefits with focus on asana and pranayama. The mind receives calming and increased concentration from the practice of meditation and relaxation techniques.

Hatha is often viewed as beginner’s preparation for Raja (royal) Yoga. There are many aspects of Hatha, such as yama, niyama, mantra, bandhas, Yoga nidra, mudras, doshas, and koshas, but many Hatha teachers focus only on physical mastery, because it is popular and it fills classrooms.

Jnana Yoga: Sometimes, this is referred to as the Yoga of Wisdom. Jnana is one of the four main branches of Yoga. Jnana is an ancient discipline of self-knowledge that can trace its roots back to the Vedas.

This Yogic discipline requires the use of intelligence, knowledge, self-study, and meditation, to find one’s true nature.  This Yogic path is suited to intellectual temperaments, because it focuses on spiritual knowledge, wisdom, meditation, and the quest for truth.

© Copyright 2009 – Paul Jerard / Aura Publications

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