Monday, January 29, 2007

Lighten up.

Religous zealots need to chill.

Yoga causes controversy in public schools

Some parents say it violates the separation of church and state

'SAN FRANCISCO - In Tara Guber's ideal world, American children would meditate in the lotus position and chant in Sanskrit before taking stressful standardized tests.

But when she asked a public elementary school in Aspen, Colo., to teach yoga in 2002, Christian fundamentalists and even some secular parents lobbied the school board. They argued that yoga's Hindu roots conflicted with Christian teachings and that using it in school might violate the separation of church and state.

Portrayed as a New Age nut out to brainwash young minds, Guber crafted a new curriculum that eliminated chanting and translated Sanskrit into kid-friendly English. Yogic panting became "bunny breathing," and "meditation" became "time in."

"I stripped every piece of anything that anyone could vaguely construe as spiritual or religious out of the program," Guber said.

Now, more than 100 schools in 26 states have adopted Guber's "Yoga Ed." program and more than 300 physical education instructors have been trained in it.

Countless other public and private schools from California to Massachusetts - including the Aspen school where Guber clashed with parents - are teaching yoga.

Teachers say it helps calm students with attention-deficit disorder and may reduce childhood obesity. The federal government gives grants to gym teachers who complete a teacher training course in yoga.

"I see a lot fewer discipline problems," said Ruth Reynolds, principal of Coleman Elementary School in San Rafael. Her observation of the school's six-year-old yoga program is that it helps easily distracted children to focus.

"If you have children with ADD and focusing issues, often it's easy to go from that into a behavior problem," Reynolds said. "Anything you can do to help children focus will improve their behavior."

In 2003, researchers at California State University, Los Angeles, studied test scores at the Accelerated School, a charter school where Guber sits on the board and where students practice yoga almost every day. Researchers found a correlation between yoga and better behavior and grades, and they said young yogis were more fit than the district average from the California Physical Fitness Test.

Guber, married to former Sony Pictures Entertainment CEO Peter Guber, embraced yoga after moving to California in the 1970s. Their 13-acre Bel-Air estate includes a clifftop garden leading to a Yoga House retreat.

In 2004, Americans spent almost $3 billion on yoga classes and retreats, books, DVDs, mats, clothing and related items. About 3 million American adults practiced yoga at least twice a week in 2006, more than doubling from 1.3 million in 2001, according to Mediamark Research.

Despite mainstream acceptance, yoga in public schools remains touchy. Critics say even stripped-down "yoga lite" goads young people into exploring other religions and mysticism.

Dave Hunt, who has traveled to India to study yoga's roots and interview gurus, called the practice "a vital part of the largest missionary program in the world" for Hinduism. The Bend, Ore., author of "Yoga and the Body of Christ: What Position Should Christians Hold?" said that, like other religions, the practice has no place in public schools.

"It's pretty simple: Yoga is a religious practice in Hinduism. It's the way to reach enlightenment. To bring it to the west and bill it as a scientific practice for fitness is dishonest," said Hunt, 80.

"I've talked to too many people who got hooked on the spiritual deception of yoga. They come to believe in this and become enamored with Hinduism or eastern mysticism," he said.

Concerns about yoga's spiritual implications have also fueled a cottage industry of books and videos that offer the purported benefits of yoga flexibility, strength and weight loss without mentioning the y-word.

Laurette Willis, 49, wrote an exercise regimen called "PowerMoves Kids Program for Public Schools." The stretching routine includes pauses for children to contemplate character-building quotes from Martin Luther King Jr., Emily Dickinson, Harriet Tubman and William Shakespeare. Willis, who lives near Tahlequah, Okla., also created an exercise regimen called "PraiseMoves: The Christian Alternative to Yoga."'


1 Comments:

Blogger Ed Vis said...

It is true that loving, caring, church going very good Christians torment over Yoga.

On one side many want to embrace Yoga and still on other side, they look at Yoga as a rebirth of Gnosticism.

We need in depth discussions about YOGA. I fully agree with that.

Even though Yoga orginated in Hinduism, YOGA has nothing to do with any religion.

It is a Sanskrit word but still it covers the goal of every religion and every culture on earth.

When some one prays to Krishna , he is following BHAKTI YOGA. If some one prays to Jesus, he is also following BHAKTI YOGA.

Yoga is like Physics or Chemistry; It is universal.

So, I firmly believe every one on earth should give more importance to spirituality that is developed through practicing different Yogas and less importance to religious dogmas.

We have to do things that will elevate us spiritually. We have to slowly eradicate negative thoughts and pump ourselves with positive thoughts.

Eventually we have to even eradicate “positive thoughts” and attain “thought-less state”.

We have to raise our vibrations to higher levels so that we can deal with day to day problems in a very constructive manner. Slowly and steadily we will reach there. That is what Hindu salvation process is all about.

WHAT IS YOGA?

Yoga means “ Union with divine” or “Self Realization of the immortal soul or Atman within you.” Of course, it has many other meanings too. The word Yoga came from the root word Yuj to Yoke or join. So yoga teaches one to join the individual soul or Atman with the absolute soul or Parmathman or God. The word Yoga is defined by sage Patanjali in his book Patanjali Yoga Sutra.

He summarized YOGA as CHITTA VRITHI NIRODHA.

CHITTA means MIND
VRITTI means VIBRATIONS
NIRODHA means STOPPAGE

So according to him, SELF-REALIZATION means
” Stoppage of Mental Vibrations or mental activity within a man.”

Sage Vasishta told Lord Rama in the Yoga Vasishta:

“Chit Chalathi Samsare;
Nichale Moksha Muchayatha
when chit [mind] vibrates”

When the mind vibrates [when one thinks];
This whole world come to existence”
When the mind stop vibrating [stoppage of thoughts];
This whole world is destroyed;
And person attains salvation

Thanks for reading.

May 17, 2007  

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