One may enter the practice of Yoga for any of the following reasons and then expand into the others naturally:

1. for fitness
2. for health and wellness – health enhancing strategies
3. for healing – a holistic approach to support healing processes
4. for spiritual development or self-realization.

As we integrate Yoga in daily life we aim to understand life better in all areas. How can one live one’s life with awareness, with compassion and in balance? How can one solve problems constructively? How can one learn to see oneself and others more clearly? Seen from this angle life is a school and we can gain understanding at every step of the way. In order to achieve this, the perception through the senses has to become clearer, and the mind needs to become quiet and focussed.

In our yoga classes, formal educations and in patient education we also adapt the eight limbs that Patanjali’s Yoga sutras offer us in such a way that students and patients gain access to Yoga in accordance with their motivation, their age and health condition. It can then become an integrative practice for any motivated person to use in daily life. As a foundation we apply the ethical principles. We offer Asanas and Hatha-Yoga purification techniques, deep relaxation through Yoga Nidra, concentration through for example Trataka, and we also offer an extended teaching on the effects of food and nutrition. Further Yoga practices we apply are Mantra recitation and chanting as well as Satsang and the study of spiritual scriptures.

Applying self-enquiry techniques we gradually come to know ourselves and see who we are and what we are not. We gain understanding of what complex situations have confused us and are the cause of our suffering and also how we can heal and transform them. Getting aware is the first step on the path to transformation.

And we can go a big step further by opening our consciousness to the whole science of Yoga,

A science with different paths of Yoga, the Margas: Karma Yoga, Hatha Yoga, Raja Yoga, Bhakti Yoga as well as Jnana Yoga, Vedanta and Tantra. Here clear teachings are offered that have proven highly useful during thousands of years giving us the opportunity to discover our true nature, to go beyond our limited mind.

How would it be to reach absolute liberation (Kaivalya), the end of all suffering? A lot of people at least in the West think themselves very far from such a high state of Self-realization. If they know of this possibility at all, they think it is only meant for Yogis who are constantly living and meditating in Himalayan caves. However, this may not be true at all. God is…now!!!

The application of the precious heritage of authentic yoga in daily life is a holistic and comprehensive system, concerning bodymind consciousness and soul. It includes all main Yoga paths which have the potential to support us on our individual path towards Self-realization. It is obvious that every Marga has its own contribution and energy, all of which are important for any human being. Traditionally Karma Yoga is seen as the path for Yoga in daily life. In our day and time, however, it is especially essential to see these paths as a whole, meant to spiritualize the body, the feeling, the intellect, and to harmonize those aspects of our humanness with one another for the higher purpose of realization.

• Karma Yoga is the path of selfless way of acting, described in the Bhagavadgita. The aim is not to be lost in outer activity and not to be identified with the results of one’s actions.
• Hatha Yoga with the Sat?kriyas, the purification techniques, and Asanas providing strength and flexibility, balancing the sun and the moon within us, the male and the female. Hatha Yoga is traditionally used to prepare the body for meditation and to clean the Nadis. However, Hatha Yoga is misunderstood by many people in the West as the whole of Yoga.
• Raja Yoga/Kriya Yoga is the path of discipline and meditation. A whole variety of techniques are applied, according to the maturity of the disciple, special methods of inner observation in meditation or apart from it, recitation of Mantras, and individual exercises that transform personal structures. They can only be given at proper time and individually designed for the need of the disciple.
• Bhakti Yoga is the path of devotion, described also in the Bhagavadgita. Devotional singing plays an important part also in our community life, in the form of Bhajans (spirituelles Lied, Anbetung Gottes, gemeinsam gesungen), Kirtan, (Wechselgesang, classical Indian devotional songs often used in the form of alternating solo singer and group singing), and chanting. In spiritual singing repetition plays an important part as the daily mind gets bypassed and the singers slowly sink into the space of worship. Prayer is another aspect of Bhakti Yoga as well as ritual worship.
• Jnana Yoga, the path of realization and knowledge, has its origin especially in the Upanishads. Jnana Yoga removes Avidhya, ignorance, the first Klesa, and the main source of human suffering. Viveka, discrimination, is one of its main tools. The transference of knowledge by the words of the masters allows us to deeply ponder upon their true meaning and to eventually enter into the space behind the words.
• Vedanta in the highest form of Advaita Vedanta describes the underlying unity behind all manifestations as the only truth.
• Tantrism is concerned with understanding energy in the body-mind and its sublimation.

On the path of Yoga we may seek the help of Ayurveda to support balance in the bodymind system, to find out what we have too much of, what we have too little of and how we can gain balance in the Doshas. Both practices are rooted in nature, they have been natural integrative approaches from the beginning, with a high level of benefit for the user or practitioner. It helps us to better understand who we are, where we are living, what we do and how we can live in harmony. Everybody can benefit from it. We only have to open all our senses to it. There is no dogma. So we learn to make our lifes more beneficial, according to our type by understanding the Doshas and to enhance our life energy. Yoga is for everybody, also according to Hatha Pradipika, and the Yoga practice can be applied and adapted for everybody in an optimal way.

Vivekanada said: “Each soul is potentially divine. The goal is to manifest this Divinity within by controlling nature, external and internal. Do this either by work, or worship, or psychic control, or philosophy – by one, or more, or all of these – and be free.“

The science of Yoga has the intention to help people clear their constantly moving and distracted mind, to centre it and to make it become quiet. If this does not happen, the person is not able to concentrate and thus cannot deepen his or her knowledge in the respective fields of interest. Yoga sees subjective perception as a distorted perception, that causes the patterns that shape the behaviour and colour the self-perception of the person. It is often said that change starts in the mind and can also be reflected as a change in behaviour and on the bodily level.

Read the full document here http://www.lonavalayoga.org/conference3.html