Light On Life Sheds Light On Yoga
Light on Life : The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate Freedom
by B.K.S. Iyengar, John J. Evans & Douglas Abrams
Rodale Books
304 Pages
Reviewed by Christine Clemens I'm not a yogi and haven't studied much on that path. However, I have studied several other natural healing and enlightenment paths, so I was intrigued to read Light On Life to see if there was any information I could integrate into my healing work. Article Continues After Illustration
I was delighted to find quite a bit of information that I could apply. B.K.S. Iyengar, the books main author, does an excellent job of breaking things down and explaining different aspects of his approach. In the chapter “Clarity – The Mental Body,” he compares consciousness to a lake:
“If consciousness is like a lake, there are primary waves or fluctuations of consciousness on the surface of the lake.” This is disappointment, “an external challenge, as it were, that causes a ripple on the surface.”
“The secondary fluctuations or waves are different. Those are ones that rise up from the bottom of the lake. The bottom of a lake is covered in sand and so, if in life you experience a sufficient number of disappointments, the ripple on the surface creates a wave that goes down to the bottom, and imperceptibly that ripple creates a little bank in the sand, so there is a little mound of disappointment.” As a result you will find yourself sad and disappointed as the mound on the bottom sends off “secondary fluctuations” or waves.
"As these things are built up over time, they can be removed only over time.” He says that with the practice of yoga you can reduce the size of the mounds and setting yourself free from these and other fluctuations or waves in our consciousness.
I feel that you can also apply the ideas that Iyengar expresses to other forms of healing. Although I learned a lot from this book, it's not a book you just sit-down and read; there is a lot of information and you only can take-in so much at a time. It's full of information and you need to refer back to it to refresh your memory. But of course, from any book that is full of information that has taken years to learn I would expect no less. Thank you, B.K.S. Iyengar, for sharing with us.
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2003 by AlternativeApproaches.com
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