On yoga

Yesterday I started another new hobby, yoga. Actually the course started about a month ago, but since it'll apparently last quite a long time, I could still join. I was somewhat skeptical in regards to whether or not yoga is just some trendy thing without any substance. But after the first time, I have to say that even if that is the case, I felt that it was fun and it helped me relax better than I've been able to do in ages. And even just for that, I'm ready to pay the monthly fee. Overall the experience was sort of strange.

I know nothing of yoga, but I got the feeling that it's sort of like feng shui. I know nothing of feng shui, either, but I've been led to understand that it's more or less common sense wrapped into a nice packet with the knowledge presented in the form of metaphores, and so on. I'm not exactly sure what variant of yoga we're doing, but it's very light and focuses quite a bit on stretching. So it's not astanga, for sure. But the stretching is also actually pretty bloody marvelous as I sit in meetings and at the office all day long and I get very tense at times. So in light of this, the feeling afterwards was undescribable. Brilliant.

I'm still skeptical about the religious aspect of yoga. For some reason I sort of reject it off hand, as I seem to do with religions in general. Again, the stories basically suggest that it's based on common sense stuff like suggesting that you should observe more and think less to achieve some sort of calmness of the mind. Which I guess is quite a good suggestion if your life and job and studies happen to be the sorts that encourage and reward quick and objective analytical skills. Oh, and I'm very much looking forward to next week's session. Yoga seems to be very addictive...