How long have you been practicing yoga?

[DChapman]

I'm curious how long everyone here has been practicing yoga and how you started.

For me, about 9 months ago a friend convinced me to go to a yoga class his sister was teaching. I remember going into that first class thinking I was going to show off as I used to be a pretty good athlete. As i'm sure you all know, what resulted was quite an ego bruising 90 minute workout like I had never before experienced. At that point, I decided to continue to go to yoga for egotistical reasons. However, as I progressed with my practices, quite the metamorphisis has happened.

While sparing you all a novel length diatribe, I can say that yoga has been one of the best things to ever happen to me. Yoga has helped me on the physical, mental, and spiritual planes. I have no doubt whatsoever I will be a devout yogi for the rest of my days.

[Austin Osman Spare]

I have been doing yoga for about 5 years now, I started on my own in response to serious spiritual crisis. I found a great book that has served as my "yoga bible" ever since.
an interesting note, the first position i ever learned was the headstand. it was the first one in the book. I remember the intense pain in my back after my first attempts, not that i was doing anything wrong, but, my energy was going crazy. I can say I've somewhat mastered the headstand now, its one of my favorite postures. "king of the asanas" they call it.
good headstand visualization: imagine you are inverted and supporting the whole weight of the earth on your head....

[m1thr0s]

geez...I'm about to date myself here but it's a great question and it deserves an honest answer. The Abrahadabra system I work with definitely classes as a tantric yogic discipline and I have been actively involved with it for roughly 20 years. Prior to this I was so heavily steeped in contemplation and study as to constitute another 10 years of development time. Yeah...I'm not a teenager anymore, but the cool thing is it's still every bit as exciting and motivating to me today as it was from the start...much moreso actually as it has grown and matured tremendously over the years.

In all fairness, there have been gaps...periods where I just laid it all down and walked away clean for a time. Somehow, in retrospect, these turned out to be as important as the periods where I was going balls-to-the-wall as they say. I think you cannot always appreciate what you have got until you walk away from it sometimes. If everything returns of its own accord, without ambition or expectation, you know you have hit onto something really big I think. Something that must be really right for you somehow, and who knows...maybe right for anybody else as well in the end (or a viable option at least).

So the work continues...

m1thr0s

[Anibis]

My first introduction to the formal practice of Yoga was about ten years ago, althought I was raised in an environment where my step mother practiced. Anyhow while in B.C. I ended up at an ashram for a few weeks where they taught Hatha, Kundalini, and Karma Yoga. Though I never went all out with any of these forms as taught there, I sort of extrapolated the salient ideas, especially of karma yoga, and have worked with them since. I also studied under a fellow named Dr. Harsha Dehejia (http://www.amazon.com/gp/search?keywords=harsha%20dehejia&index=blended&tag2=lpo_ixdpgocaen-20) who taught me the tantric approach to contemplating art. He basically defined Yoga as 'Any act deliberately undertaken to create a union between Mind, Body and Spirit'. As well, I became a juggler about a year after that trip, which is a yoga of it's own. So that's my relationship with yoga.
-Ibisis-
P.S. Dehejia's 'Advaita of Art' is a great book.

[Kain]

My initial introduction to formal yoga practices was about 10 years ago, when I actually found a dropped Hatha Yoga book on the street outside my house(!). The book wasn't perfect and in fact it was a quite annoying and mistranslated Greek version of a text in English, however the content was very interesting to me and I even started practicing some of the preliminary excercises. I kept them up on and off for the years to come, experiencing times of great infatuation with those practices and other times where I would stop completely.

It was 5 years ago that I practically organized myself as a practitioner, stumbling upon more concise and informative resources primarilly online and then through books I ordered through Amazon and the like. So I guess I formally got initiated and started practicing Tantra and Kundalini Yoga 5 years ago, and I must say my resolve is ever increasing concerning this work, just like my gains from conducting it.

Kain

[Seipiriz]

Inspired by Kain and his great work with his ascension it's now been 4 months since I started but the results are amazing I fill deeply fulfilled ...

[Kain]

Inspired by Kain and his great work with his ascension it's now been 4 months since I started but the results are amazing I fill deeply fulfilled ...Thank you Seipiriz, I deeply appreciate your remarks...! We are all equally learners in this respect though and it's important to remember that always.

Kain

[Seipiriz]

Kain is my fellow-traveller in the ascending journey...

[Zaii]

Don't know if this is yoga per se, but I've been doing the five tibetan rites for a few years now. Had a huge gap for a while where I didn't really have a steady practice but got back into it recently. An interesting note is that I actually found the book containing the exercises in a trashcan. I suppose someone wasn't having spectacular results. If nothing else, they've been a good energy boost in the morning for me.

For those unfamiliar with them: Link (http://www.mkprojects.com/pf_TibetanRites.htm)

[Kain]

Don't know if this is yoga per se, but I've been doing the five tibetan rites for a few years now. Had a huge gap for a while where I didn't really have a steady practice but got back into it recently. An interesting note is that I actually found the book containing the exercises in a trashcan. I suppose someone wasn't having spectacular results. If nothing else, they've been a good energy boost in the morning for me.

For those unfamiliar with them: Link (http://www.mkprojects.com/pf_TibetanRites.htm)Nice link Zaii, thanks a lot for sharing...

Lol...I guess books tend to find those who will appreciate their contents, one way or another...

Kain

[Amur]

Personally I don't like to use the word Yoga as it has been clichéfied to such extremes. So I just stretch and breathe. Seems to work fine for me :D

The tensions need to be stretched, both in mental and physical spectrum.

[Ðanisty]

What kind of shape do you have to be in to start yoga? I know you guys are probably going to say any shape at all, but I'm seriously overweight and i'm pretty sure that unless i lose some first, I won't be able to do any of it.

[m1thr0s]

There are certain yogic disciplines that do require pretty good health, and yet I have seen overweight elderly people take up even some of the more strenuous branches (such as Ashtanga Yoga) and still manage to derive a great benefit from it. They probably won't go on to become certified instructors in the stuff but not everybody wants or needs that anyway. Nearly any reputable instructor will tell you that listening to the needs of your own body is much more important than following some script to the letter. So I think it's more a question of personal determination than anything else. That, and whatever patience may be required to compliment that.

m1thr0s

[Zaii]

What kind of shape do you have to be in to start yoga? I know you guys are probably going to say any shape at all, but I'm seriously overweight and i'm pretty sure that unless i lose some first, I won't be able to do any of it.

I can't really speak for anything other than what I've done, but the link I posted has some solid exercises that start off at a very light pace that you build up gradually over a period of months. The actual book has a myriad of testimonials from elderly or overweight (sometimes both) folks who made good use of the exercises. None of them are particularly difficult, but are all solid.