What is Yoga? An Adventure in Awareness
Some people think yoga is a religion, some think it's for vitality and health, and some people think it is to promote their personality. In reality, this is all a misunderstanding. The word yoga, as we in the West understand it has come down from the biblical word, yoke. If you go to the original word in Sandscrit, it is jugit. The definition of a yogi is a person who has totally leaned on the supreme consciousness. Yoga is the union of the individual's unit consciousness with the infinite consciousness. That is all it means.
Classically, your potential self is infinite, whether you know it or you don't know it. The fact remains that every human mind belongs to infinity and to creativity. But in practical action, it is limited. So a technical know-how is required through which we can expand our mental faculties in order to bring about the equilibrium to control our physical structure and experience our infinite selves. That's all yoga means in simple terms.
In this life of ours, yoga is greatly needed. Today the human being does not understand why, or what it means to be a human being. The first factor as a human being is to understand your vehicle, the physical or gross body. You have a very complicated inner machinery. It is not just the flesh and bone you can see. It's a very systematic system. It has glands, blood circulation, a breathing apparatus, heart-beat pulsation, a brain, and a total nervous system. All those systems combined over a structure of flesh and bone constitutes your physical system. It is a functional system. Whatever is a functional system needs cleaning, needs care, need tuning. It also needs careful assessment of its capacity of activity, its potential to be extended, and its possibilities of longevity. ~Siri Singh Sahib Bhai Sahib, 1974