What is Yoga ?

"Ever since antiquity yoga belongs to mankind. Yoga is the most precious treasury possessed by the human race. The human personality consists of three basic components: the body, the mind and the soul. To master our body, to control our mind, to be initiated into the greatest mysteries of the soul and to reach balance of these three levels of existence – physical, mental and spiritual – this is yoga.

Yoga is the path that leads man to self-knowing. Yoga also helps him make its body healthy and strong and to releases him of any toxins and unnecessary substances which perturbs the functioning of the body. Yoga confronts man to the mess in his mind and to the mistakes and complexes of his personality. Yoga helps him to set free from its limited way of thinking, from the opinions and ideas that the society and the surroundings has filled up his brain. Yoga brings him back to his own centre and helps him find his self, helps him to understand who he is in reality and what really he wants from life.

Yoga is like a giant ocean with a whole world on its bottom. Yoga has many different aspects which help according to the needs and purposes of the one that is practicing it. Literally the word “yoga” means “unity” - unity of the clear conciousness and the individual human conciousness. But to reach this supreme level of existence man has to start from the first step of the ladder”.
  Swami Satyananda Saraswati