Yoga can help you take care of yourself! It is different from other kinds of exercise that emphasize your performance. Yoga helps you find inner as well as physical strength. In aerobics classes you move to exciting music and check yourself in a mirror. In yoga you do not need to worry about how you look. You are concerned about how you feel. 

You discover the peace and quiet available inside you. You will close your eyes during most of the poses to bring your awareness inward.

We have all learned to compete in school, in business, or in sports. Yoga helps you focus inward to discover who you are and what you want to be, rather than what the world is trying to make you do. Yoga helps you find a relaxed energy in your own mind and body.

For thousands of years, people who have practiced yoga have learned that we waste much of our energy. 

The problem starts with our minds, which produce a constant stream of thoughts; sometimes it seems as if our minds are out of control. Instead of staying focused on one thing, we are subject to a constant flow of thoughts. We wonder: "How can I do everything I need to do today?" and then start to make a mental list. We think: "I am happy about this; I'm worried about that." This dance of thoughts keeps us from concentrating and thinking clearly about any one thing. (If you don't believe this, just stop reading this book for a couple of minutes and try to envision your mind as calm and quiet. 

Note all the thoughts that pass through your head.) Without our even knowing it, this constant stream of ideas puts tension into our bodies  sometimes to the point of becoming ill.

The purpose of yoga is to quiet our minds so that our mental energy can go where we want it to. This allows us to focus on what we choose to concentrate on. This is called "one-pointed concentration.

" When you calm your mind by doing yoga, you also calm your body. You may realize that all those exciting, interesting, or worrisome thoughts were agitating and tensing your body. As the yoga poses slow you down, you become more relaxed.

Through yoga you also may discover that you have more strength and energy than you realized. The constant flow of your thoughts, muscular tensions, and other physical stresses use up an enormous amount of your energy. 

If you can relax and focus your energy, it is available for other purposes. You can be calm, quiet, and strong physically and emotionally. You can become aware of a source of spiritual strength within you.

Yoga is different from other exercise, and you need to do it differently if it is going to work for you. Here are some principles to follow as you practice yoga