Yoga is a Sanskrit word, a belief and a way of disciplining one’s mind and body.  It is an old technique that originated in India where in it uses techniques or ways of exercise, breathing, and meditation.  It was discovered that it can keep a person healthy and relieve stress.  During the Classical period, the old or the classic yoga was initiated by person named Patanjali.  It was said that the existence of yoga was around three thousand years before Christ.  The stone seals proved that yoga really existed during this time because of the yoga positions engraved on the stone.

A person who is into practicing yoga is called a yogi.  A man performing yogi is called yogin and a woman performing yoga is called yogini.  During the Vedic period, somehow yoga has already been performed during this time because of their yogic teachings.  The Vedas is an anthology of sacred hymns and they called their teaching as Vedic Yoga.  Buddha started teaching Buddhism where it emphasized on meditation and also involved some yoga positions or poses.  Siddharta Gautama attained his refinement at the age of 35 and he was the first Buddhist to learn about yoga.

During Patanjali’s time, he wrote the Yoga Sutra to assimilate the classic yoga which is consists of 195 sutras.  He affirmed that a person is melded with prakriti and purusha.  Prakriti means matter and purusha means spirit.  His belief was in opposition to the beliefs of Vedic and the pre classical yoga because he believed that matter and spirit should be separated in order for it to be absolved.  Both the vedic and pre classical yoga believed that the body and spirit should be united into one.  The yoga positions were almost forgotten because they were focused only in meditation but today yogis are now using the techniques to relax their mind and body.  Today, the modern yoga has different techniques and principles they follow.  A person named Swami Sivananda formulated some principles that we can follow regarding the new yoga such as absolute or proper relaxation, breathing, exercise, diet and meditation.