Yoga - a healthy exercise

Yoga is a physical, mental, and spiritual practice or discipline which originated in India. Yoga gurus from India later introduced yoga to the west, following the success of Swami Vivekananda in the late 19th and early 20th century. In the 1980s, yoga became popular as a system of physical exercise across the Western world.Yoga in Indian traditions, however, is more than physical exercise, it has a meditative and spiritual core.In Vedic Sanskrit, yoga (from the root yuj) means "to add", "to join", "to unite", or "to attach" in its most common literal sense.

Over time, an extended yoga physiology developed, especially within the tantric tradition and hatha yoga. It pictures humans as composed of three bodies or five sheaths which cover the atman. The three bodies are described within the Mandukya Upanishad, which adds a fourth state, turiya, while the five sheaths (pancha-kosas) are described in the Taittiriya Upanishad.They are often integrated:

1. Sthula sarira, the Gross body, comprising the Annamaya Kosha
2. Suksma sarira, the Subtle body, composed of;
   1. the Pranamaya Kosha (Vital breath or Energy),
   2. Manomaya Kosha (Mind)
   3. the Vijnanamaya Kosha (Intellect)
3. Karana sarira, the Causal body, comprising the Anandamaya Kosha (Bliss)

Within the subtle body energy flows through the nadis or channels, and is concentrated within the chakras.