Book Review

For this project I chose to read, The Seven Spiritual Laws of Yoga, by Deepak Chopra and David Simon. This book was filled with information on many different aspects of yoga! This book starts off introducing the philosophy of yoga by describing it as a practical system to awaken your human potential by generating you with a healthy belief system with a more flexible nervous system. Then after describing the purpose of yoga it moves into the eight branches of yoga, which are: Yama (rules of social behavior), Niyama (rules of personal behavior),Asana (postures), Pranayama (vital energy), Pratyahara(senses), Dharana(attention and intention), Dhyana(awareness), and Samadhi(meditation). These are just the eight different branches of yoga that yogis often perform on certain days of the week. The next subject brought up in this book is the seven spiritual laws of yoga. Each day of the week, as a yogi, you are assigned a certain law to follow for the whole day. On Sunday,it's the "law of pure potentiality", which is basically stating that you should become aware of your place in the world and practicing non judgement while you perform yoga poses. The "law of giving and receiving" is held on Monday, and states that you should give someone a gift that day whether it be a kind word of a small gift. You should also take pride in all the gifts you have in your life while practicing yoga positions. The law for Tuesday is the "the law of karma", and you can obey this law by listening to your heart for guidance and asking yourself what are the consequences before making a decision. The "law of least effort" is reserved for Wednesday, and you can do this by accepting yourself and others as they are, and by staying open to all points of view. The fifth law, "law of intention and desire" is for Thursday, and can be accomplished if you write down the things you would like to see happen in your life. Friday's law, the "law of detachment" can be put into effect when you let go of the control in your life and just let things flow naturally. The last law of the week is the "law of Dharma", and this goal can be accomplished when you become aware of your unique talents. This is to help you use your certain talents to help other people out. The last chapter of this book is about meditation. According to Deepak and David, "Meditation is the exploration of your inner world. Yoga encourages you to be as familiar with your inner world of thoughts, feelings, memories, desires, and imagination as you are with the outer world of time, space, and causality" (Chopra 97).

I enjoyed reading this book a lot. I got tons of information out it like poses, the laws of the days, how to meditate, and etc. My favorite part to read was the philosophy part. I guess since I've been reading about how to meditate, and how to perform certain positions, it was good to find out why these two authors think yoga is important in any lifestyle. I loved how they didn't force you to think that yoga can only be performed to reach one goal, which might be to become spiritual, or become fit, but they gave you the idea that yoga can be used in however many forms you want it to be used. Also at the beginning of each chapter, it started off with a yoga-related quote, which i thought was cute!

There were some down sides to this book though. Although it was filled with information some of the sections were very long. Most of this information was useful, but there were times when I felt like I was reading the same point of view over and over again just in different wording. I also didn't like how the last pages of the book are just random yoga poses. It's got such a great source of information and then the information kind of dies down when random yoga poses start popping up. If anything, I liked this book more than I disliked it, I definately learned alot more details about yoga concerning how strict the pratice can get. I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in becoming a yogi or is a beginner.

Chopra, Deepak, and David Simon. The Seven Spiritual Laws of Yoga. Hoboken, New Jersey: John Wiley & Sons, 2004. Print.