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Hehe. This is what I basically wondered when someone told me that mindfullness was helping her cope with pressure of work life. The new decolonization movement

Hehe. This is what I basically wondered when someone told me that mindfullness was helping her cope with pressure of work life. The new decolonization movement in India has been thinking quite deeply about this and other developments where Indian traditional knowledge is taken to the US and then copyrighted, patented and trademarked, and then sold around the world, incl. India. Amusingly, with American marketing being so brilliant, Indian knowledge has in recent history become far more popular once it was "U-turned" in this way. Lots of interesting work being done. Interestingly, you can also see similar developments as those done to appropriate non-Western mathematical/scientific knowledge in the centuries prior within Europe. Yoga, and Mindfullness are en course to being de-rooted and turned into Western inventions, by rewriting histories or by silencing them. SOAS for instance has one guy who was anointed a Mahant, and he writes books with another guy who says Yoga is a cynical rebranding of Swedish exercises. It's all very very curious. I suppose, if a foreigner flatters an Indian, he'll give you every bit of wealth he has (and then cry foul later). Hehe.

soul4krsna 7y ago
I hope that Krsna has special karma for people who keep thinking they are independent and rulers of nature. I cant wait for that day so I can laugh while I do real yoga for this age of Kali. America will also have its day of reckoning. And to bust your bubble, they will never be able to silence or rewrite history. UK has tried and continues to fail. The people who know the real truth just have too much bliss enjoying reality than trying to convince the dull masses otherwise. Everyone today believes they are so great and smart because of the tiny advancements in manipulating nature that no matter what presentation is done in whatever language, no one is listening because of pride and fear of losing their cherished life paradigms. Posts like this remind me how all I've just said is a waste of time and people are doomed so I just chill in bliss while everyone else is insane worried about death. Hare Krsna!
- UnpossibleJim 7y ago
  I see you've learned a lot from your studies =) Good luck and may the force be with you.
mindfulthrow1 7y ago
“SOAS for instance has one guy who was anointed a Mahant, and he writes books with another guy who says Yoga is a cynical rebranding of Swedish exercises.” I’m assuming you mean James Mallinson. I met him briefly in Jaipur and had been wondering who the white guy with dreadlocks was that I kept seeing around (here in the US it’s considered racist by people of color to wear dreads if you’re not black). To make a long story short, he doesn’t practice yoga, is largely a rich guy that likes the “sadhu lifestyle” (he’s a Baron in the UK), and studies ancient texts in the way a typical white academic would. But I will say for all my skepticism going into it, I read his “Roots of Yoga” and it was great. It’s clear that the practice of yoga is syncretic and means many different things to many different people. We definitely should criticize all the white girls in the west that are using Yoga as a brand for their calisthenics, teaching without knowing anything about pranayama or dhyana. Their style of practice is so far from any Hatha practice I’ve done you can’t even consider it the same thing. Most of those standing postures they do I’ve never encountered from my Hatha teachers. What these white western women are doing is for the most part awful and pretty racist. However, we should be equally skeptical of Hindutva making claims about what Yoga is while ignoring the long, syncretic history and how it grew and exchanged practices with Buddhists, Sufis, Jains, and all sorts of other sects and groups through thousands of years.
- thrwe4234safd 7y ago
  > However, we should be equally skeptical of Hindutva making claims about what Yoga is while ignoring the long, syncretic history and how it grew and exchanged practices with Buddhists, Sufis, Jains, and all sorts of other sects and groups through thousands of years. Non sequitur - this has never been a point of contention in India. I know this is typical of the press in the English-speaking world (and thus the peoples of these places as a whole), but its hilarious to see "Hindutva" being projected as a "Hinduism is supreme, and everything else must be suppressed" (and now all the propaganda with Nazis/Hitler ... my oh my). Criticisms of "Hindutva" from these sources are so insipid and stupid that they are not even worth acknowledging. (Note - I'd place a large portion of the Indian elite within the English speaking world.)
  - 7y ago

soul4krsna 7y ago

I hope that Krsna has special karma for people who keep thinking they are independent and rulers of nature. I cant wait for that day so I can laugh while I do real yoga for this age of Kali. America will also have its day of reckoning. And to bust your bubble, they will never be able to silence or rewrite history. UK has tried and continues to fail. The people who know the real truth just have too much bliss enjoying reality than trying to convince the dull masses otherwise. Everyone today believes they are so great and smart because of the tiny advancements in manipulating nature that no matter what presentation is done in whatever language, no one is listening because of pride and fear of losing their cherished life paradigms. Posts like this remind me how all I've just said is a waste of time and people are doomed so I just chill in bliss while everyone else is insane worried about death. Hare Krsna!

UnpossibleJim 7y ago
I see you've learned a lot from your studies =) Good luck and may the force be with you.

mindfulthrow1 7y ago

“SOAS for instance has one guy who was anointed a Mahant, and he writes books with another guy who says Yoga is a cynical rebranding of Swedish exercises.” I’m assuming you mean James Mallinson. I met him briefly in Jaipur and had been wondering who the white guy with dreadlocks was that I kept seeing around (here in the US it’s considered racist by people of color to wear dreads if you’re not black). To make a long story short, he doesn’t practice yoga, is largely a rich guy that likes the “sadhu lifestyle” (he’s a Baron in the UK), and studies ancient texts in the way a typical white academic would. But I will say for all my skepticism going into it, I read his “Roots of Yoga” and it was great. It’s clear that the practice of yoga is syncretic and means many different things to many different people. We definitely should criticize all the white girls in the west that are using Yoga as a brand for their calisthenics, teaching without knowing anything about pranayama or dhyana. Their style of practice is so far from any Hatha practice I’ve done you can’t even consider it the same thing. Most of those standing postures they do I’ve never encountered from my Hatha teachers. What these white western women are doing is for the most part awful and pretty racist. However, we should be equally skeptical of Hindutva making claims about what Yoga is while ignoring the long, syncretic history and how it grew and exchanged practices with Buddhists, Sufis, Jains, and all sorts of other sects and groups through thousands of years.

thrwe4234safd 7y ago
> However, we should be equally skeptical of Hindutva making claims about what Yoga is while ignoring the long, syncretic history and how it grew and exchanged practices with Buddhists, Sufis, Jains, and all sorts of other sects and groups through thousands of years. Non sequitur - this has never been a point of contention in India. I know this is typical of the press in the English-speaking world (and thus the peoples of these places as a whole), but its hilarious to see "Hindutva" being projected as a "Hinduism is supreme, and everything else must be suppressed" (and now all the propaganda with Nazis/Hitler ... my oh my). Criticisms of "Hindutva" from these sources are so insipid and stupid that they are not even worth acknowledging. (Note - I'd place a large portion of the Indian elite within the English speaking world.)
- 7y ago