The Tree of Yoga

B.K.S. Iyengar

$12.95

In this book, one of the world's moremost teachers of yoga offers his thoughts on many practical and philosophical subjects, ranging from teh place of yoga in daily life to insights from Patanjali's Yoga Sutras. He includes chapters on family life, love and sexuality, health and the healing arts, meditation, death, and advice to teachers. Iyengar enlivens the text with accounts of his personal experiences in the practice of yoga, teaching, and putting spiritual principles into action.

How to Use Yoga
A step-by-step guide to the Iyengar method of yoga, for relaxation, health and well-being

Mira Mehta

Paperbound, large format

$14.95

How to Use Yoga gets my vote for the book that offers beginning and intermediate students the most useful information at a very modest price. Mira Mehta, a student of Iyengar's since childhood, has carefully selected 41 asanas (yoga postures) which can be safely attempted by beginners of all ages. Each pose is clearly illustrated with multiple photographs and written instructions, and alternative ways of practice are offered for those (like me) who are stiffer or out-of-shape. In some instances, more advanced variations are also pictured for those able to go beyond the basic pose. In addition, and this is what I really love about this book, there are 10 weeks of lessons which, if really worked when varied and pursued through all the illustrated variations, really offer 1 to 2 years of progressive practice. There is also a wonderful selection of yoga sequences for various ailments, ranging from arthritis and headache, to digestion and menstral problems. I came to understand so very much about the human body by simply studying these postures designed to alleviate various illnesses. Beginning pranayama (breath exercises) and meditiona are also covered. I have been working with the lesson sequences of How to Use Yoga for several months with no injury to myself and with lots of improvements in my overall health. Very highly recommended.

Yoga
The Path to Holistic Health

B.K.S. Iyengar

Hardbound, large format, over 400 glossy, photograph-filled pages

$40.00

Yoga - The Path to Holistic Health is not only the crowning work of a master, the book itself is a masterpiece. There is no book on yoga that is at all like Yoga - The Path to Holistic Health. B.K.S. Iyengar has brought the full force of his genius into the content of this encyclopedic work, and the Dorling-Kindersley book designers have likewise contributed their own genius. The result is the deepest, broadest, most complete, and most useful book on yoga ever published. Also the most beautiful.

Forty years ago, Iyengar wrote Light on Yoga, in which he demonstrated and described over 200 asanas (yoga postures). A lifetime of teaching experience later, he has gifted us with a different approach. In Yoga - A Path, he has carefully selected 23 classic poses, discusses them thoroughly (including their specific health benefits and when to avoid them) with step-by-step color photographs, and then accompanies the 360-degree photographs of the final pose with one practical pointer after another. These poses are offered in forms ranging from the most basic to advanced and become the foundation of a 20 sequential lessons (which, if pursued through to the advanced forms, offers at least 3 years of joyful progress).

Although this would be quite an accomplishment in itself, Iyengar doesn't even think of stopping there. He goes on to develop a massive section concering the application of yoga as an antidote for stress - here we find 43 poses with enough information about their effects to enable us to select and sequence them according to our needs and abilities. I have never witnessed such a careful consideration and such a helpful approach to what has become the most widespread ailment of modern life. This section alone can literaly save lives and is worth the price of the book in and of itself.

However, it only gets better, and we're nowhere near done. Iyengar follows his 75+ pages on Yoga for Stress with over 150 pages of photographed sequences of Yoga Therapies for a full range of ailments. All the main systems of the human body are covered with specific types of illnesses addressed within each system. Iyengar has learned that, just as we can use herbs, homeopathy, acupuncture and more to stimulate underactive organs and processes or to quiet overactive ones, so we can use yoga when we understand the effects of the poses therapeutically. This is an amazing work!

At other various places in the book, Iyengar clearly discusses the philosophy of yoga, beginning pranayama (breath exercises), the use of props for yoga practice (he did, indeed, earn his nickname of "the furniture yogi" - and I, for one, am glad he did), food and nutrition and much more.

Recommended fully and without hesitation.

Yoga the Iyengar Way
The New Definitive Illustrated Guide

Silva, Mira and Shyam Mehta

$23.00

For those who would like to deepen their own practice or simply to have a clear and comprehensive reference source for almost any yoga eventuality, this is the book. It features over 100 key postures, illustrated by multiple color photographs and detailed instructions (including pointers for practice). Each posture is also graded according to level of difficulty. Throughout Yoga the Iyengar Way, advice for beginners and the less flexible is incorporated along with the finer details of technique for more advanced stuents. Progressive, carefully sequenced lessons are also included, designed to take the student from the beginning stages well through advanced levels - really material for a lifetime of practice. There are also sections on pranayama (breathing exercises), meditation, and the history and philosophy of yoga. Silva Mehta studied with Iyengar for 35 years, Mira and Shyram Mehta have been his students since childhood. I really, really like this book and use it as both a reference and a guide on an ongoing basis. If you are at an intermediate or advanced level, or if you can afford more than one book, Yoga the Iyengar Way is an excellent choice.

Light on Yoga

B. K. S. Iyengar

Foreward by Yehudi Menuhin

$18.00

Light on Yoga is almost 40 years old, the 600+ photos are black and white and grainy, the typesetting maddingly dense and the layout gives the feeling of never pausing for a breath. It is a tribute to Iyengar's vision that despite textual problems of the sort that have consigned many another book to clearance tables and dusty alcoves, Light on Yoga has such extraordinary intrinsic value that it has undergone three revisions and remained in print during its entire history.

This book is the most comprehensive source of information and instruction on the yoga asanas (postures) available in print in English. Iyengar identified and demonstrated over 200 of poses, and included with each one detailed instructions for assuming the pose and clear descriptions of the benefits of the pose, when to do it and when to avoid it. Here too, are sequence after sequence of asanas for over 80 ailments and physical disabilities as well as a staggering 275 weeks of progressive lessons.

While I would never recommend Light on Yoga as a first book for beginners, I unhesitatingly and enthusiastically recommend it for anyone with a serious interest in the healing and sustaining practice of hatha yoga. I continue to learn from it and consider it a treasured resource - and now I am so interested in what Iyengar has to say that I hardly notice the books typographic ideosyncracies.