Yoga, Astrology, & Mindfulness, Oh My!
I am often asked how yoga, astrology, and mindfulness fit together. First of all, they don’t have to. Within each field of knowledge and practice, there is plenty to immerse in and benefit from. We could also say plenty to get lost in or liberated by!
For me, Yoga and astrology came together. The first books I read, the formal teachers I had, even my mother became a yogi and astrologer. After she died I acquired her library and took up my study, including going to India to visit the ancient planetary temples.
Mindfulness came in the middle. It came through yoga and what I appreciate most is the simplicity. We can suffer less, simply by becoming more aware. We can see and know the deepest truths, just by observing the breath. Nothing cosmic need ever happen.
What we know now more than ever, is that mindfulness meditation helps the brain to integrate, process, and influence our life experience more effectively. With this integration there is more potential to choose our response, rather than react reflexively. The more we can respond, rather than react, the more we can influence the outcome. It does not have to be, what it has been.
In Yoga we call this,” transforming our karma.” We practice shifting patterns that have kept us limited. Astrology gives us an even bigger perspective on past patterns, present circumstances, and future potentials. More esoteric than mindfulness yes, but practiced for thousands of years; a literal science in that it has been tested and refined generation by generation.
Astrology was also our earliest form of astronomy, with the unaided eye it produced a vision of the universe that continues to resonate with the understandings of modern physics.
And when thought of as a symbolic language, gives us a means to integrate left and right brain forms of knowing and open up our connection to the greater whole. Here are some modern voices that point towards these grand themes:
- “A millennium before Europeans were willing to divest themselves of the Biblical idea that the world was a few thousand years old, the Mayans were thinking of millions and the Hindus billions” –Dr. Carl Sagan, Cosmos
- “The whole history of science has been the gradual realization that events do not happen in an arbitrary manner, but that they reflect a certain underlying order, which may or may not be divinely inspired.” -Stephen Hawking
- “As our Jyotish guru observed, ‘Why are Westerners so interested in changing your destiny when it is so hard to live up to it?’ One of Jyotish’s tasks is to teach you what your dharma is, instead of what your ego desires it to be.” -Hart DeFouw and Robert Svoboda, Light on Life
- “The man who understands symbol not only opens himself to the objective world, but at the same time succeeds in emerging from his personal situation, reaches a comprehension of the universal … and thanks to the symbol, the individual experience is awoken and transmuted into a spiritual act.” -Marcea Eliade, Mandala
Natasha Korshak is a long-time teacher and trainer of yoga, meditation, mindfulness and MBSR, and has been working in the field of integrative health and wellness her entire professional career. She is a graduate of the Interfaith Theological Seminary and an ordained Interfaith Minister specializing in contemplative practice, grief processing, and spiritual direction. Her study and training of mind/body/spirit methods is extensive and she has learned from many of the pioneers in their discipline. As the founder and director of the Sol Center she is well regarded for her depth, warmth, authenticity, and the smile in her voice.
