Types of Yoga and the Benefits

Since ancient times, yoga is believed to be the best remedy for numerous chronic ailments. Arthritis and backaches, which are difficult to treat, using ordinary medications, can be helped by practicing yoga regularly. Yoga is also good for our mental health. Because yoga requires concentration and focus, it allows us to gain control of our mind and rids us from bad thoughts.

Yoga is good for everyone. There are many different types of yoga. The following is a brief list of the major types of yoga that help us to achieve a union between the body, spirit, and mind.

Bhakti Yoga
Bhakti Yoga is known as one of the most appealing practices of yoga because it also involves spiritual practice with an emphasis on love and devotion to the Almighty. People who perform this type of Yoga tend to have a more positive attitude toward life. They will also learn how to love others and achieve a peaceful mind.

Hatha Yoga
Hatha Yoga is known as the origin of the many styles of yoga, including Power Yoga, Bikram Yoga, Kundalini Yoga and Ashtanga Yoga. The goal of practicing Hatha Yoga is to achieve balance between the body, mind and spirit by practicing Asanas, Shatkriyas, Mudras, Pranayams and meditation. Hatha Yoga helps us feel more relaxed, even in stressful conditions, and prevent both physical and mental ailments.

Jnana Yoga
This type of yoga is usually known as the Yoga of True knowledge. People who are practitioners of Jnana Yoga aim for tranquility, perfect concentration, mental endurance, faith, and total control of their mind.

Karma Yoga
Karma Yoga is also known as Yoga of Action. Karma yoga focuses on the adherence to duty (dharma) while remaining detached from the reward.  Those who practice Karma Yoga have to purify their heart and maintain a peaceful mind and body.

Kundalini Yoga
This type of yoga is also known as the yoga of awareness, which focuses on the psycho-spiritual growth together with the breathing and movement of the practitioners. Practicing Kundalini Yoga improves concentration, enhanced intuition and mental clarity.

Mantra Yoga
Mantra Yoga is actually a form of meditation. People who practice mantra yoga have to chant a certain mantra until they transcend their mind and discover their consciousness. Mantra yoga has been proven to have unique healing potentials. There are three ways of chanting the mantra: ‘baikhari’ (chanting the mantra loudly to remove unwanted thoughts),’upanshu’ (chanting the mantra in low voice which can only be heard by the chanter), and ‘manasik’ (this involves the repetition of the mantra in the chanter’s mind).

Purna Yoga
This type of yoga is a combination of art and the traditional Yoga system in India. The ultimate goal of practicing Purna Yoga is to complete self integration and the union between body, mind and soul.

Raja Yoga
Raja Yoga “royal yoga”, “royal union”, also known as Classical Yoga, is concerned principally with the cultivation of the mind using meditation (dhyana) to further one’s acquaintance with reality and finally achieve liberation. Raja Yoga is sometimes referred to as Astanga (eight-limbed) yoga because there are eight aspects to the path to which one must attend. Patanjali himself called his system of yoga ‘Kriya Yoga’.