In retrospect, we can see that yoga has been the source of inspiration for countless spiritual, intellectual, and social innovations in the world, and that far from having become solely degraded into franchise yoga, it has also been greatly enriched by its contact with foreign lands, cultures and religions. The concept of civil disobedience for instance, formulated by the Bhagavad Gita-loving Thoreau, later influenced Mahatma Gandhi who incorporated it, along with the classical yogic teachings of non-violence, ahimsa, as a fundamental building block of his nascent satyagraha (“resistance for Truth”) movement. Decades later, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. found inspiration in Mahatma Gandhi’s teachings, and re-imported the yogic teachings into the West through his non-violent civil rights movement. In the 1960s, millions of Westerners disillusioned with an increasingly selfish and materialistic society, turned to yoga for a saner philosophy of life... just at the time when yoga was on the wane in India. Re-energized by the fabulous success of yoga in the West, yoga is currently experiencing a renaissance in India and throughout South-East Asia, often by re-importing the Western packaging of yoga back into their own homeland!

New science too has been profoundly marked by the teachings of the Upanishads, with several quantum physicists crediting their breakthroughs to a scientific application of the mystical texts of Vedanta.
Art and philosophy have equally benefited from exposure to yogic teachings, with the great Schopenhauer declaring,

“In the whole world there is no study so beneficial and as elevating as that of the Upanishads. It has been the solace of my life; it will be the solace of my death.”

As the great river of yoga spawns multiple streams of inspiration in all the lands in traverses, let us make sure we keep drinking at the purest source of yoga and share its life-giving bounty with all.

“You have dispelled my doubts and delusions, and I understand through your grace,” declares Arjuna in the closing verses of the Bhagavad Gita. “My faith is firm now, and I will do your will.”