Yoga in Smithsonian: Hindus urge all US museums to hold yoga sessions

Hindus have welcomed Smithsonian Institution, “world's largest museum complex and research organization”, for holding yoga sessions; and are urging all US museums to launch yoga on their premises.

This hour-long Vinyasa yoga class is held in the Smithsonian American Art Museum in Washington DC and pairs yoga and art appreciation. Next class has been scheduled on April 17.

Distinguished Hindu statesman Rajan Zed, in a statement in North Dakota today, termed it as a step in the positive direction to make yoga available at such an inspiring museum location and blending yoga with art.

Yoga, referred as “a living fossil”, was a mental and physical discipline, for everybody to share and benefit from, whose traces went back to around 2,000 BCE to Indus Valley civilization; Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, noted.

Rajan Zed further said that yoga, although introduced and nourished by Hinduism, was a world heritage and liberation powerhouse to be utilized by all. According to Patanjali who codified it in Yoga Sutra, yoga was a methodical effort to attain perfection, through the control of the different elements of human nature, physical and psychical.

According to a recent report of US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: “Yoga is the most popular complementary health approach in the United States - used by 14.3% of the adult population, or 35.2 million people”. According to US National Institutes of Health, yoga may help one to feel more relaxed, be more flexible, improve posture, breathe deeply, and get rid of stress. Yoga was the repository of something basic in the human soul and psyche, Zed added.

Federally funded The Smithsonian, created by Act of Congress in 1846, claimed to be “the world's largest museum, education, and research complex” with nearly 155 million collections; was visited by about 29 million people last year. US Chief Justice John G. Roberts, Jr., is the Chancellor; Dr. David J. Skorton is the Secretary; while US Vice President is on its Board of Regents.