Before it was an Instagram hashtag, before it became a designer hobby, yoga was a mystical and spiritual ritual and no country knows that better than India. Today it’s estimated that up to 36 million Americans practice yoga spending an unbelievable 16 billion dollars on classes, clothes and other accessories. So what was this now billion dollar industry before it crept into the limelight? According to a LIFE magazine article following the research of a Yale scholar in India, in 1937 it was still very much true to its origins.
The article explained yoga as a mystic Hindu practice that allowed an expert, through muscular control, to detach the mind from the body and allow the ‘higher-world soul’ to join with him. It also clarifies that although primarily a spiritual pursuit, yoga has therapeutic and athletic benefits as well. Following this, the magazine published another article documenting photos of yoga being practiced across the world between the years of 1945-1949 right before it became popularised. By the 1960’s and 1970’s with the influx of people on a soul-searching journey the art had become a symbol for the hippy generation and was suddenly in vogue.
Take a look back through history to a time when yoga was a novelty and out of reach of the internet generation.