New Center Shares Ancient Yoga Methods

By Nargis Nooristani

When Dileepji Pathak left India to come to America, he thought it was to pursue microbiology. One visit from his childhood yoga master proved him otherwise.

For 32 years, Pathak and his wife, Anamdima, have been scouring the world passing on the ancient yoga practices of their homeland.

The Antioch residents opened Dhyanyoga Centers at 3306 Contra Loma less than a month ago. The nonprofit yoga and meditation studio has classes starting at $90 for six sessions with proceeds going back into funding the operating costs of the studio and some going to humanitarian causes in India. Wellness workshops are also on the agenda as well as weekly meditation open to the public at no cost.

“Hopefully, we’ll do more for the community now that we have a facility,” said Pathak who plans to reach out to the local shelters and the needy.

The center’s general manager, Kajal Dhabalia, said the goal of the practice of yoga and meditation is self-awareness that can transcend to the community to bring peace.

With few studios in East County, she said they wanted Dhyanyoga Centers to be a sanctuary for the local community.

“We wanted to establish a place people can come,” Dhabalia said. “A place to quiet their minds.”

It will also give the more than 30,000 students that have attended Dhyanyoga seminars throughout the world a solid location to visit, Pathak said.

“There was no single physical location where they could come and stay and spend more time with us and get in deeper with the practice of yoga,” he said.

Pathak, who got into the practice at the age of 13, traveled to America in the early 1970s to pursue a degree in microbiology. When his nearly 100-year-old master, Dyhna Yogi, came for a visit and began traveling to spread his teachings, Pathak began to have second thoughts about the path he’d chosen.

“Being with him and the way he reached out to people without selfish motives, that just touched my heart so much as a child,” Pathak recalled. “Over time this just became my mission in life to carry on what he thought was his mission.”

Dyhna Yogi’s most accomplished disciple and travel companion became Pathak’s wife and teaching partner.

The couple, who have lived in Antioch for 18 years, have made it their life’s work to carry on their master’s teaching when he died at the age of 116.

Janani English, who has studied under Pathak for 17 years and now teaches at the center, said she has learned the many different purposes yoga serves the deeper she has gotten into the practice.

“In yoga we practice and learn to change the body and mind from an internal perspective,” she said. “We come to know ourselves physically, emotionally, mentally, and most importantly spiritually.”

Originally published by Nargis Nooristani, Correspondent.

(c) 2008 Oakland Tribune. Provided by ProQuest LLC. All rights Reserved.