In the first of a two-part series on International Yoga Day, spiritual guru and philanthropist Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev answers celebrity questions and dispels myths about Yoga.

Shekhar Kapur, filmmaker: Why does everyone talk only about yoga’s physical aspects?

Sadhguru: One aspect of yoga is towards ensuring your body isn’t an issue. The body is full of compulsions. It can be a terrible bondage. Or, it can be a stepping stone for something extraordinarily beautiful beyond your imagination. If you yourself are an issue, what other issue can you handle in the world? Physical yoga is relevant to prepare the body, mind, emotions and energies so they are not an issue. But there are other dimensions and aspects to yoga, and to reduce it to an exercise form would be a crime!

Virender Sehwag, cricketer: While batting, sometimes the thought comes, ‘Just hit the ball!” How do I control these thoughts?

Sadhguru: In the human mind, there is perception, memory and imagination. There is memory of the game. There is imagination of carrying the cup. There is a reality of a ball coming at you. Memory is about what is over, imagination is about what is yet to happen. You can only fancy with these two. It is only reality that you can handle. People are unable to keep these things separate. What you need is clarity.
Yoga is a tool towards bringing this into your life.

Juhi Chawla, actor: What’s the difference between yoga and meditation?

Sadhguru: The English word “meditation” doesn’t mean anything because if you sit with closed eyes, you are “meditating”. But with eyes closed, you could do many things — japa, tapa, dharana, dhyana, samadhi, shoonya. Or you might have mastered the art of sleeping in vertical postures! If you mean meditation as dhyana, it is one aspect of yoga. “Yoga” is an all-inclusive word. It isn’t suggesting any particular practice. No matter what you’re doing — maybe just jogging or watching the ocean — if you use it as a process to reach your higher nature, that’s yoga.

KV Kamath, banker: How does one deal with egos?

Sadhguru: Many people have taken this mode: When they’re joyful, Mr Ego is absent. Whenever they do something nasty, they blame it on Mr Ego. This is just one more way of passing the buck. If you say, ‘me and my ego reside within this body’, it means there are two of you. If there are two of you, that means you are either schizophrenic or possessed!
You are an individual. If you are an individual, you understand that whether you are wonderful or horrible, it is you. If you realise this, would you want to be horrible?

Anupam Kher, actor: Why are people unhappy?

Sadhguru: People are unhappy because they haven’t taken charge of the fundamental instruments of life given to them. The human mechanism is the most sophisticated gadget on the planet. Most people are using way below 1% of its potential. What it means to be human hasn’t even been attended to.

Yoga gives you access to the very source of creation throbbing within you. There is an intelligence here that can transform a piece of bread into a sophisticated machine. If even a drop of this intelligence enters your daily life, you will live magically.