The full history of yoga is fairly unclear still, despite many curious researchers digging deep to further piece together the jigsaw.

Part of the reason for this uncertainty, is that in the early days of yoga, knowledge was passed on by word-of-mouth only. Later, this word-of-mouth knowledge was written onto palm leaves, however with their fragility these were often damaged, lost or destroyed, leaving few clues as to the early origins of yoga practice.

Ashtanga yoga is made up of six series or sequences, each with 25 asanas (poses). The sequence is always practiced in the same order to enable you to build up your technique and focus wholly on the accuracy of your alignment. This in turn allows deeper stretches and clears the mind of idle or negative…