"You can not get your PhD before you finish your ABC," says Susan Williamson, the Yoga Club's yoga teacher from the time the club was founded back in 1978.

 The Yoga Club at AUB does not teach flying or telepathy.  Rather, it teaches classical Hatha Yoga, a type of yoga which stresses the well being of the body and the balancing of its energy.   Pranayama is the art of controlling the cosmic energies which come by way of breathing techniques. Williamson also teaches Raja Yoga, which is mind control and meditation.  The idea behind yoga, for Williamson, who attained her yoga teaching diploma from Shivananda Yoga Vedanta Forest Academy in India, is "self-perfection."  It aims at helping people seeking health and happiness to achieve them through the techniques and practices taught at the club twice a week.

 According to Nada El Housseini, president of the Yoga Club for the second consecutive year and a first year medical student at AUB, yoga benefits the body by making one feel lighter, healthier and more flexible.  "Somehow it gives me a sense of being independent, being able to control myself and my body, my state of mind."
 
The Yoga Club has always been considered a minority group at AUB due to the various misconceptions people have of it, particularly those related to religion. Although yoga originates from India it does not pertain to any particular religion but is universal, as Tarek Yamani is keen on emphasizing.  According to Tarek, a computer science senior at AUB and a member of the Yoga Club, "Yoga means union in Sanskrit.  It's the union of the body and mind, the mind and the spirit, the spirit and the absolute.  It does not have anything to do with religion.  You can be a Buddhist, you can be a Muslim, you can be an atheist and you can still do yoga."

Yoga to Williamson is the "union of the individual soul with the supreme soul."  Life to Williamson, consequently, is not about enjoying the mundane trifles of life but "a gift from God."  The world that we see "is not reality. It's only temporary.  The reality is the things that which we don't see.  It's the spiritual things that will not change or fade away."  It's about accepting that material things are ephemeral and that when we seek happiness through them we are really "knocking at the wrong door."

In answer to the stereotyped suspicions people have of yoga, Housseini insists that it be clarified to students that yoga is not flying. Williamson supported Housseini by saying, "Yoga is not lifting my body from the floor; it is lifting my spirit to God."  As for telepathy and controlling the mind of others, Williamson replies, " This is not part of yoga. My business is to understand and control my own mind."

The Yoga Club, which currently consists of 15 registered members, is holding a workshop on yoga and health on March 3 at the club advisor's residence at AUB.  The club advisor is Iman Nuwayhed, who has an MD and a PhD in Public Health, and was, himself, president of the Yoga Club during his student days at AUB. The members will bring homemade vegetarian dishes with them for vegetarianism is part of the Indian philosophy of non-violence which is the first step of Raja Yoga leading to meditation and Samadhi(cosmic bliss).  The club also plans a trip to the mountains in order to practice yoga in nature.  It has a seminar planned later on this semester in hope people would become better acquainted with yoga.  As Williamson says, she often reminds her students, "Yoga is not learning to stand on the head, it is learning  to stand on one's own two feet."