A disciple of B.K.S. Iyengar says that yoga teachers injure themselves as much as football players: “How Yoga Can Wreck Your Body”  (New York Times)

Recovering yogi Glenn Black: the vast majority of people should give up yoga (Daily Mail)

Five years in the making: The Science of Yoga: Risks and Rewards (Simon & Schuster)

Blowback from the yoga industry: Teachers rally to keep their students (The Daily Beast)

One of the criticisms of the new book, The Science of Yoga, is that American teachers are disconnected from the Hindu origins of yoga.

Here, our resident yogini, Raquel Tavares, explains the first principles of the 20th century’s greatest yogi, B.K.S. Iyengar — and models the poses herself:

What Mormon and Muslim fundamentalists share in common: Romney vs. Obama (Huffington Post)

Officially outlawed in the 19th Century when Utah joined the United States of America, polygamy makes for great ratings in award-winning 21st C  television. (LA Times)

On Broadway: Mormonism makes a blockbuster musical. (NY Observer)

Web 2.0: some of the hottest lifestyle bloggers are Mormons (Good Magazine)

Massachusetts and JFK redux:  Romney and religion. (Huffington Post)

Maureen Dowd: “the elite of the elite in the Mormon Church”   (New York Times)

Where Mitt’s Mormonism is an Achilles Heel: The South. (Media-ite)

Are you seduced by the LDS’s multi-million-dollar like-ability campaign? (Businessweek)

Political activists on both the left and right project dark times ahead. We present a contrarian upside, spiritually-speaking:

 1.  You can start the year by seeing the Dalai Lama, live (Dateline: Bodh Gaya, India)

2.  The world will have more saints in 2012 (Dateline: Vatican City)

3. The Mayans, the New Agers and the movie were wrong: Why the world did not end on Dec. 21, 2012

4.  The world economy ain’t so bad, after all (Global Insight, the world’s largest economic forecaster)

5.  The U.S. economy is posting a surprise comeback (TIME/Associated Press)

6. An AIDS-free generation: NIH-Chapel Hill study of antiretroviral drugs called scientific breakthrough

 7. A new Earth: Our planet has a ‘twin’ 

9. How do you say, “winning”? Charlie’s back! (Hollywood Reporter)

10. So is Al Gore: Watch the epic Inconvenient Truth sequel, “24 Hours of Reality”  (24 locations, 13 languages)

BY DAVID RICKEY — January in northern California is usually a time of rain, cold, and a psychic hangover from the double-barreled Christmas and New Year holidays, which can tend to be anything but Holy days. After getting swept up in the maelstrom, let’s step back a bit a get some perspective. Thanksgiving is a good place to begin as both a word and place in time.

Being grateful for what we have, for what we experience — even for who we are — has a major effect on our daily life.

Gratitude comes from an awareness that this is not all just an accident. This morning, as I left for work, at about 5:30am . . . I was greeted by a clear night sky pocked with stars. Recently I read that we are “recycled stardust,” that the elements that make up our bodies had their origins in the ancient unfolding of the universe.

1,000 points of meditative light

Looking up at those stars I could feel a sense of belonging, that all that, out there, produced “me.” And you!

And probably other life forms that we don’t have the cognitive capacity to comprehend. This isn’t an accident. Scientists are discovering evidence of a directionality, a purpose that you and I participate in. Part of this purpose is consciousness.

We are here to experience this amazing universe. And what a gift that ability is!

An awareness of our emerging out of this 15-plus-billion-year evolutionary process can make us grateful for all that has gone on before our being here. And it can be the source of celebration of all that has emerged with us and supports our journey: the food we eat, the specially-blended air that we breathe, the exact temperatures and seasonal balances that support life here on Earth. It can also be the foundation of a sense that this is not so much about us, but that we are part of a process that is still unfolding, evolving now through our choices and actions.

Seeing light waves as the carrier of the cosmos’ intelligence

Christmas then becomes a celebration of the light that is the source of our life, and our wisdom.

When we speak of the “Light that shines in the darkness” we can recognize that Light is the essence of everything, the currency that transmits all intelligence and information, if you will.

The divinity that we participate in is now expressed in human form. The wisdom has incarnated. We may see this in Jesus, or in other great sages, but it is our truth as well. It is available to each of us if we will only quiet our chattering thoughts and tune into the greater wisdom that is our essence and has brought us here, and that urges us forward in responsible growth and expansion of capabilities.

The cyclical aspect of life, that gives expression in each New Year, shows us that there is forgiveness and the chance to “try anew.”

We too are evolving, and hopefully learning as we go. With gratitude for what brought us here, with a celebration and honoring of the wisdom that is available to us, and with the acceptance of both our failings and the possibilities of doing better and learning from our mistakes, we have all that we need to contribute to the future, to be an active part of the evolution of consciousness, of creating new and better life.

In this way, these holidays can indeed be Holy Days, days where we touch again the sacred truth of who we are and why we are here. This holiday can become a template for each day, living in gratitude, with wisdom, forgiveness and new resolve.

David Rickey is an Episcopal priest, Soul’s Code co-founder, and counselor in San Francisco who holds a weekly ministry at a residence for the elderly in northern California. Read David’s previous articles for Soul’s Code: Church for the 21st century: an oral and aural buffet we can all savor, and Mosques and the masks of God. Follow David on Twitter.

BY DAVID RICHO, author of Daring to Trust and 14 other books about spirituality and psychology — Annual planting among ancient peoples began with prayer that recalled how the gods performed this same task at the beginning of time. The human lifecycle, thus, became a repetition of a primal religious event.

Whatever happens every year becomes a promise in perpetuity, and thereby the phases of life and the seasons fit into a spiritual framework.

Among ancient peoples this fostered a sense of belonging here on earth.

Repetition and participation give humans roots: “I am real because I am part of something. I have a grander meaning than is outlined by my fragile body.”

Primitive religious peoples lived in a world that had an alternative meaning to the given one.

Pre-Columbian meso-Americans, 400 B.C.

Belief in a mirror universe to this one gives oppressed people a special hope which is missing from the society in which they live. In that other world rank, status, and hierarchy are all reversed.

This is the apocalyptic vision of a future equality in which goodness and justice triumphs. Here the persecuted will inherit the kingdom and will finally be honored. Such an anticipation and hearkens back to a primordial state, e.g., Eden.

The early Christians believed fervently in a parallel kingdom that defied and abrogated the Roman empire and all its power. In the apocalyptic kingdom God will fully approve the unapproved and the last shall be first.

In our contemporary world we do not have beliefs quite like this. But the collective unconscious can weave a web of myth and symbol that reconnects us with our origins. In the Jungian perspective the psyche is a source, not simply a depository of knowledge. This reflects the ancient views, especially those of Gnostics and alchemists.

Psychologically, we all have a need to trust that we are supported by powers that resemble us, nurture us in our life pursuits, and understand us compassionately.

Our modern egos may balk at this. They often drive us to want autonomy and independence at the cost of connection.

Actually, the ego does not have the ability to sustain itself independently. In addition, the ego fears independence and true freedom.

With independence it would lose its entitlement to be taken care of. With freedom it would lose its escape hatch of blaming others for what goes wrong. So we are searching for and demanding the impossible.

Left to ourselves, we homo-sapiens will spiral down into a cycle of destruction. Relying only on what is innate gives humanity no hope for survival. This is why spiritual teachers come along, so that we can survive and open to other wonderful possibilities in our nature. We were born with a proclivity toward spiritual practice just as we were born with an inclination to dance.

Huston Smith says that religions are to spirituality as universities are to education. You can get there without it but you will be traveling uphill. A spiritually-aware religion provides a platform, a framework in which to understand the world and ourselves. Then it can show us a path to love of the world and ourselves. In addition, when crisis hits, religion may not have an answer but when we come to believe that our suffering is shared by God, it becomes tolerable. Faith also promises that our power to love will not be lost no matter what occurs. In the Void, all of this may be hard to believe, but that, like everything, is temporary.

Religious beliefs are meant to help us accept reality as it is—including death and chance. Indeed we can learn from life itself which shows us so much when we use religious teachings as pointers. Our sacrifice is to give up the craving for absolutes and certitudes as our forms of safety and to use religion as a source and treasury of perennial wisdom and as a coping mechanism in a stressed and stressing world.

David Richo is the author of 15 books, including How to Be an Adult. A formerly active Catholic priest who has made Buddhism his personal practice, he is also a licensed psychotherapist who specializes in individual and couples counseling. Dave divides his practice between San Francisco and Santa Barbara, CA.