'थे 'योग वार्स' पार्ट II

At the time of my youth and early adulthood, there weree very few practitioners and 'studios' and other places devoted to yoga and adjunct practices like Tai Chi,QiGong,Thai Massage(and other systems), aroma therapists, psychic consultants,karate/kungfu/martial arts, Zen, Tibetan Buddhism, and other things often labeled as 'New Age',which at that time were listed under 'dubious' practices and charlatanry by mainstream thinkers, medicos(save for a rare few) and academics. Nowadays, in my rambles and drives around Vermont & New Hampshire, in particular as well as a few other places, I find hardly a nook or cranny in the remotest rural areas where some type of 'certified' studio, dojo,and new-age curio shop ahs not penetrated and been erected. Moreover,elaborate spas, retreats, worshops, ashrams, temples,etc.exist-so in one sense, THE MOUNTAIN(omposed of all these esoteric, mystical practices and systems)HAS COME TO MOHAMMED-meaning one does not have to travel to India, The Far East,Egypt or any other exotic land or inaccessible area, to learn, study, practice or embrace any of these abstruse subjects. A casual visit to a bookstore,if you can find one in some places), a library(if they are still in existence at the time of this writing and not shutting down or completely switched to digitalization and electronic storage), a magazine rack in a super market of mall,focusing on the women's mag sections where a lot of this is shelved for sale or go on internet forays to multiple websites on all of these things that have proliferated or to search for such topics of a recondite nature, will often give the FALSE IMPRESSION that these things are a permanent fixture in aFICKLE 'civilizaton' and a changing Culture/Society.