Tony Aidney Has a Growing Passion for Yoga

Three years ago, Aucklander Tony Aidney and his son went on a spiritual retreat to Peru. The retreat offered three free yoga classes as part of the package, and was the beginning of Aidney’s passion for yoga, which is growing by the day.

“It started as an experiment for a year when I drifted very often,” Aidney says. Aidney, 63, who is a construction diver, “sub-sea work for oil companies”, as he explains, got an offer in Qatar for an offshore job last year. In Qatar, Aidney enquired where he could learn more about yoga, and make it a daily routine.

Recently, Aidney practiced yoga in Kerala, India under Kochi-based yoga guru S Rajendran.

“Though he’s 63, he’s doing even the toughest of asanas with the energy and passion of a 23-year-old,” Rajendran says.

“I’m fascinated by the asanas, and I wanted to go to the next level into spirituality, driven by yoga,” Aidney adds.

Yoga has also brought about a sea change in Aidney’s lifestyle. “I’ve completely stopped eating meat. Alcohol consumption has also come to an end, except for occasional red wine,” he says. He says there’s also a significant improvement in his health.

“Earlier I used to get sick regularly. Now, this doesn’t happen,” he says. “Life is more balanced, my personality is completely changed.”

Aidney says he finds more people tuned into yoga in New Zealand than in India. “I’m close to retirement, and I want to start a yoga centre in New Zealand next. It’s my dream.”

Original article by Rajesh Abraham, The New Indian Express, June 11, 2017.