Abstract (eng)
The aim of this thesis was to provide an insight into the experience of yoga under certain aspects. Thus, the yoga practice was linked to the psychological phenomenon of flow and the Buddhist concept of mindfulness. The theoretical part of the work, which provides a broad basis for the later analysis, is followed by a qualitative survey. Therefore, six yogis, among them a man and five women, were interviewed by means of a guided interview. They first performed a yoga session common to them and then met for a conversation about the topic. The generated data was then analyzed. For this purpose, a case by case analysis was first implemented, which was then followed by a Qualitative Inhaltsanalyse of Mayring (2010), with a total of 14 categories and seven subcategories emerging from the transcribed raw material. Subsequently, this was related to Csikszentmihalyi and Jackson’s (2000) components of flow and to some studies on the same subject. Furthermore, the filtered data was compared with Kabat-Zinn’s (2001) basic factors of mindfulness in order to draw conclusions on the survey in yoga. As a result, flow could gain access through yoga and the participants were able to experience it. However, the results were not that clear when it came to mindfulness. In fact, the interviewees could partly apply mindful concepts, but they did not consider some other important principles. Hence, mindfulness could rather be applied in the meditation phase which was following the body postures.