Meditation is a good thing. There are supposed to be some tangible medical benefits to blood pressure, heart rate, etc. I don't think it has to be difficult or expensive to get into it. 'Quiet time alone' is a little different from meditation, though I'm sure it's beneficial. Some people focus on an object (like the candle) and others on their breathing. There are people in the world who do 'moving meditation' - it's not easy to meditate while walking but some people have done so.
As for yoga...it originally was very, very hard physical exercise, with only a few basic positions. In the early 1900's, a gymnastics troup came to India, I think from China maybe, and a lot of the teachers adopted a lot of the gymnastic positions so there was a lot more variety, but the many positions are new in the last 100 years, not ancient.
I am not too sure about all the 'flavors' of yoga in the US or what, if anything, they really have to do with yoga. I once met some Indian guys at a yoga place, and they were standing in the hall just STARING into the room with their mouths wide open. They pointed to the 'yoga class' and one asked me, 'Um.....do you know what those people are doing in there?' I said, 'Yoga'. They all just stared at me and said, 'Oh, Man, stop kidding me' !!
As the lady in 'Dirty Rotten Scoundrels' said, 'Is that so wrong?' I dunno...if people enjoy it, it's probably good for them. They could be doing worse things...
