I've been practicing yoga for almost 20 years, and for probably over the first year or so, all I knew of yoga was asana (the poses). Over the next few years, and as I took teacher training, I learned more of the philosophy. I was encouraged to read the texts, old and "new", and one of the first things I learned was that namaste is actually a greeting. It seemed odd that we always used it to close our classes.
Fast forward a few years, and everyone started talking about cultural appropriation. I started to worry, as we in the west, especially in the fitness setting, have misconstrued yoga to mean only asana. Was I short changing my students? What would some say, especially management at the clubs if I started philosophizing during class?
I came to yoga at the gym, and at the time I would never have stepped foot in a yoga studio. That was not for me. It wasn't until I started practicing, and really getting an understanding of asana before I was anywhere near ready to accept more. I still believe that's pretty typical of the average beginning student. Some may never have any interest in everything else yoga can hold, some may develop a voracious appetite for all that is yoga very quickly. It's your path to walk, I believe you'll know when you're ready.
I'll be blogging more about philosophy over the coming weeks, but what started this idea was the thought about changing where I use namaste in class. A very literal translation is "bow to you", and as I said was typically used as a greeting, mostly to a teacher, or guru. When I first started reading long ago, I found the following translation:
"I honor the place within you where the entire Universe resides; I honor the place within you of love, of light, of truth, of peace; I honor the place within you, where, when you are in that place in you and I am in that place in me, we are one."
For now, I'm going to leave namaste where it is. But be sure, I'll be sharing more about it going forward.
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