#Morning sun salutation sequence full

#Morning sun salutation sequence full

The full practice includes 132 passages and takes more than an hour to recite. According to Ganesh Mohan, a Vedic and yoga scholar and teacher in Chennai, India, Vedic mantras to honor the sun were traditionally chanted at sunrise. The Vedic tradition, which predates classical yoga by several thousands of years, honored the sun as a symbol of the Divine. The original Surya Namaskar wasn’t a sequence of postures, but rather a sequence of sacred words. Understanding its history and meaning will allow you to bring the healing energy of the sun and a connection to the Divine into your own practice. And like so much about yoga today, it reflects both ancient ideas and modern innovation. Surya Namaskar also embodies the spirit of yoga in the West: It is intensely physical but can be infused with devotion. Eventually, you are going to have an ecstatic experience of the life force entering your body.” Reaching up, bowing forward to the earth in prostration-the meaning is inherent in the movement. Namaskar means ‘to bow,’ to recognize with your whole being. “‘Salutation,'” she says, “seems so formal and stiff. Rea prefers the Sanskrit name for the sequence, arguing that the translation to the English “Sun Salutation” doesn’t capture the intention and experience of the word namaskar. “It revitalizes every aspect of your being, from physical to spiritual,” says Shiva Rea, creator of Prana Flow Yoga and founder of the Global Mala Project. While it’s not always taught with such auspicious intentions, the humble Sun Salutation-performed in studios across the country as an energizing sequence that links the body, breath, and mind-is nonetheless deeply potent. As we bring our hands together in Namaste, we gather the space of the heavens back into our heart and breath, acknowledging that our body forms the center point between heaven and earth.” As we rise up from the earth, we stretch through the atmosphere once more, reaching for the sky. “As we lower our bodies, we connect with the earth. “As we sweep our arms up and bow forward, we honor the earth, the heavens, and all of life in between that is nourished by the breath cycle,” he says. To Chapple, Surya Namaskar is nothing less than the embodiment of the Gayatri mantra, a sacred prayer to the sun. Chapple, a professor of Indic and comparative theology at Loyola Marymount University, says the sequence not only wakes up the body but also “calls us to stretch our minds and spirits to the corners of the universe, allowing us to feel the vast expanse of the cosmos within the movement of our bodies.” Repeating the sequence in each of the four cardinal directions, the students perform a silent yet powerful ritual of gratitude. Students at the Hill Street Center in Santa Monica, California, reach their arms toward the sky and then fold forward to the ground as if in prostration to the sun, expressing the same reverence for the life-giving solar energy as did the ancient yogis.

Heading out the door? Read this article on the new Outside+ app available now on iOS devices for members!Įach Sunday morning, Christopher Key Chapple opens his 8:30 yoga class with eight rounds of Surya Namaskar (Sun Salutation).