For the Namaste Yoga team, our Journey 2012 began with one seemingly simple task: coming up with a name.
Naming anything can be a challenge. A name, once given, is a most prominent and permanent adjective of that item. It is best the name be an accurate and all-encompassing portrayal of the thing it describes!
The “Namaste Yoga Journey” began first as a “Namaste Yoga Challenge”. However, yoga should not be viewed primarily as a challenge. In fact, one of the goals of yoga is to learn how not to compete, with others or yourself! Yoga is meant to be a more of a journey. The time, the process, the flow, all provide for the yogi a path to travel. Each person’s path and the discoveries to be made along the way are different.
The experience for some is mostly physical. You acquire awareness of held tensions or the acquisition of increased flexibility and strength. Improved posture is a gain for many. With repeated practice, increased confidence in your own abilities is almost inevitable!
Others find themselves on a mental journey. Sometimes, the process of flowing from pose-to-pose and breath-to-breath clears the way for the mind to recognize the needs of the soul. The calming effect of the practice tends to wash away our more topical worries and anxieties, and make clear the larger and deeper needs of the spirit.
The practice of yoga can take so many people so many different places! How do you name a journey that creates such diverse paths?
These thoughts of personal discovery, unity, diversity, transformation, awakening, clarity, calm and revelation stirred us to explore many different words. In the end, only one seemed to encompass it all…
Sādhana
According to Yoga Word Wise:
"Sādhana is the practice by which the desired end may be achieved. By sādhana the sādhaka, one who practices, achieves the state of fearlessness. Sādhana bestows the supreme and imperishable knowledge. In following this praiseworthy yoga there is absolutely no despair.”
In order to attain Sādhana in practice, you must have faith in your own potential for self-transformation, determination to achieve your goal, and ability to maintain continuous practice. The key to any self-transformation is to engage in Sādhana. This is what our journey through Namaste Yoga is about!
We will begin in January with the first sequence on the Season One DVD, Exalted Warrior. If you missed the announcement about the Journey, you can read about it here.
We hope you will find Sādhana as you come along with us. Discover the difference that Living Namaste can mean in your life. All you have to do is commit to practicing at least one new episode per week. Of course, if you have time for more, that’s great!
As Kate loves to remind us, “Yoga should feel so good that you will want to practice every day!”
We look forward to hearing about your experiences (and sharing our own!) along the way. Join us for Sādhana, the Namaste Yoga Journey 2012.
Sādhana, the Namaste Yoga Journey 2012