Sat Naam and Namaste!
What do Sat Naam and Namaste mean? These are yogic greetings where we offer love, respect and reverence to one another. Sat Naam comes to us from the sacred language of Gurmukhi.
Sat means truth and Nam means name. Together, Sat Nam essentially translates into something deeper: “I am truth,” or “Truth is my essence.” Sat Nam is known as a bija (seed) mantra—a one-syllable sound that activates the chakras, or our energy centres. Sat Nam affirms your truth and that of others, it is a beautiful expression and created vibration to drop deeper into your authentic true self.
Namaste literally means, “I bow to you.” It comes to us from the ancient Indian language of Sanskrit. When we say Namaste to one another, we are essentially acknowledging that “the divine in me respectfully recognizes the divine in you”, or “the highest good in me sees the highest good in you”. Namaste invokes the feeling of oneness of heart and mind in ourselves and with the person one is greeting.
Today in our yoga video we explore laughter, we didn’t plan that but instead we accepted what was in the moment – trying to not force or control a situation. Amidst the laughter we also explored some somatics for the pelvis, moving through 4 feldenkrais inspired movements for the pelvic girdle. After you’ve watched the video, play some calming music and go through the sequence one more time.
To watch the video click here
To recap,
we start on our backs with our feet planted on our mats. Inhale, raising belly up creating space between your low back and your mat. Your hips should stay in contact with your mat – this is not bridge pose, we are simply inviting soft forward and backward tilting in the sacrum. The sacrum is the bone at the base of the spine – in the center of your pelvic girdle, it is shaped like a bowl and we want to rock this bowl with our breath. Ideally muscles are soft and your body is moving with the rhythm of your breath.
Keeping legs in the bent position, with your feet and knees together, we want to drop our knees together to one side, inhaling up, exhaling down.
When you’ve come to a place of completion with that movement, bring your feet about hip width apart – or wider, and allow that same movement in. The legs will be moving in a windsheild wiper orientation. Experiment between those 2 iterations.
In the 4th part of this sequence I ask you to imagine you have a plane of glass above and below your pelvic girdle. Our hips stay in contact with the mat. Imagine there is a string from your right armpit attached to your right hip, and a string from your left armpit to your left hip, now slide your right hip up between the 2 panes of glass towards your right armpit. Exhale bring hips back to neutral, on your next inhale slide left hip up towards left armpit. Hips stay in contact with your mat, they simply slide in a hip hiking motion.
When you’re finished, bring your knees into your chest and make some tiny circles. Think of something funny and let yourself laugh…….
Till tomorrow
You are so very loved,
Amber (and Noah and Lucas)
Thank you for the instruction notes Amber as my wifi is hit and miss and it is difficult to watch a full video on line without interruption. My mother in-law has sciatica and we are trying these stretches together. Namaste
Laurie if you ever want me to email you the videos I can certainly do that, then you could download it when you have a good window. Let me know. Let me know also how your mother – in – law is doing – and how YOU are doing! Much love, thank you for watching! Namaste
Good morning amber, We are well..the spring garden season is lifting our spirits.. My mother-in-law is healing slowly but still very uncomfortable. She tries the stretches that you included above every morning and easing her sciatic pain (thank you!). She also applies ice and heat to Low back which is also helping thoughout the day. Our WiFi connection is hit and miss so videos are difficult to watch…but receiving soo much from your written instructions. Your service to the community is wonderful..especially now during these isolating times…sending gratitude to you and yours!
Good afternoon beautiful Laurie. Oh I wish I could help your mother-in-law. I know how uncomfortable sciatica can be. Thank you for your kind words, that means alot. I feel like it’s important, showing up for our community especially right now. Sending you so much love, to you and your whole family.