Our Asana and Meditation Practice
We explored multiple postures in the Hatha Yoga Tradition, working with our upper and lower body. Towards the beginning of the retreat we eased into basic yogic posture to truly understand our body, mind and energy limits. This was a great way to enhance our knowledge and understanding of our own body, its strengths, limitations and challenges.
Further into the retreat we took our yoga practice to a deeper level and explored posture to open up our body, mind and energy levels. Tapping into our Energy Body and working with Chakras and Energy Alignment. We used the concepts of movement (asanas), vision (dristi) and sound (mantra chanting), in yoga sequences that we performed and experienced through our body, mind and senses, through our daily yoga practice.
We understood and learned the Sivananda Sequence of Yoga Asanas (12 basic postures), studies concepts from the Bihar School of Yoga to warm up the body and flex the spine, and explored the practice of Meditation by chanting Bija Mantras and other Vedic Mantra to harmoniously align our practice with our overall being.
Pranayama was an integral part of our daily Practice - We studied and learned all the basic techniques of abdominal breathing, thoracic breathing, kapalabhati (fire breathing) and alternate nostril breathing (nadi shodhan / anulom vilom).
We learned that Yoga is not just performing asanas on the mat, but is a much larger way of life, guiding us with wisdom and clarity day after day, enriching our whole journey of this beautiful life.