Let’s explore the Sanskrit word pranayama. Prana is our life force energy, and pranayama includes various ways of working with the breath to affect change in our prana. Leslie Kaminoff calls it the practice of “unobstructing the breath,” or removing...
Today we’re exploring the Sanskrit word bhakti. Bhakti (pronounced Bach tea…now there’s a visual!) can simply be defined as devotion to God. Bhakti yoga is one of the 4 paths of yoga in yoga philosophy: the paths of action (karma yoga), devotion...
A common term in Ayurveda (the sister science to yoga), chikitsa, is the transliteration of the Sanskrit word often defined simply as “therapy.” Yoga chikitsa applies the tools of yoga therapeutically to help someone find balance in the koshas we talked...
You may have never heard the word kosha before, but it is the basis for yoga therapy and addressing imbalance. Yoga philosophy posits physical, subtle, and causal aspects of each person that are encompassed in the 5 koshas (each with their own Sanskrit name): the...
Today we’re looking at the Sanskrit word vayu. Literally translated, it is wind. In the sense of the 5 prana vayus, they are the “winds,” or particular movements of energy, Prana. They are: prana vayu (energy of taking in), apana vayu (energy of...
If you have practiced yoga in a classroom setting, or on YouTube, you have no doubt heard the word asana. It is the plural form of the word asan, which literally means seat. Modern yoga translations are position or posture. While in the west yoga has come to be...
