[Rabindra Sahu, Acharya of Swami Rama Dhyana Gurukulam, taught a class on ‘Attitude of Worship and Surrender in the Practice of Sun Salutation’ at Swami Rama Sadhaka Grama on 22 november 2023. You may watch a glimpse of the session by clicking on the video below.]

Hatha yoga is worship with the body, whereby each action and posture becomes a ritual, an offering to the divine light within. How then we approach our yoga meditation practice and offer salutations to the sun—with a sense of purity, with a sense of sacredness.

This is the context within which we practice hatha yoga and we set the intention before we even approach our practice. With what approach we are going to the seat of our meditation or even our hatha yoga practice is something we can bring more awareness to. The quality and depth of our practice is dependent on our approach and intention alone.

Before going to the temple or church in the morning, we don’t just get up from the bed and go. We make sure to cleanse and purify our bodies by brushing our teeth, taking a bath, and wearing nice clothes. Why do we do it? We feel clean, sacred, pure. And only then we enter the sacred chambers of the external temple. In our practice, we can also approach and enter the sacred chambers of the internal temple in the same manner, with a feeling of purity and sacredness.

When was the last time you felt that there is something very sacred within you?

If we allow ourselves to remain in tune with that purity and sacredness within, we cannot do anything that is non-harmonious. Can we say, ‘I feel so pure and sacred that I want to scold you. I feel so pure and sacred that I want to punch you.’? It in itself is impossible. The moment we feel so pure and sacred, the silence and stillness naturally dawns within us and we just want to remain there.

We are not unfamiliar with the sentiment of surrender, as we do surrender and offer ourselves (to whatever degree) in our daily lives towards those from whom we have received something that is of value to us. We then bow down to them in gratitude. It is then natural to have the same feeling of gratitude and surrender towards the life affirming Sun.

As we allow ourselves to surrender and be in tune with something higher, something deeper with us, then we are able to experience this body as a temple of Divinity.

Swami Veda Bharati writes in the Philosophy of Hatha Yoga that “To making the body a fit vessel for God’s worship becomes the purpose of hatha yoga. That was the purpose, the only reason, for which the ancient yogis started the science of hatha yoga.”