Since it is my first blog write up, I thought of starting it with few thoughts on 'Namaste' itself.
Ever since I landed in Houston, it is one of my favorite routine to call my cousin sister during my evening tea time and talk with her. That day returning from yoga class she said "today in class they told us about meaning of Namaste, it means 'the light within me bows to the light within you'. It is so unfortunate that our own ancient priceless practices like yoga or namaste, are today being taught to us by Americans" this made me to ponder the deeper meanings of ‘Namaste’.
Noted educationalist Dr.Karjagi said “Our Indian culture is not expressive like west but it is reflective, reflective towards inner self. We don’t tell our mom explicitly that ‘mother we love you’ neither does our mother say ‘I love you’ to the us, unlike in west. In our culture love is always implied by actions. It is reflective to inner self, not the outer appearance”.
While the western culture encourages outward growth, Bharatiyata(e) reflects on inner growth. Western culture says to reach out and touch others to say 'hi' or 'hello' 'bye' with a hand shake, Indian culture says to look within yourself - implied in a gesture like namaste. Namaste is bowing to other person but with grace and pride. Greeting with Namaste is a greater honor than a ‘hi’, because ‘namaste’ is the same greeting we use to pray God. Definitely we cannot handshake God and say ‘hi’ to god, if at all God appears before us :-). So Namaste is expressing the same respect to the person as we show respect to our God. This is so because Indian philosophy believes in the existence of divinity in every human being.
Namaste is a gesture or mudra, bringing both palms together and touching them near heart (Anahatha chakra).Gesture itself expresses itself and one need not actually say namaste. Namaste is derived from Sanskrit word 'namaha' + 'te' - literally meaning 'I bow to you'. However there are deeper meanings to Namaste, all are spiritual to be felt deep inside our heart. Namaste means
- I bow to the good/divine in you.
- The light within me bows to the light within you
- I bow to the God who is within you and me.
- I respect the real you in you as I respect myself.
- I honor the place in you where the entire universe resides. I honor the place in you, where lies your love, your light, your truth and your beauty. I honor the place in you, where...if you are in that place in you ... and I am in that place in me...then there is only one of us
We are so much tuned to western culture that we are forgetting the good things about our own culture. Do we need others to tell us about these? A very simple everyday greeting like Namaste is also being forgotten these days. I myself is so much used to 'hi' that it is taking time to change it back to namaste. I'm still trying. Many of us know that there are deeper meanings to our practices but most of the times we don’t know what they are for and what they mean. Attempts are required in this direction to know the true meanings and retain the good values. With thousands of years of experiments, Yoga, meditation, Ayurveda, Vedas and other concepts have been formulated. Lets preserve good culture of ours and learn good from other culture and enrich ours further. Try to use Namaste wherever possible and encourage others to use it. It is for greater causes than just a greeting.
In college days one of my friend tried using namaste. Everyone started using namaste only to greet her and some would go to an extent to make fun of it. Why is it that when it comes to traditions, we are ashamed to follow it? Why is it considered not fashionable to follow our own good traditions? Have anyone observed that our traditions are coming back to us from west after research? For example now it is scientifically proven that Veda Mantras have power of influencing mind in positive way by the use of sound energy. Now it is proven medically that two teaspoons of turmeric if used daily, can help fight cancer. It increases immunity and is helpful for arthritis, allergy, asthma, Alzheimer’s disease, heart disease also. It is a tradition to include turmeric in all the food preparations we make. West has realized the benefits and importance of yoga more than us and has adopted it. I can quote here hundreds and thousands of researches. Why is it that some fact only when it comes from west is treated as correct? It is time to realize value of our culture, its benefits. Let’s understand and retain the good part of us before it is too late.
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