The Eight Limbs: Yama (Ahimsa)

We begin our eight limbed journey with Yama, or universal morality. Basically Yama consists of the 5 traits that we should all use in relation to other beings around us. Yama is how you treat people, animals, resources, basically everything, including yourself.

Yama consists of 5 main principles:

1. Ahimsa

2. Satya

3. Asteya

4. Brahmacharya

5. Aparigraha

Or in normal people talk:

1. non-harming

2. honesty

3. non-stealing

4. abstinence

5. non-hoarding

Now, that's a pretty basic outline. Over the next few weeks I'll give you more of an insight into each Yama. For today, let's talk about Ahimsa.

Ahimsa. Non violence. Kindness. Friendliness. Compassion.

Ahimsa is all about showing compassion to yourself and others both in body and mind, through your actions, words and even your thoughts. You must be gentle with yourself and with others and do no harm in any way.

For something so simple and so bloomin' obvious, this can be pretty tricky. For me, I work on not taking any relationship I have for granted. It takes time to learn to be truly compassionate (I'm far from it!), but I believe it's something we should all work towards; being nice.

All you have to do to take the first step is start noticing when you are unkind in your actions, then your words, then your thoughts. This can be anything from giving the bird to a friend to thinking "I really don't like the way my tummy looks today". Once you notice the things you are doing, saying and thinking, you can work to contradict them. Apologise to other people and to yourself. Eventually, you won't do, say or think those things anymore, but it takes time and effort.

In a yoga class, we try and utilise Ahimsa by being kind and gentle with our students both verbally and with corrections. We work out how we can do things in a nice way. We also strive to encourage students to be kind to themselves in body and in ego. That is, we often mention that you should not push the body too much, be kind to it, and don't compete with others or yourself in class, be kind to yourself and accept where you're at.

That's all for today! If you have any questions or you'd like to know more about Ahimsa, let me know in the comments or whip me an email (riseandyoga@gmail.com).

SIDE NOTE: On the weekend I completed a Yogafun Kids Yoga Teacher Training workshop with Connie Mah! It was soooo much fun and I learnt so much from all the ladies who attended. I can't wait to start teaching fun yoga to mini humans!

Namaste x