Christina Sell

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My body is a temple - yoga as a path to wholeness

The body as a temple is a common metaphor within many spiritual traditions. In this book, author and yoga teacher Christina Sell delves into the "how” and "why” of this widely accepted comparison. With the freshness of a memoir, she uses her first visit to an extraordinary temple in southern India as a structure upon which to build a treatment of basic yoga principles. Beyond the ordinary aims of yoga as a means of stretching and strengthening, or even for being happier or more cantered, My Body is a Temple is an instruction manual for dedicating oneself to a life of the spirit, in and through the vehicle of the human body. The temple of the Indian saint Yogi Ramsuratkumar (1918-2001) was still under construction when Christina entered for the first time in 2004. Yet, within it, she felt a deep peace, happiness and connection to ultimate "Sanctuary” within herself. Her own body was experienced as a receptacle for the saint's grace and an artefact of the Presence of God. "Could a life of yogic practice help me to abide more constantly at the shrine of my own heart?” she asked herself upon returning home. "Do the forms of yoga practice contain the necessary building blocks to construct a life that is a sanctuary, and a body that is a temple?” This book answers those questions. Students of yoga will appreciate that this metaphor embodies high ideals. The author argues that aiming toward this higher sphere elevates one's life, "unsticking” us from habitual, ordinary mind. Instead of simply performing the yogic postures (asanas) physically, she explains how to use exercise as prayer, affirmation, and an expression of Remembrance.