Ashtanga Vinyasa Yoga system and serves several purposes. It is a bridge, between your daily life and your practice, something to 'set the mood' when you step on your mat, and remind you that you are there to do your yoga. Eventually when you have chanted before every practice for a long while, you will find that just going through the chant gets you ready for class, it clears your mind, and helps you step out of whatever your day involved. When you look at the meaning of the chant, you discover another reason for using it to open your practice. The first stanza is all about thanking your teachers, and your teacher's teachers for learning this practice themselves, and then passing it along so that you could learn and benefit from it. It reminds us that this practice is more than just an exercise or workout, that there is a long lineage of teachers stretching far back in time that have brought Ashtanga yoga to us more... See more text