Practical Moon Salutations

Moon Salutations (Chandra Namaskar) are often treated like the “soft” counterpart to Sun Salutations — but softness isn’t the point. Moon Salutations were created for nervous system regulation, hip-led mobility, and lateral movement the human body is starving for.

If Sun Salutations organize the spine vertically, Moon Salutations organize the spine diagonally and laterally, which touches an entirely different set of tissues, fascia lines, and emotional centers. This sequence is cooling, fluid, and grounding, but it’s not passive. Done correctly, it moves like water with weight — steady, slow, and intelligent.

Why Moon Salutations Were Created

Unlike Sun Salutations, Moon Salutations are not ancient.They appeared in the mid–20th century, developed by:

• the Bihar School of Yoga, and

• teachers influenced by the Krishnamacharya lineage

Why? Because practitioners needed a counterbalance to the heat, intensity, and sympathetic activation created by Surya Namaskar. Moon Salutations were designed to:

• soothe overstimulation

• calm the nervous system

• open the hips

• work the side body

• prepare the body for sleep or recovery

• bring awareness inward instead of outward

They don’t “relax” you — they recalibrate you.

What You’re Training Today

This sequence works because it moves your spine and pelvis in directions missing from daily life:

• Side bending

  (opening the intercostals + ribcage → more breath capacity)
  

• Lateral hip movement

  (releases tension in QL, low back, and outer hips)
  

• Diagonal stretches

  (hydrates fascia + resets sluggish breath mechanics)
  

• Gentle twists

  (relieves upper back stiffness without forcing rotation)
  

• Hip-led transitions

  (help you move from your center instead of collapsing into shapes)
  

Moon Salutations strengthen the nervous system through slow, controlled exhalation, not through heat.

How Moon Salutations Shift Your Energy

While Sun Salutations rise upward and energize, Moon Salutations:

• pull awareness down and inward

• lengthen the sides of the body

• widen the ribs

• cool mental agitation

• ease emotional pressure in the chest

• anchor scattered energy

• regulate breathing without force

Think of the effect as: Inhale → expansion, Exhale → release. Where Sun Salutations are a wake-up, Moon Salutations are a reset.

Practical Benefits (Real-Life, Not Abstract)

The benefits show up immediately and apply to real life:

1. Nervous system down-regulation

Slow, hip-led movement pulls the system out of fight-or-flight.

2. Reduced tension in the low back

Lateral bending and diagonal activation relieve the tissues people stretch but never actually hydrate.

3. Better sleep and evening regulation

This sequence cools internal heat and settles the mind.

4. Improved breath capacity

Side body expansion opens the ribs in ways frontal stretches don’t touch.

5. Emotional decompression

Moon Salutations release pressure in the chest and diaphragm — the places your body holds unprocessed emotion.

6. Hip mobility without strain

Movement comes from the pelvis, not forced into the legs. This is the kind of practice that changes the rest of your day in under five minutes.

How to Use Moon Salutations in Daily Life

You can plug this into any part of your day:

• Evening wind-down

  Perfect before bed or after work to release tension.

• During emotional overwhelm

  Side bending helps unlock the ribs and diaphragm — instant relief.

• After sitting too long

  This unwinds compressed posture without backbending.

• Before meditation

  Opens the hips and the breath so you can actually sit.

• During menstrual discomfort

  The gentle lateral hip work eases pelvic tension.

Moon Salutations do for your fascia what Sun Salutations do for your breath.

A Brief History of Chandra Namaskar

Moon Salutations were crafted intentionally — not inherited.

They emerged:

• around the 1960s–1980s,

• taught in restorative, therapeutic, and feminine-centered yoga circles,

• built to cool, ground, and regulate.

There is no classical version because it didn’t exist in early Hatha texts.Different lineages shaped their own sequences, but all shared one goal: mirror the Moon — fluid, steady, receptive, introspective. That adaptability is exactly why the sequence works so well today.

Moon Salutations don’t make you “relax.” They make you functional again.

Slow.Fluid.Hip-led.Breath-guided. Nervous-system intelligent. Let this practice soften the edges and bring you back into your body — so Sun Salutations can land with clarity and strength.