Meditation arrives at the Turin Book Fair

The occasion was the presentation of the book ‘The Salute to the Moon’ by former Paralympic athlete Patrizia Saccà

ROME – The audience of the International Book Fair, at the ‘La Stampa’ stand, stopped in meditation for a few minutes. People closed their eyes, felt their body breathing and watched their mind go everywhere, accompanied by the multiple noises in the Lingotto Oval pavilion. Everyone inhaled together and exhaled in unison, but always in silence. The occasion was the presentation of the book ‘The Salute to the Moon’ by the former Paralympic athlete Patrizia Saccà, in a wheelchair due to an accident at the age of 13. “Yoga is for everyone, for those who practice and those who don’t,” says the writer who has been working with the Italian Hindu Union since 2018 to create yoga without barriers. She became a Yoga teacher and has already invented the method ‘Free ray yoga‘, the subject of another of his books.

“The unifying principle in yoga is the well-being and happiness of all living beings, because happiness arises from love. Everyone has a condition about him. No matter what we are, we are what we are and the basis for all is breath– says the former Paralympic athlete – yoga is union, because we are all different notes. I don’t like the words disabled, differently abled, inclusive – continues Saccà – they are all words that have no meaning because everyone has their own voice and body. Maybe people have had an accident or have blindness, but what does this desire to include mean? Why do we have to exclude? There is room for everyone in this symphony“. A concept which, according to the author, applies “to gender identity and everything else”.

The moon salute is a more advanced practice. “There are people here who have been practicing with me for years and I have seen the evolution of their bodies, I notice greater resistance and greater capacity for strength. In the moon salute there are sitting positions for which you need to have a lot of strength”, recalls Saccà.
“We are always compressed with the diaphragm and there is a need to breathe and practice. This helps us a lot. I have seen the difference in the quality of life of people with disabilities who practice. Consider that I brought the sun salutation to 1,500 people at the yoga festival in Milan last autumn. Yoga is for everyone, for those who stand and for those who sit. Time passes and we need to look at old age– he states – and have the strength to try to live and feel well. In the book there are pills to tell us how to love ourselves and accept that we are no longer who we were yesterday. Yoga helps us see our thoughts and recognize them– he concludes – because the mind tends to lie”.