Ayurvedic Self-Love Technique - Abhyanga Or Self-Massage

One of the main ways to increase your love for yourself and your body is to do a daily practice of Abhyanga or self massage, where you lovingly take 5-10 minutes in the morning before a shower to rub sesame or coconut oil all over your body.

Transcript

Hey guys!

I hope that you guys are doing amazing wherever you are in the world.

My name is Boom Shaka and I welcome you to my channel.

I am absolutely grateful that you guys are spending time with me here and I appreciate the support.

In this video,

I want to speak to you guys about a special technique,

An Ayurvedic,

Which is Indian medicine,

Technique that has really helped me connect better with my body and really helped me pamper myself in a way that makes me feel more and more self-love for myself every single day.

I'll give you a little bit of background on why I started doing this technique.

By the way,

The technique is called Abhyanga,

A-B-H-Y-A-N-G-A,

And it's a self-massage technique and it comes from Ayurveda,

Which is the Indian medicine technique.

When I was younger,

I had a couple of sexual assault incidents which really made me blame myself for it.

Even though I was still a child,

I think I was 12 or 13,

Maybe even younger than that,

And even though I was not the one responsible for it,

Even though it was a stranger doing it and he was obviously mentally challenged or there was something wrong with him because he was going after children,

Even though that was the case,

I felt like it was my fault and I felt like it was because I was a female.

That was the reason I was assaulted or it was because I was wearing shorts.

That was why I was assaulted.

There was all of this stuff that came up for me.

Until that point,

I was pretty much a normal child and I loved myself and I loved who I was,

But all of a sudden I started feeling all of this hatred,

Not only for the fact that I was female,

Because I thought that was the reason that happened to me,

Not only because of that,

But also because of the fact that I had this body and it was because of this body.

It was the body's fault that I was assaulted.

It wasn't obviously his fault,

The stranger's fault,

Or this world's fault that you live in a world like this where men will come up to little girls and do these kind of things,

But it was the body's fault.

And I noticed myself unable to look at myself in the naked form.

Now,

I mean,

I was still a child,

My breasts were still sprouting,

I was still becoming a woman,

I could not look at myself naked.

Even if I went to the shower,

I would still have my undergarments on as I showered.

I could not look at myself in the naked form,

Especially the genital area and boobs.

I mean,

Anything that was related to my femaleness,

I could not look at it anymore.

I felt ashamed of being who I was.

I felt ashamed of my feminine nature.

And so I was like that for I think a couple of years,

And then little by little I started opening myself up,

I started doing yoga,

I started running at first.

So I was like,

Alright,

Let's run,

Let's get rid of all of this shame about our bodies.

So I ran every morning,

And then I started doing yoga.

But still,

The self-love part wasn't there.

I was fine with taking a shower naked all of a sudden,

It was alright,

And I could look at myself,

But I still hated what I saw.

And then I started the practice of abhyanga,

And it's a self-massage technique.

I was still poor then,

So it wasn't like I could go outside to a professional masseuse and get a massage.

But I decided,

Why not do it for myself?

Why not take care of myself in a sensual,

Loving manner?

And so the abhyanga practice is very simple,

And it's really accessible to everyone on this planet.

That's the reason I love it so much.

You don't need to have a lot of money to do it.

Actually,

It's free.

You just need to buy the oil that you're going to use.

Coconut oil is perfectly fine.

You don't need to go to anyone.

No one needs to be around you.

You can be single and do it.

You can be alone and do it.

And the technique is that you massage yourself.

Now obviously not in a sexual way.

You can if you want to.

But this is all about sensuality and about physical touch.

The skin is the biggest organ in a human body.

It occupies a lot of space and weight.

The skin is extremely heavy.

And also,

Not only that,

But it has a lot of receptors on it.

Neurons,

Nerve receptors,

Touch receptors that are activated and cause pleasurable senses in our body.

Not only do they release endorphins and help us feel good about ourselves,

But also it can release,

If someone else is touching you,

It can release oxytocin which connects you to that person.

So the skin itself has a lot of power in it that we don't access.

At least according to me.

And according to Ayurveda as well obviously.

So basically what you do with Abhyanga is you grab any kind of oil.

I would recommend,

For me I use simple virgin coconut oil.

Really,

Really organic and clean.

And what I would do every morning after you take a shower is preferable because it's the best time to do it.

But any time is fine.

You can do it before you go to sleep.

You can do it in the afternoon.

There's no specific time.

You just need the time to do it.

And the space.

And you start from your left foot and you start massaging it with that oil.

You put a lot of oil in your hand and you just massage it.

Massage your left foot.

And you go up the left leg all the way to your genitals.

And then you start with the right leg and your right foot.

And you go up all the way to the right part of your body,

Right hip.

And then your stomach and your back and your chest,

Especially your breasts,

If you're a female or if you're a man.

And then your shoulders and your face and your hair and your head.

And little by little,

You touch each part of your body and you send loving thoughts to it.

And you tell yourself that you are lovable and you are loved by the universe in general and by yourself.

Even if there's no one else on this planet who loves you,

You yourself love yourself.

And you are your own best friend and you are your own best lover.

And so you love yourself.

And you're little by little.

And you spend a lot of time on each body part.

So this whole process should take at least 15 to 20 minutes.

Even if you're a small person,

You're spending an inordinate amount of time.

Normally you wouldn't do that.

Normally we just kind of whip it up.

We put the oil or the body lotion and we just walk off.

But this is about sensuality.

It is about touch.

It is about pampering yourself.

It is about telling yourself that you're worthy.

Because I think that's the main thing that's missing in the self-love process.

If you don't love yourself,

I think the main thing you're missing is you believe that you are not worthy of love.

You believe that you are unworthy in some shape or form.

Now for me,

It was because I was assaulted.

And that kind of relieves all of this shadow within me.

Other people it might be different things.

Perhaps your parents told you you were unworthy.

Or perhaps your partner tells you that.

Or perhaps it's just this general world.

We live in a world where advertising is constantly telling us that we're unworthy of love.

Unworthy of love unless we do something.

Unless we buy something.

Unless we're skinnier.

Unless we are more beautiful.

Unless our hair is a certain color.

Unless our skin is a certain color.

And so constantly these messages are being portrayed and transmitted to our body and our mind.

And therefore,

I'm sure you've heard stats on the fact that I think 80-90% of the population really dislikes their body.

Especially women.

And so the practice of Abhyanga self-massage,

For me I think it's one of the most powerful techniques out there in order to make yourself love yourself.

As you are.

As you are.

With all of your flaws.

With all of your stretch marks.

With all of your imperfections.

You still love yourself.

And the act of touching yourself and massaging yourself every single day.

Or however often you want to do it.

Every single day is preferable obviously.

But as often as you do it.

The act of doing that tells your body constantly,

Consistently,

That yes,

I love myself.

I love myself.

I love myself.

No matter who I am.

No matter what I look like.

No matter how big my hips are.

Or how thick my thighs are.

Or how skinny my ankles are.

Or whatever it might be.

Whatever you think your flaws are.

You love yourself.

I love myself as I am.

I love myself as I am.

And that unworthiness little by little drops away.

Because there's no space for it anymore.

There's no room for it anymore.

You are loving yourself as you are.

And the unworthiness cannot stick around anymore.

Because it's impossible for it to be there anymore.

And I noticed for myself as I did it.

I did it continuously,

Consistently every morning after I took a shower.

For a long period of time.

I would say two or three years.

And I noticed significant changes in the way I viewed my body.

In the way I moved to the world.

In my confidence levels.

And in my self-esteem levels.

I noticed myself loving myself more,

Obviously.

But all of that transmitted to my relationship with the world.

I did not need someone else to tell me that I'm worthy anymore.

Because I was telling myself that every single day.

And proving it to myself that I was worthy.

And so the confidence that I felt moving through the world.

It was just magnificent.

It was a 180 degree turn from where I was previously.

There's a lot more to Abhyanga.

And there's a lot of benefits to it.

And I'm sure you guys can go online and read up on it.

But I wanted to share my experience with you guys.

Because I know we read about all these techniques online.

And we think,

Yeah cool it would be nice to do.

But it's until we actually try it and we see the benefits in ourselves.

Or we hear about someone else's benefits.

I don't think we are really interested in it.

And I've been sharing the practice of Abhyanga with a lot of different people.

Especially people who have issues of unworthiness.

Of self-esteem or low self-esteem or low confidence in themselves.

Especially the women in my life.

I always tell them to do this practice.

Because it really changes your perspective on yourself.

All of a sudden you're not looking at your knobby knees or your ugly thighs.

Or your ugly stomach or your fat stomach.

You're not looking at your body in that negative manner.

All of a sudden you're just a body.

A beautiful body.

A powerful body.

And that in itself can completely transform the way you move through the world.

The way you look at the world.

The way the world looks at you.

And the way you look at yourself.

I hope this makes sense.

It's such a powerful technique that is so simple.

It's so simple and that's why I love it.

Because the simplicity of it makes it so accessible to every single person on this planet.

So I do recommend that you guys obviously do your own research.

But I do recommend that you try it.

You try it out.

Because it's such a powerful technique for everyone to apply in their life.

If you guys have any questions about the technique itself or about any other video topic I've done.

Please email me.

Do not ask me questions on Instagram or Facebook.

Because I don't think that's an appropriate forum for discussions like that.

So email address.

It's below in the description.

And I shall see you guys in the next video.

Bye for now.