Several years ago, I took a yoga certification course during a turbulent time in my life. Three days away were rejuvenating. Later, I incorporated the poses into my fitness bootcamps and called my version “Troyoga.” I stripped away the spirituality and tradition, keeping the challenging movements and adding familiar body weight exercises. It was a hit. All exercise; no ritual. Yet a greeting associated with the practice eventually drew my attention to something I had set aside: the way we acknowledge the person standing before us.

What Does Namaste Mean

The word brings together namas, meaning homage or obeisance, and te, meaning “to you” (American Heritage Dictionary, n.d.). Its plain meaning is a respectful salutation. In Hindu Rites and Rituals, K. V. Singh describes the greeting as joining the palms before the chest and bowing the head slightly, in encounters with friends, elders, younger people, and strangers (Singh, 2015).

Namaste also has a life beyond the yoga studio. In her commentary for Wellcome Collection, scholar Rumya S. Putcha distinguishes its association with closing a yoga session from the broader history of Indian salutations and the way they have been understood in the English-speaking world. She notes related forms such as namaskar and namaskaram (Putcha, n.d.). A familiar yoga custom should not become our only lens for understanding the greeting.

Sociologist Erving Goffman helps explain why even a brief salutation matters. In his analysis of social interaction, greetings convey something about the relationship between participants and help establish the terms on which they enter conversation (Goffman, 1972). A greeting can acknowledge another person before any disagreement begins. That does not guarantee sincerity, but it gives the encounter a beginning worth attending to.

The Hindu Meaning of Namaste

Within Singh’s account, namaste can also recognize a divine presence shared across human differences. Bowing becomes an expression of reverence for the person we meet, regardless of caste, color, or creed (Singh, 2015). This is a religious interpretation of the greeting, rather than the intention we should assume behind every use.

Singh connects namaste with the idea of “not me,” an invitation to subdue the ego before another. This is his spiritual interpretation, rather than the word’s literal linguistic derivation. Its psychological invitation remains: for a moment, I loosen my grip on being the center of the encounter. You are here, too.

I’m not a religious sentimentalist. Still, I find something moving in the willingness to pause before another person with reverence. Those who speak of divinity may understand that pause through faith. Others may recognize the dignity of a life as complex and vulnerable as their own. We can appreciate this ethical meeting point while allowing our beliefs to remain different.

Namaste and the Quiet Ego

Our conversations can arrive burdened with protections. Jack Gibb described defensive communication as an encounter in which perceived threat draws attention toward protecting oneself. Listening becomes entangled with concerns about how we appear and whether we can avoid an attack (Gibb, 1961). We may prepare a defense while another person is still speaking, hearing a challenge to our worth where a question was intended.

The quiet ego offers a useful way to understand this balance. Heidi Wayment, Jack Bauer, and Kateryna Sylaska describe a person who can notice what is happening without immediately becoming defensive, recognize connections with others, consider their perspectives, and remain willing to grow. Caring about oneself and caring about others can coexist (Wayment et al., 2015).

Making Room for Another Person

A quiet ego leaves room for confidence in our own choices. We can care about another person without erasing our preferences or surrendering a necessary boundary. The research connects a balanced sense of self with qualities such as coping and well-being; it does not suggest that we must disappear in order to become compassionate (Wayment et al., 2015).

Softening the ego can begin in these ordinary encounters. Perhaps I can listen without immediately correcting. Perhaps I can admit that a criticism contains something useful. These are ordinary ways of making room for another person. Connecting them with namaste is a psychological reflection on the greeting, rather than a finding from studies of namaste itself.

Intellectual Humility in Everyday Encounters

Intellectual humility means accepting that we may not know enough and that a belief we hold could be mistaken. Tenelle Porter and colleagues explain why this is harder when a disagreement touches our religious, political, or moral commitments. Recognizing our limits may help us stay open, although researchers are still working out how best to measure this quality and understand its benefits (Porter et al., 2022).

The relevance is personal. Before deciding that a practice is foolish, dangerous, or beneath us, we might learn what it means. And before congratulating ourselves for being open-minded, we might notice how quickly we dismiss the person who remains uncomfortable with it. Humility asks something of both sides of the conversation.

Compassion Beyond the Greeting

Of course, saying namaste does not magically transform us into compassionate people. A warm salutation can be followed by impatience, condescension, or indifference. The significance we assign to a gesture becomes more credible when our behavior carries it into the rest of the encounter.

In Being Peace, Thich Nhat Hanh connects understanding with compassion and the wish to relieve suffering. He also describes attending carefully to our own anger rather than simply fighting it (Hanh, 1987). These Buddhist teachings offer a parallel reflection on care; they are distinct from Singh’s Hindu explanation of namaste.

Practice may also matter. In a small study, Helen Weng and colleagues compared people who spent two weeks practicing compassion with people who practiced thinking differently about stressful experiences. Among the 41 people included in the final analysis, those in the compassion group gave up more of their own money to help someone treated unfairly in a game (Weng et al., 2013). The study did not examine namaste or show whether greater kindness lasted beyond the laboratory. It offers a limited but useful finding: practiced concern can sometimes carry into action.

Respect Without Control

The original question that drew my interest concerned objections to namaste in yoga settings. How do we honor another person when the practice that expresses our respect makes them uncomfortable?

Erich Fromm gives this question substance. In The Art of Loving, he describes respect as recognizing another person’s individuality and caring about their development for their own sake. Without respect, responsibility can deteriorate into domination or possessiveness (Fromm, 1963). This is a humanistic account of love, and it offers a useful ethical foundation for encountering difference.

Gibb’s communication framework provides a related perspective. He contrasts expressions of superiority and control with a willingness to engage as equals and work on a shared problem (Gibb, 1961). Applied here, the question is whether we are making room for another person or asking them to confirm our preferred image of ourselves.

Imagine a yoga participant who quietly declines to say namaste. The instructor explains the greeting’s meaning, then accepts the participant’s choice without embarrassment or ridicule. The class continues. The welcome remains.

An instructor who instead treats the person as unenlightened may be defending a spiritual identity at the expense of the person before them. The example is hypothetical, but the question is practical: does our respect survive someone choosing differently?

Religious convictions deserve serious consideration. Someone can decline a gesture without treating its practitioners with contempt; an instructor can explain a tradition without demanding participation. Recognizing dignity includes allowing another person to answer in a way consistent with their own conscience.

A Few Words by Psychology Fanatic

My version of yoga left little room for ritual. I wanted challenging movement, and the people in my classes enjoyed it. Looking back, I can also appreciate the question a simple greeting places before us: how much room do I make for the humanity of the person I meet?

I return to the sacredness of life. For some, that language refers to the divine. For others, it expresses wonder at existence and the responsibility that comes with sharing a world. Neither understanding requires us to pretend that our traditions are interchangeable. Another person’s worth does not depend on their becoming more like us.

I don’t fear a phrase because it comes from a tradition different from my own. I am more concerned about the contempt we can carry into an encounter while feeling certain of our righteousness. That concern applies to me as readily as to anyone else.

We will not bow our way out of every conflict. But we might pause long enough to listen, ask a better question, or respond without humiliation. If we speak of a shared spark of divinity, let that belief become visible in how we treat each other. If we speak instead of human dignity, let our conduct honor it.

Namaste, my friends.

Associated Concepts

• Yoga and Wellness: A practice combining physical movement, breathing, and attention, with traditions and meanings that vary across settings.
• Whole Person Wellness: An approach to well-being that considers physical, psychological, relational, and spiritual dimensions of life.
• The Noble Eightfold Path: A Buddhist framework of understanding, intention, speech, conduct, livelihood, effort, mindfulness, and concentration.
• Human Flourishing: Living well through meaningful engagement, supportive relationships, and opportunities for development.
• Quiet Ego: A less defensive sense of self that balances personal needs with concern for others, allowing connection without sacrificing individuality.
• Intellectual Humility: Recognition that our knowledge is limited and our beliefs may be mistaken, encouraging thoughtful consideration of perspectives different from our own.

Resources

American Heritage Dictionary (n.d.). Namaste. The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (5th ed.). HarperCollins. Dictionary entry.
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Fromm, Erich (1963). The Art of Loving. Bantam Books. Published by arrangement with Harper & Row; original work published 1956.
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Gibb, Jack R. (1961). Defensive Communication. Journal of Communication, 11(3), 141–148. DOI: 10.1111/j.1460-2466.1961.tb00344.x.
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Goffman, Erving (1972). On Face-Work: An Analysis of Ritual Elements in Social Interaction. In Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face-to-Face Behaviour (pp. 5–45). Penguin Books. Book first published in the United States in 1967; essay originally published in 1955.
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Hanh, Thich Nhat (1987). Being Peace. Edited by Arnold Kotler; illustrations by Mayumi Oda. Parallax Press. ISBN: 9780938077008.
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Porter, Tenelle; Elnakouri, Abdo; Meyers, Ethan A.; Shibayama, Takuya; Jayawickreme, Eranda; Grossmann, Igor (2022). Predictors and Consequences of Intellectual Humility. Nature Reviews Psychology, 1, 524–536. DOI: 10.1038/s44159-022-00081-9.
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Putcha, Rumya S. (n.d.). Rumya Putcha Talks About the Word Namaste and Yoga. Wellcome Collection. Expert commentary and transcript.
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Singh, K. V. (2015). Hindu Rites and Rituals: Origins and Meanings. Penguin Books. ISBN: 9780143425106. Digital edition published 2016; eISBN: 9789385890048.
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Wayment, Heidi A.; Bauer, Jack J.; Sylaska, Kateryna (2015). The Quiet Ego Scale: Measuring the Compassionate Self-Identity. Journal of Happiness Studies, 16, 999–1033. DOI: 10.1007/s10902-014-9546-z.
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Weng, Helen Y.; Fox, Andrew S.; Shackman, Alexander J.; Stodola, Diane E.; Caldwell, Jessica Z. K.; Olson, Matthew C.; Rogers, Gregory M.; Davidson, Richard J. (2013). Compassion Training Alters Altruism and Neural Responses to Suffering. Psychological Science, 24(7), 1171–1180. DOI: 10.1177/0956797612469537.
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