The Essence of Yoga

By Kushal Kumar

Kushal is a student on our Holistic Stress Management Diploma course

The word YOGA in Sanskrit means “yuj” or “to unite”. The union referred here is that of the Self with the Supreme. Also, yoga is said to be the union of the body and the mind. It is the harmony between the body and the mind which leads to a coordinated, better life.

Yoga is as old as the existence of the human being. In earlier days, the students in India used to go and live with their teachers in schools called “Gurukul”. The education used to include the teachings of yoga and its philosophy. The teachings of the philosophy are compiled as short sentences known as aphorisms by Sage Patanjali some 5000 years ago.

He realised that this knowledge which was being taught on a one to one basis might get lost through the ages and thus put them down as “Yoga Sutras” His teachings are based on the fact that “Yoga chitta vritti nirodha” – meaning that yoga is the quietening of the modifications/fluctuations of the mind”. The mind, which is said to be a flow of thoughts, is the most active part of us, generating app. 60000 thoughts in our waking time. It is therefore, also referred to as the “monkey mind”, jumping from one thought to another-some memories of the past, some anxieties of the future.

To quieten these fluctuations of the mind, the sage has prescribed the 8 fold path of yoga starting from self resraint (Yama), self observances (Niyam), postures (asanas), breathing techniques (Pranayama), and withdrawal from the external (pratyahara), Concentration (Dharana), Meditation (Dhyana) and Absolute Bliss (Samadhi).

Yoga also believes that the body is the house of the mind and unless the house is clean, nothing living in it can be clean. Thus, it prescribes a cleansing process known as “Shatkriyas”- the 6 cleansing processes. It basically talks about the techniques to cleanse all outlets of the human body - the alimentary canal (with water), the nasal passages (with water), the intestines & colon (with water) and the skull region (with breath). These techniques, however, should only be learnt and practiced with a qualified teacher of yoga and under guidance.

He further goes to say that once these fluctuations of the mind are quietened, the Divine Self of the human being is realised. So the aim of yoga is to realise the Self, which is Divine. Keeping this basic theory in mind, the teachings of yoga as a health benefit is only a side effect, as there is more to gain and achieve through yoga than just good health. Since yoga is being taught as a commercial subject, various forms are being propagated and the crust of the subject is getting lost as most students of yoga become teachers after 15 days of learning. The depth of the subject is far greater and there is more to gain than what is being taught. We shall discuss in subsequent articles the various afflictions/states of the mind and the ways to overcome them.