If you want to understand a bit more about yoga than the poses, there really is no better place to start than reading Patanjali. My kids prefer to watch films when they know what's going to happen (weird I know) because they say it allows them to enjoy it more. I think the same holds true when it comes to this text.
The first thing you will need to get your head around is the distinction between the mind and the self. In modern western thought, the two are so interchangable as to be almost indivisible. Blame the enlightenment and the age of reason (yes you, M. Descartes, with your cogito ergo sum).
To understand the entire premise of Patanjali you need to think of the mind as one thing and the self as another. The self is called all sorts of things depending on the translation - self Self, I, atman, conciousness - but it's all the same. The self exists in a sense behind the mind and is often obscured by the mind, which masquerades as the true self and hogs all of concious thought.
A useful analogy is Blakes assertion that he sees through the eye, not with it. The mind isn't the self, it's just a big processor that whirrs away thinking of reasons and explanations for everything, rationalising our experience rather than just perceiving it. If you can stop the mind generating all that froth for a minute, then you have a chance to be able to see things not as you think they are, but as they really are.
No comments:
Post a Comment