The eight steps of raja yoga are: yama, niyama, asana, pranayama. Yama and niyama are mental conditions. Asana and pranayama are physical activities. Then comes pratyahara, dharana which are the two practices. Then dhyana and samadhi which are two aspirations; they are not practices. You cannot practise samadhi and you cannot practise dhyana. They are experiences that develop and manifest naturally, as the result of you working through yourself.
In reality, raja yoga is not ashtanga yoga. It is only ‘do-anga’ yoga, pratyahara and dharana, two parts. Pratyahara and dharana are known as raja yoga. Samadhi is the outcome of pratyahara and dharana perfection. Dhyana is the outcome of pratyahara and dharana perfection. Asana and pranayama have no reference here. Even Patanjali does not mention asana or pranayama. Nobody practises yama and niyama, thinking they are ethical and moral rules of yoga. People meditate, but they do not practise yama or niyama. So, the whole focus is on two components only.
What is pratyahara and what are the different stages of pratyahara? First stage of pratyahara is relaxation. This relaxation is not sleep; this relaxation is reduction of stressors of life. You develop the ability to manage those stresses of life which create tension, anxiety, frustration, dissipation of the mental energies and faculties. Relaxation is the beginning of pratyahara.
After relaxation, comes the development of awareness. There are many aspects of the mind just as there are many different parts of body. There are arms and legs in the body, there is the head in the body, and all parts have different functions. Together, they are known as the whole body. I can grab this whole body by grabbing your wrist, by grabbing your arm or any part of the body. When I grab that part of the body, I can also control your body. If I grab your arm, I can pull you, push you or move you, as there is that much control.
The practices function in the same manner. For example, there is a practice called antar mouna, thought observation. The mind is not only thinking; it is one component, just as the arm is one part of the body. When you are able to control that thought process, you are also able to deal with the rest of the mind – up to a point. If you are able to develop awareness of the thinking patterns, it is like grabbing the arm of somebody, and then you can move the person. Just by grabbing one aspect of the mind, you can also influence other aspects of the mind. Awareness begins with one aspect, then another, then another. It can begin with thought, it can begin with visualization, with breath or with mantra; and each aspect activates the awareness. It forces you to observe, it forces you to bring your dissipations or your dissipated mind back to focus, back to its centre. So, cultivation of awareness is the next item.
Relaxation and awareness become the strength of pratyahara. Then, other areas of mind are explored and brought into control. This is a basic description of pratyahara. Without going into philosophy or scriptural references, one can say, pratyahara is the process of relaxation and developing awareness from the sensorial to the mental, from the sensorial to the emotional, from the sensorial to the psychic dimension, covering all dimensions of human nature.
Dharana means focusing or concentration, holding your mind onto something. Look at a flower, and you keep on looking at it without thinking of any other thing. Maybe you can hold that attention for a few seconds, yet those few seconds will represent dharana, the time when your mind was fixed on the object. Not the time when the mind moved from the object, but the time it was fixed on the object. If I look at you, for example, for whatever time I am looking at you, my focus is not on any other person, it is on you. So, the mind is fixed there.
Although I am not aware of that as dharana, I am aware of that as sight, ‘I am looking at you, I am looking at you, I am looking at you.’ The same vision can become dharana, if I hold that image for an extended period of time without the mind being dissipated. So, focusing and concentrating, they constitute dharana. There are many ways to perfect dharana as well. You can concentrate on breath; at the eyebrow centre, on the tip of the nose, a star at night, the moon, on nature or a flower. As long as your concentration is fixed, it will indicate your dharana, focusing and concentration.
Pratyahara and dharana become an important ingredient for our life. If we can apply the principles of pratyahara and dharana in our normal yogic routine, in everything that we do, then we would be in control of our life. Right now, we are not in control of our life, yet, in this manner, we can take control of life and the fluctuations that we face. We can maintain our balance and our sanity in this world. From my perspective, this is the need of the time now. Psychologists and psychoanalysts around the globe say that the next biggest challenge is going to be mental health. That mental health does not relate only to children, young people or students. It is also very much part of an adult’s life.
Our whole life depends on our mental health. So what are the possible external tools to improve our mental health? That has not yet been found – except going to a psychoanalyst, for counselling, consultation, taking some medicine and spending some money. There is no clear pathway to deal with mental health challenges. If we think of pratyahara and dharana, and learn to apply them properly in our life, many of the mental health challenges can be overcome with the application of pratyahara and dharana, not as tools of meditation but as tools of regaining our inner balance. Once our inner balance, our mental balance is regained, then the same becomes the tool to advance in meditation.
1 April 2024, Pratyahara & Dharana Training, Ganga Darshan, Munger