Review of the Eight Limbs of Ashtanga Yoga - Dhyana and Samadhi
Photo by Ilona Frey on Unsplash
Over the years of practicing yoga asana (the physical yoga poses in a yoga class we work on), I realized that doing the yoga poses was only a small part of understanding what yoga is and teaching us. Yoga in Sanskrit means union. Gurus, monks, and spiritual aspirants throughout the centuries developed and passed down their knowledge and instructions with one goal: Through stilling the mind, we can find union with the divine source.
“Yoga is the cessation of thought waves in the mind” Sage Patañjali, Yoga Sutras.
The thought progression of the discipline of yoga is this: The practices of yoga (sadhana) purify the mind and body to develop concentration > Perfect concentration leads to a thoughtless mind and superconsciousness (samadhi) > Higher consciousness brings knowledge of reality and peace.
Sage Patañjali prescribed a process to achieve inner peace in a collection of writings called the Yoga Sutras. He described this process as having eight parts or “limbs”; thus, the system is called Ashtanga (ashta = eight, anga = limb) Yoga.
The eight limbs are:
Yama (restraints)
Niyama (observances)
Asana (posture, seat)
Pranayama (control of prana, breath)
Pratyahara (withdrawing the mind from sense perception)
Dharana (concentration)
Dhyana (meditation)
Samadhi (superconsciousness)
Dhyana and Samadhi
Translation:
Dhyana: “meditation”; “dhi,” meaning “receptacle” or “the mind”; and yana, meaning “moving” or “going.”
Samadhi: “total self-collectedness”, “completion”. In Sanskrit, “sam” means “together”, “dhi” means “intellect"; a state of meditative consciousness, the state in which individual and universal consciousness unite.
Never has meditation been more prevalent in North America than now. There are tools, apps, online classes, tutorials, music, and videos everywhere that claim they can help teach you to meditate or improve your meditation practice. When I Google “meditation,” there are over 417 million results.
I am also on the meditation bandwagon, as I already wrote a post only a few months ago about this topic. Luckily, meditation is such a broad subject; I could write another ten articles and feel like I could still do more research into another facet of dhyana and samadhi.
I wrote in a previous post about how Dharana (concentration), Dhyana (meditation), and Samadhi (union, superconsciousness) can work together and bring us into a state called Samyama. Achieving samyama may be considered an advanced ability, which makes sense when samadhi is considered an elusive state to achieve. Still, I also feel like combining these three strategies is the most logical way to gain success if union with the divine consciousness is your goal.
But should superconsciousness be our goal? For many, samadhi nor samyama are never realized. I know that it hasn’t for me. And yet, I feel that meditation is something that has become an important part of my routine. But why?
In my previous article about meditation, I wrote a list of all the possible benefits of adding a regular meditation practice to your routine. One aspect I didn’t focus on was the concept of dispassion. Baba Hari Dass wrote a lot about dispassion over the years in his teachings and reiterated that to develop dispassion is a sign that one has learned to quiet their mind and open one’s heart.
Understanding dispassion took a lot of thought for me. Dispassion could be a synonym for indifference, which implies a lack of care. An absence of care, I feel, is not what was intended.
The understanding that I gathered from reading Baba Hari Dass’s books, and the teachings of other gurus, is that if we do the work (which Baba Hari Dass called “regular sadhana”), the practice of meditation will change our bodies, our minds, and ultimately our perspective. The first perspective is to develop the skill of experiencing each moment presently.
What would happen to our minds if we only concern ourselves with what is happening now, instead of reflecting, or even lamenting, what happened before. What could happen to our thoughts if we can stop worrying about what may happen in the future? Being in a moment, ideally, can help you realize that you are safe and there is no serious problem at this moment. Having this observation can give you the space to find a sense of calm instead of dread or panic. This feeling of stillness could be considered as one quality of dispassion.
Another part of dispassion is observing the world around you and recognizing that everything is connected. Every. Single. Thing. We are all made of the same stuff: other people, animals, plants, roads, lamps, your sofa. Meditation provides us with the opportunity to consider these heady ideas and gives us time to consider them seriously.
If I can understand that the jerk who cut me off in traffic is me, is a part of me, then will my perspective and reaction change towards that person? If I recognize that plants and trees are of the same materials I am, can I change my observations about them? The underlying message here is one of love. Can we love all things equally? If we are all made of the same stuff and are all created, live, and die on this planet, why should I love anything less than I love myself? Or more than myself? True dispassion, to me, is developing the ability to approach all things with love and acceptance for them as they are, and not imprinting my preconceived notions upon them.
The last part of dispassion is to eliminate all of our desires and aversions. Desires are responsible for keeping consciousness in our bodies and can drive us to repeat the same actions in our lives mindlessly. Throughout all of the practices of the Eight Limbs of Ashtanga, we are invited to observe what attracts us and what we avoid. Through meditation, we aspire to stop allowing our minds to wander. When we control our thoughts, it provides space for us to observe our thoughts and actions dispassionately, which means without the heat of our emotions and reacting without understanding why. With a silent mind, we can use a logical process to consider what path provides us with the least harm and the most love. We can give ourselves an opportunity to change our paths.
The strongest message from Baba Hari Dass pertaining to dhyana and samadhi was to keep trying. He wrote:
“There is no peace in the world. If there is any peace is it only in meditation. At first, everyone does false meditation; while you sit different kinds of thoughts come. But false meditation turns into true meditation by regular practice. One should not be afraid of the thoughts, but try to eliminate them from the body.”
I hope that this gives you some curiosity and inspiration to keep practicing meditation, to keep exploring what your mind can find in moments of peace.
*Source: Silence Speaks by Baba Hari Dass