#11 Meditation Is De-Hypnosis | Yoga Sutras Of Patanjali

All our lives we live in a kind of hypnosis. We don't know what we are doing, we don't really know why we are doing what we are doing. Only when the hypnosis breaks, one gets to realize what was going on. Meditation is the process of de-hypnosis and waking up to take control back of our life.

Patanjali in his Yoga sutras describes 9 obstacles in the path towards clarity and silence of the mind.

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Transcript

Namaste and a very warm welcome to all of you in this daily morning live meditation session with me,

Dhyanase.

My salutations to Patanjali for the knowledge of yoga and this opportunity for us to come together,

Explore these sutras to bring back harmony in our life.

You must have seen a hypnotist working on his candidate,

Demonstrating extraordinary things that the candidate is undergoing when he or she is under the hypnosis.

And the whole time the candidate who is going under the hypnosis has no clue what is happening.

Even afterwards,

If you ask what happened,

They will never be able to describe fully what actually happened,

What actually they were doing,

Why they were doing what they were doing.

We also live in somewhat of a hypnosis.

We,

If we deeply ask ourselves,

If we face ourselves in all honesty,

We don't know why we are doing what we're doing,

But we just keep on doing.

We don't even realize that we may be in some sort of a hypnosis.

We may be living our entire life in hypnosis.

Meditation is that process to de-hypnotize ourselves.

A lot of people think that meditation is some sort of self-hypnosis.

It's exactly the opposite.

It takes you out of the hypnosis that you have been living all throughout your life,

Whichever kind of hypnosis,

The hypnosis of religion,

The hypnosis of ambition,

The hypnosis of any other psychological impressions that you have been carrying all throughout your life,

The hypnosis of your desires,

The hypnosis of your understanding of the world,

The hypnosis of your knowledge.

All those hypnosis that you are living,

Meditation is bringing you to this state of de-hypnosis,

Where for the first time you wake up and you realize where you are.

You may not even be able to reflect back on what you were doing,

Why you were doing,

But that is not important.

What is important is that you wake up,

That you are aware,

And then you can conduct yourself with your own self,

With your own mind,

With your own body and not being constantly externally conducted.

We are currently discussing Patanjali's Yoga Sutras,

Which are in the first phase establishing a silent mind.

Patanjali is giving all his knowledge,

All his wisdom to establish a silent mind first,

Because without a silent mind,

There is no further development.

There is nothing that penetrates into the consciousness.

There's nothing,

No growth,

No development,

No possibility for that.

And he says that while trying to achieve this silent mind,

There are nine obstacles that become a distraction of the mind.

Yesterday,

We started discussing those distractions.

Let us look at what these nine distractions are according to Patanjali.

The first three,

Which I started yesterday and discussed yesterday was Vyadhī,

Dis-ease,

When your body,

When your mind is in dis-ease,

When it's not at ease.

That's the obstacle number one.

Second,

Satyana,

Langua,

Tiredness or having lack of energy,

Samasya,

Doubt,

To have constantly doubt about things,

To constantly frame problems out of situations.

That was the third obstacle.

And then Patanjali says the next obstacle is Pramada.

If you translate this word Pramada,

It translates into carelessness.

But what here Patanjali is saying is this carelessness due to the sleepiness,

Due to the hypnosis that we are constantly living in.

Because of this hypnosis,

We are unaware,

We are careless.

We are not knowing what we're doing.

We're not knowing why we are doing what we're doing.

So we are in a state of carelessness about our body,

Carelessness about our mind,

Carelessness about all our actions.

Next,

Alasya,

Laziness.

This is something where yoga is a discipline not for the lazy ones.

Yoga is not for the ones who just want to sit in front of the couch,

Listen to something and hope that they will undergo a transformation.

Yoga is not entertainment.

Yoga is a discipline which requires effort,

Which requires commitment,

Which requires you not to be lazy.

If you would be in laziness,

This will become an obstacle in your transformation and you'll never be able to achieve what yoga is all about,

What yoga has to offer to you.

The next is Virithi,

Sensuality.

Here you have to see that our energies are organized in what we call as seven different chakras.

And one of them is responsible for the sexuality.

One of them is responsible for the entire experience of sensuality.

And unfortunately,

We are only most of the times stuck there.

All our energies are most of the times stuck in the lowest most form,

In the lowest most chakra of sexuality,

Of sensuality.

Therefore,

We see everything as sensual.

We are driven by sensuality.

We are motivated by sensuality and we are having a compulsion for sexuality sensuality.

Patanjali says that becomes an obstacle in your growth because unless the energies are rising up,

Unless the energies are rising up to your heart to open up for love,

For compassion,

To your third eye,

For the wisdom,

For the knowledge and above you,

There is no development any further.

So what he's saying is if your energies are only stuck in sexuality sensuality,

Too much of that,

That would mean you this will become an obstacle.

So take a check in your life.

If you're constantly only driven by sensuality,

If you're constantly driven only by sexuality,

See that yoga can never happen to you.

See that something has to change about your life.

There has to be a discipline that has to be brought in to put a check on this over sensuality in life.

Next is Branti,

Delusion.

This is similar to the state of hypnosis,

Where in this case you're convinced that what you're experiencing,

What you're seeing,

What your perception is telling you is the truth.

That is Branti,

That is delusion to blindly trust your perception,

Your knowledge as something that is the truth,

That is the fact.

Patanjali is saying drop all knowledge,

Drop all what you consider as the truth in order to come to the truth.

You have to put your version of the truth down.

You have to put your Brantis,

Your delusions down.

Whatever you are concluding out of your perceptions,

You have to put them aside in order to rise up in your energies,

In order to rise up in your consciousness.

Darshana labdha bhumika,

Non-achievement of a stage.

This is again related to energies,

That when your energies are broken,

They are misorganized,

You're never really coming to fruition.

You're never really achieving.

You make an effort and you see there is no result.

You continue to make an effort,

But nothing comes to fruition.

That's an obstacle which also demotivates you while you are practicing yoga,

While you're going into your inner world,

That you go a little,

When you meditate,

You sit down,

You're trying to be silent,

You achieve a little,

But you never really touch the silence.

So you're always discouraged.

If that's the case,

You see there is an obstacle right there,

Which has to be addressed.

And the last obstacle,

According to Patanjali,

Tvan vasthita tvani,

Instability,

That you are sometimes deciding for this,

Sometimes deciding for that.

You're not fully committed.

You're not fully stable.

Your mind is not making a decision,

Making a commitment and giving your practice stability.

For all these nine obstacles,

Patanjali says,

Om is the antidote.

When you chant om,

The vibrations of om,

The reverberations of om,

They reorganize your energy.

They take you out of this hypnosis,

Of this laziness,

Of this delusion.

The energies of om break all these obstacles.

The vibrations of om break all these negative obstacles that you have in you.

And the vibrations of om reorganizes all your energies to not only get stuck in sexuality,

In sensuality and open up love,

Compassion,

To knowledge,

To experiencing one's own true self in meditation.

Then Patanjali says,

Dukh dhormanasya angamay jayetva shvasa prasavasah vikshepa sahabhava Grief,

Despair,

Nervousness and irregularity in your breath.

These are the indicators.

These are the indicators of that you have these obstacles in your practice.

So if you are in grief,

If you are in sadness,

If you are in despair,

If you are in hopelessness,

If you are in nervousness,

That you are constantly nervous,

You're trembling,

There is an inner trembling that you experience while you are in normal,

Ordinary situations.

And if your breath is irregular,

This is the most concrete indicator that you can have that when you observe your breath,

If you see that the breath is not flowing regularly,

Is not flowing naturally,

That means you are coming across these obstacles.

That means you are stuck somewhere which needs attention,

Which needs this practice,

Which needs the reverberations of Om.

And the last,

Tat pratiksa dharatham ek tatva bhyaasa.

Patanjali says for removing all these obstacles,

There should be constant practice of one principle.

What is this one principle?

It means to bring your mind in a one pointed state,

To make effort to have first of all,

Leave all other practices and first of all,

Have the practice of bringing all your energies to one point.

To practice concentration,

To practice this one pointedness along the lines of Om,

Along the reverberations of Om.

So as we chant Om together,

Not only you will chant Om,

Not only you will listen to Om,

Not only you let go in the reverberations of Om,

But you'll bring all your mind,

All your heart,

All your energies to these sounds,

To these vibrations of Om.

Don't leave even a scent of energy not involved in the process,

Not involved in the meditation.

Pull yourself from all different directions and go into this chanting of Om with all your heart,

All your mind,

All your energies.

Let pour everything and see that your mind,

All your energies and everything becomes one pointed,

Is reverberating in the vibrations of Om.

With that,

Let us close our eyes.

Take a posture that is allowing us to sit comfortably.

Let us breathe in.

Awareness on your breath.

Just check if you're breathing naturally.

Allow the breath to flow in and out naturally.

Settling down.

Begin chanting Om.

Om.

Om.

As you chant or listen to Om,

Meditate on the vibrations,

Letting go in these vibrations.

Om.

Awareness at all times inwards.

Om.

Om.

Feel the vibrations in every cell of your body,

In all your body,

All your mind,

All your energies.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Feel the silence that arises along with these vibrations.

After every om,

The silence in your inner space,

In your mind,

In your consciousness.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Om.

No more effort.

Awareness inwards or nothing in particular.

Allow the energies to reorganize while you remain aware and silent.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Notice the silence in your inner space.

Or your breath is flowing naturally,

Silently.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Om.

Remain still,

Silent and aware.

Om.

If you wish to stay in this meditative silence for some more minutes,

Keep your eyes closed and let go in this inner space,

In your depths,

With silence and awareness.

Or very gently and slowly,

You may open your eyes.

Maintaining your presence in this moment,

Maintaining silence,

Centeredness,

Awareness and taking this space,

This taste,

This state to your day,

To your routines.

I will see you tomorrow at 7am Central European Time.

Namaste.

Reviews

🙏

Excellent teachings from Patanjali, Reminders To stay on the correct path! Thank you for your teachings and for waking us up!

Thank you for sharing the knowledge to be in bliss and love Having a human experience we have to master controlling our mind Otherwise we act unconsciously and ruin of relationships and our divine self

Thank you I feel at peace