#60. Unfold Empathy With Meditation | Yoga Sutras Of Patanjali

Empathy, love, compassion...are not mere words. To live them requires not only an intellectual understanding in the mind, but an emotional sensation of these words in the heart, and the truth of them in one's spirit.

Patanjali gives meditation as a tool to apply for unfolding words into their sensation and the truth. Listen and meditate along.

======

Join me in a 30 min meditation session every day at 7 AM CET on my website

Transcript

Namaste.

Welcome to this meditation session with me,

Dhyansay,

Your path to inner peace,

Wisdom and awareness.

We are meditating upon Yoga Sutras of Patanjali on the Vibhuti Padam,

The path of accomplishments.

In order to achieve those accomplishments,

Patanjali has prepared us with the right tools,

With the right learnings,

With the right mindset.

And now he starts giving us the knowledge how to apply those tools and how to accomplish what has to be accomplished.

He is not just about theory.

He is very practical.

He is not just about one thing.

He is about a lot of aspects of human life and he is so exhaustive that one single human being cannot go through all what Patanjali is there to offer,

All what he has to offer,

All the dimensions that Patanjali opens.

It is nearly impossible for a human being to unfold all this in one's life.

But in his Yoga Sutras,

He lays down everything.

Go through it,

Learn from it,

See what is relevant to your life,

Pick up that you feel inspired,

Pick up that you feel useful,

Take it into your life and integrate this into your life for the betterment of your own experience and everyone else around you.

One such application he is bringing in is the communication.

The communication of what you are feeling,

What you are experiencing,

What you are thinking,

The entire expression which then is communicated to the other,

How to improve that.

Just imagine a world where we are completely unable to communicate with anybody.

For a moment,

Just for appreciating the work that is put behind from Patanjali in these Sutras and the applications that he has developed,

Think of a world where there would be absolutely no communication possible.

Where what you are thinking,

What you are feeling,

What you carry inside of yourself,

There is no way that you could express it out.

There is no language which you can use to speak,

To share.

What sort of a world would that be?

Do we want to live in that kind of a world?

Can we imagine to exist in that kind of a world?

More importantly,

Think of it like this.

When you have this imagination and you put it on the timeline of evolution of human beings,

Do you see this somewhere in our far past that we could not communicate and we evolved in our communication,

We evolved the language,

We evolved different expressions of communication?

Or do you see that we are heading towards somewhere,

A time,

A place where we are more and more unable to communicate,

More and more unable to express,

More and more limited in what we are saying,

How we are saying,

And remaining unsatisfied because there is this gap,

There is this communication which is not happening.

How would we fill that gap?

How would we make sure that whatever is inside is shared outside,

With the outside,

And whatever is in the outside,

We are also able to absorb that,

Able to have this exchange,

To have this communication.

How is that possible?

How are we going to work upon that?

It is an essential fundamental of being,

Of our existence,

Of being able to relate to this existence,

To be able to relate to this world.

So it is time that we work upon our communication,

Not by going through some sort of language training,

It is not about how sophisticated,

How articulate your language is,

It is more about how much clarity that you have inside on what you are thinking,

On what you are feeling,

On what is going on within you.

If you have clarity of your inside,

There are higher chances that you will be able to share it with the outside.

And same is with the outside,

If you have the clarity of what is going on outside,

You can relate it to in a better way.

Here Patanjali says,

What that means is,

A word,

Its meaning and the knowledge behind it are normally confused because of superimposition upon one another.

By samyama on the word or sound produced by any being,

Knowledge of its meaning is obtained.

Long way of saying that you need to be very clear in your inner world so that you can communicate with the outer world.

Normally,

In an unclear state,

In an unclear state of mind,

In an unclear state of being,

What you say,

What you feel,

And what is the meaning behind,

What is the knowledge behind,

The entire thing is distorted.

They are not in one line.

You are saying something,

You are feeling something else,

Or at times not knowing what you are saying,

What feeling it carries,

And the truth of it is not there in your words.

As an example,

We talk a lot about compassion and empathy and love and all these beautiful words.

Are we really able to stand by these words?

Are we able to really live the truth of these words?

Are we really able to feel these words?

If I say empathy as an example,

Are we able to really know what that means?

Even if we intellectually read the definition of this word empathy,

Are we able to really bring that empathy in our life?

No.

For that empathy to come to our life,

For that empathy to be actually there,

We have to step down from just the intellectual understanding to what sensation it brings in the heart.

We have to let the word be more alive in our heart.

We have to meditate upon the word as an example,

Empathy,

To really understand not only what this intellectually means,

But what is the sensation of this word empathy?

How does one feel when one shares,

When one cares about other people's emotions?

What does that mean?

Not just intellectually,

But in your heart and in your spirit.

Going further deeper,

What does this really bring to oneself and to the other?

Is this only just an intellectual communication?

Is this only a form of emotion that you enjoy,

That you have as one quality in you,

And that has a certain utility for the world?

Or is there a deeper sense that it brings?

Does that bring to the truth,

To the fact that we are all one,

And we share this oneness,

We share the emotion,

We share this one existence together?

So each and every word,

It does not matter what,

If you take it from the intellectual to the emotional and to the spiritual level,

And you gain clarity on all these three levels about whatever you're saying,

Whatever is in your communication,

You will see that intellectually,

It has its own place,

It has its own functionality,

The joy of expression,

The joy of communication only happens when you can take this on the level of heart,

On the level of emotion,

And bring that aliveness on this level of heart and emotion in those words,

In those expressions that you have.

And the utmost pleasure,

The utmost bliss happens when you can unfold that word in its maximum potential,

Meaning that word,

That articulation,

That expression,

That sound that you utter,

It always becomes a reminder that we are all one,

That there is a sharing that we do,

Which is common to us,

We communicate on the heart,

We communicate on the level of the mind,

But in spirit,

We are all one.

And that's one way of using and applying meditation to bring all that is going on on the surface to its very depth,

Allowing oneself to see that in the silence,

When all the words are settling,

In that silence,

The meaning,

The impact,

The purpose of all communication is that to realize we are all one,

We all share something common,

A consciousness that is one.

Again,

These words might just remain as words,

Or they stir a certain emotion in you,

Or they become the truth in you,

It all depends on you.

Here,

Patanjali is giving the chance to meditate upon the communication,

Meditate upon each and every word,

Each and every sound that you utter,

And taking it from being purely intellectual,

To being alive in your heart,

To the very truth of your spirit,

And allowing you to communicate and share with the rest of the world as well.

With that,

Let us take this knowledge,

Take this wisdom from Patanjali in our own experience,

And meditate in a way that we not only remain on the surface,

Not only remain in the mind,

But move to our heart and can touch the depths of our spirit.

You may set an intention of love,

Compassion,

Empathy,

Anything that you would like to bring in your life as we move from mind to heart to the spirit.

Please close your eyes,

Take a posture that is comfortable for you,

With your back upright,

Shoulders relaxed,

Your entire body rested.

With its weight on the ground,

Take a nice deep breath,

Inhale from the nose,

And also exhale from the nose,

And with the exhalation,

Allowing the body to rest.

Allowing your mind,

Your energies,

To stay in this moment,

To settle in this moment,

Your awareness in this moment.

And for the next minutes to meditate upon a word,

Its meaning,

Its feeling,

Its sensation,

Its truth,

Let us choose an intention,

A word.

As an example,

Empathy.

As you become more and more silent and aware in these moments,

In your mind,

Bring your thoughts to empathy.

What is empathy?

And let all other thoughts fade in the background while you focus your mental energies,

Your thoughts on empathy.

Concentrating.

Contemplating.

Meditating.

Upon empathy.

As you unfold the meaning,

Images,

Memories,

Ideas,

From your life may appear.

Let them come and pass by.

While you unfold empathy,

Its meaning,

And its sensation,

Its feeling in your heart.

With every breath.

More in a silence centeredness and focus on one word,

Empathy.

What it means,

How it feels,

What is the sensation in your heart?

As you breathe,

The word,

As you think of the word,

As you feel the word,

Let it unfold in your consciousness.

Let it touch sensations in your being.

Thank you.

Let this word empathy unfold.

Take its right place.

Take its right place.

As this word unfolds in your heart,

Stairs your emotion,

Allows you to connect with the outside,

Be more silent,

Be more aware.

Let go of the word.

Stay with the feeling.

Stay with the sensation.

Taking the sensation,

The feeling,

Further deeper,

Towards the truth.

And even letting go of that,

Remaining absolutely silent and aware.

In this silence,

In this awareness,

Is perfect communication with everyone.

In this silent awareness,

You are one with everyone.

With that sense of oneness,

Centeredness,

And silent awareness,

Very gently and slowly,

You may open your eyes.

Take this message of empathy,

Of love,

Compassion,

Sharing with the rest,

Into your daily life.

Thank you very much.

Namaste.

Reviews

🙏

Excellent