8 Limbs of Yoga | Patanjali + Yoga Sutras

Hello everyone, welcome to this episode of the Mindful in Minutes podcast. So today we are doing a free-form episode, so chit-chatting here, no guided practice. If you're looking for that, hang tight until Sunday or you can listen to like the 350 other guided meditations. That's not an exaggeration that are on this podcast feed, but twice a month-ish, we do a free-form episode where we dive into a particular type of meditation or an aspect of like mindfulness, self-development. I was looking at kind of the calendar of like past years, I was working on a little bit of a project and I realized that we used to do a lot of just kind of like general topics, right? Like we did this kind of recently with like perfectionism, where we talk about kind of this general topic and like how it pertains to our life and things like that. So we do that sometimes. I think I want to revisit that a little bit this year, towards the end of this year. So that's just me thinking out loud. But welcome. Hello. I'm Kelly. So happy that you're here. And today we are exploring the eight limbs of yoga. So this is something that I've talked about, like we've explored different elements of the eight limbs of yoga. And I think every time I talk about a particular like aspect of it, or talk about some kind of a yoga topic in general, the eight limbs of yoga come up, but I've never done an episode in which we've kind of really explored like what they are, what are the different limbs, where does this come from, why is it significant? So as a little bit of background, I started as a yoga teacher first, and that is kind of what started me on this entire journey, was yoga. So when I first heard about the eight limbs of yoga, it was in my 200 hour teacher training. And it was when I was first introduced to this idea that like yoga is more than poses. And it kind of blew my mind a little bit. Because when I thought about yoga, I thought about, you know, what a lot of us think about, especially this would have been, gosh, like 12-ish years ago, this is totally dating me, but I did my first yoga teacher training the summer after I graduated college. So that was definitely over a decade ago. But you know, oh, well, here we are, aging is such a beautiful thing, such a luxury that I get. I mean, that truly, that came off sarcastic. But aging really is a beautiful luxury that if you get to do it, it's really special. So when I, circling back, hello, also, if you're new here, I have ADHD. So it's nice to meet you. When I was first introduced to this idea of the eight limbs of yoga, and I learned about Patanjali, who we're going to talk about, we actually read the yoga sutras as part of my training. We, I just, I had no idea that there was so much to it. And I just pictured yoga as like, you know, some bendy person, especially this was like the height of like Instagram yogi or just going into the height of like Instagram yogi. It was just we were just starting to get to that point where it was like you would do these beautiful bendy poses and post on Instagram and write some inspirational quote or something. And I just didn't realize that there's so much more to it, so much depth to it. And that one of those limbs is actually meditation, which we're going to talk about. So kind of broad look at the eight limbs is basically if you have this umbrella and the umbrella is yoga, there are eight different things that fall underneath that umbrella of yoga, which we'll talk about those. And that is what those eight different elements underneath an umbrella is what creates the big, well-rounded aspect of like a true yoga practice where like you're living it. You're breathing it, you're doing it with your body, all these different elements, a common depiction of the eight limbs of yoga is a plant, actually either a plant or a wheel. So often you'll see kind of like a plant depiction in which you have the yamas and the niyamas. We'll dive into all of these in a moment that you have basically these foundational ones and then they kind of go in like a different order, like different like leaves on like a flower. And at the very top, there's a flower, which is like Samadhi or like kind of like union enlightenment. But there's also a common depiction of the eight limbs of yoga in which it's a wheel. So there's no true starting point or end point. It's this thing that's like continually turning the spokes of a wheel. I personally subscribe more to the wheel depiction versus like a plant depiction. And what I mean by that is, although I'll talk about these, you know, go through one by one. I, I, my personal belief, I'm open to being wrong, also totally fine if you believe something different. But from my experience practicing yoga, also teaching yoga and teaching people how to teach yoga, is that a lot of these different elements is that it's not like you need to master one before you can move on to the next. It's not like a video game where it's like you beat level one and then you've unlocked level two. To me, it feels like a lot of these you're working on simultaneously. And sometimes there'll be certain elements, certain spokes of this wheel, certain limbs in which you're spending more time or maybe you're spending less time. And to me, it doesn't feel like this thing where it's like you master the yamas, then you can move on to the yamas. Because to me, there is no true like mastery of yoga, of meditation necessarily, maybe even of the self. I kind of go, you know, back, well, I take that one back. I do think there is like, at some point, you know, maybe you could fully master the self. But I don't think it's like the same levels idea or like, you do this and then you do that. Like you can't really quantify progress in that way. It's just like a continual turning or evolution within yourself. And you'll need like different limbs at different times to kind of unlock different things to explore different parts of yourself. But if you Google, you're a visual person and you Google the yoga sutras, a lot of times you'll see it like. As a flower or like in a particular order, but I think of it more as like a wheel, like it's always turning and you kind of like need them all to keep that wheel turning. So so let's dive right in. What are the eight limbs of yoga? Where do they come from? Who created them? All of that jazz. Let's talk about it. Also, this is like giving me so much nostalgia because I haven't done it in a while, but I used to lead 200 hour yoga teacher trainings. They were just like so special. Every time I did it, I was always like really, really special. And there's, you know, we have a very long lecture and like exploration of yoga. So I'm nostalgic, like talking about this here. I just love this stuff. It's so cool. So the eight limbs of yoga, they're like this foundational framework that's outlined in the yoga sutras. Patanjali is the one who wrote the yoga sutras that we'll talk about. Is Patanjali actually a person or a collection of people? He's a little bit mysterious. But if you were to go on Amazon and try to pick up a copy of the yoga sutras, it would say that it was written by Patanjali. And in this text, this classical text, it talks about the practice and the philosophy of yoga and how the limbs are kind of these these this roadmap, this framework for how to live a well-rounded, like comprehensive yoga practice. And so he lays out these eight limbs. There's a lot more in there, too. So if anyone is like when I get emails and DMs of people being like, do you have a book recommendation? I'm trying to deepen my yoga practice. Looking into the yoga sutras, I think it's always an interesting place to start. It's not like particularly long of a text. It is one where you kind of like read a little bit, let that sit with you for a bit and decide kind of, you know, to pick it apart in your own brain, digest it, and then you can go back. But I do think that the yoga sutras are a nice place to go if you're looking to deepen your practice, because there's a lot more than just like the eight limbs of yoga in there. It's kind of our first like yoga how-to that was written down. So looking at Patanjali, he is, we don't know that much about him. I will tell you what we do know or at least suspect. I'll also tell you the controversy isn't the right word, but let's explore Patanjali for a second because, you know, he's a little bit mysterious. We love a mysterious yogi. So the information we have about Patanjali is somewhat limited and people do debate, you know, whether he was a real person, who his identity was. But this is kind of such a deep dive, like this is generally what you'll find. So Patanjali was believed to have lived in ancient India. We don't know the exact time. This is actually one of the big things that's debated is like when did Patanjali actually live? But I would say you usually see around like 200 BCE ish. Some people will say earlier. But that's kind of the estimate that's out there. And part of this, too, as I've said, is some people debate whether or not Patanjali was like an individual or if he was Patanjali was like different kind of scholars and philosophers, like different people that collectively came together and like wrote as Patanjali. So that's why it's also a little bit hard to pinpoint a time, because if it's multiple people, it could have spanned across like different times. But 200 BCE is seems to be what at least on the Internet is mostly agreed upon. But it is somewhat debated. Like I said, some people will say earlier than that. It's also important that, you know, to note that Patanjali's life and the details of his biography, they're really kind of ambiguous. They are not necessarily like well known. And again, there's this theory, was he a person or is he just kind of this name that people symbolically gave to represent like the collective wisdom of the ancient yoga traditions? That is unknown. But what we do know is that Patanjali's teachings, whether Patanjali was a person with a collection of people, the writings of Patanjali, whatever that is, has had this really long lasting impact on the philosophy of yoga to this day. You take yoga teacher training and a lot of them are studying Patanjali, his writings and his work. But that's really all we have for like who was Patanjali. It's really it's not a lot to to go off of, which I think it's kind of fun. It's kind of mysterious. But the big piece Patanjali is best known for is compiling the yoga sutras. So this text, like the actual yoga sutras itself, if you pick up a book, it's the sutras usually with like commentary, with analysis. And the book itself only has one hundred and sixty seven sutras and like the sutras themselves are like not that long. You could read through all of the sutras like just from getting down to like an hour or two. It's not that long, but it's then usually then the analysis that goes with it that takes a little bit more time. And these one hundred and ninety six sutras provide guidance on like the philosophy of yoga, the practices. There is one yoga pose in it and it's what we would call like an easy seated yoga pose. So that is that's it. That's the only pose I'm going to get in there. And it's considered the yoga sutras is considered like one of the foundational texts for classical yoga philosophy. And then within these sutras, we get the eight limbs of yoga, which is where, you know, it's really this guide on how to live a path of yoga, including like ethical principles, physical postures, priority, easy seated position, breathing exercises. Stages of meditation, that sort of thing, it gets laid out in these sutras, which is why we use it a lot in teaching yoga, this foundational text. So diving into the actual eight limbs and you might be thinking for those who've been around for a while and you're like, Kelly, what kind of a companion meditation are we going to have to this episode? Like, where are we going here? I'm so glad you asked. One, as you know, one of the limbs is meditation. So technically any meditation we did with this would be a companion episode. But I want to talk about the yamas and the yamas first and the yamas and the nyamas are they just like captured my heart when I learned about them. Like it truly I think the yamas and the nyamas, which are these first two limbs that we're going to talk about, like maybe it sounds dramatic to say that they changed my life. But when I kind of looked at this sort of like ethical framework in a way, it just it really clicked with me. It resonated with me. And I was like, it just it really changed the way I looked at things. And we did read about the yamas and the nyamas in the Yoga Sutras, but also again, if you've been around for a while, you've heard me talk about this. There's a book by a woman called Deborah Adele. She's also from Minnesota, but she lives in different parts of the northern part. I've heard her speak before. It was like iconic, it was like, oh, my gosh, I was like. I just like a nine year old girl at like a Backstreet Boys concert again when I went and heard Deborah Adele speak when I was like 29 years old. But anyways, I've heard her speak a couple of times. It's really great. She has a book that is called The Yamas and the Nyamas, and I highly recommend it. That's the other one where if people are asking for recommendations for like deepening their yoga practice, a lot of times I'll recommend that book as well. It's an easy read, but like a profound read. And she goes through all the yamas and the nyamas like one by one. She has like teachings, insights, things like that. And for whatever reason, that just is one of those books that has always resonated with me, like every time I pick it up or I read a portion, I kind of pick something new out of it. So there is yoga book club recommendation. The Day of the Yamas and the Nyamas by Deborah Adele. So we're going to start with the yamas and the yamas. This is technically the first limb, we'll just call it limb number one. But remember, you know, Kelly's yoga school, I personally don't think that, you know, like like I don't think that you would have to fully master the ethical guidelines of like the practice of yoga before you'd be able to practice a breath work or a meditation or a physical posture, which are all different limbs. I don't believe that. Again, open to being wrong, also open to other opinions here. That's just the conclusion I've come to. So the yamas are the ethical and moral guidelines that really kind of provide the principle for how individuals should like interact with the external world. So I think of the yamas as being like, how do you interact with the world around you? And then the yamas are kind of like, how do you treat the world like within you? So how do you interact with yourself? So the yamas, there's five of them. They are ahimsa, which is nonviolence. So ahimsa, nonviolence or non harming. Yes, it it comes, you know, the literal translation of like non harming and like not being violent is kind of its literal translation. But what I think about when it comes to ahimsa, too, is nonviolence towards all living beings, but also towards the self and thinking about all the places that we can cause or all the ways we can cause harm or violence towards one another and towards ourselves, like through the way that we think about ourselves, the way we talk about ourselves, the way we talk to others or about others. You know, even like certain looks that you give people, there's many different ways that you can cause harm to others. And so ahimsa really asks you to question and to look at where am I causing harm? How can I do less of that? And the second yama is going to be truthfulness. Now, truthfulness and non harming or nonviolence really go hand in hand because there's a way to be truthful. Right. So truthfulness, practice of honesty and thought, speech, action. You know, we know what truthfulness is, but there's a way of being truthful that doesn't cause harm. And this is one of those things I was first saying about this. It just like, I don't know, just like broke my brain. I was like, why I never thought of it that way. But you know how sometimes you have people and they're saying like, well, I'm just gonna be honest with you. Well, or, you know, well, if you know, if you really want me to be honest and you know what the next thing is going to follow is like the sledgehammer, it's like they're not actually practicing truthfulness in a way that is intended to be non harming. There is a way to absolutely speak your truth and to be honest without the intention of harming. There's also a way of kind of using truthfulness as like a mask or deterrent or a excuse to just kind of be mean. Right. So, yeah, that's those two are very closely linked. And we're looking at the almas as a whole, our kind of base principle, like non harming that applies to our truthfulness as well. And like how we how we speak to people and thinking about the intention behind our words for both others and to ourselves. And is that, you know, harming or not? Then we have non stealing and non stealing is, yes, of course, like, you know, don't go and like be a thief of like actual things. But a big piece of non stealing and what's always resonated with me is this idea of like don't take away from like others opportunities or like respecting other people's boundaries. That's a huge one of non stealing. Right. Because if you're overstepping someone else's boundaries, if you really are kind of stealing from them in a way, taking away from them and non stealing can be really the sign of like respect towards others. And also, I see this a lot in terms of non stealing. And I think about this as a parent as well, is not stealing opportunities from your children, like to struggle. And what I mean by that is, you know, we learn a lot of things in our struggle, like whether you call it like helicopter parenting or like in the Midwest, sometimes they call it like snowplow parenting, where you just kind of like push any obstacle out of the way for your child so they can have an easy road. And that in a way is actually stealing their opportunity to learn how to navigate challenges and to remove those obstacles themselves. And that always stuck with me in terms of like. Kind of less obvious ways that we can like steal from someone, including giving them the opportunity to like rise to the occasion, to become resilient, to do hard things because they can and to learn some of those life lessons that we have been able to learn through our struggles. Again, I think about that a lot in the context of like parenting and just like not stealing the opportunity for kind of your kids to do things on their own. That just always stuck with me. Then we have moderation. You will see kind of this. You'll see different. I guess that's what I'm looking for. Why are words so hard? You will see different interpretations. That's what I was looking for of, you know, what this word actually is. But like moderation is one that I kind of land on in terms of like just, you know, things in moderation, like kind of keeping control of your desires, not, you know, going crazy any direction, just being kind of responsible and balanced, like. In everything that you do. Moderation and balance, then we have non-possessiveness, this is the final Yama and non-possessiveness, sometimes it's called like non-greed, it really involves like letting go your attachments, especially material possessions and just kind of looking for. Sort of the fulfillment and happiness within, as opposed to like through possessions or wanting to like have things. So that one, I think it's just a good one in general, kind of this non-possessiveness and something that I think I talked about this. A couple of months ago, I think it was when I was sharing, I think I was answering your questions I was sharing like recently, I had a big kind of like health incident. You know, as my dog, if you're new here, she's a queen, you love her. She's also really big. I get this question all the time. And like I think people picture Mila as being like really little and she's not. She's a big Newfoundland, so she's huge. She's like 120 pounds. And we just love her to death. But I should this big health incident and we didn't know if she was going to make it or not. She did. So it has a happy ending. But one of the more interesting applications of. Non-possessiveness that I have heard was from one of my students and they read a book called The Holy Man and they were talking about how someone in this book had passed away and they said that, you know, it was time to give them back, basically. So like this idea of like everything's on loan to us in life, including like our loved ones and like how great and how special. But we don't like own people. We can't like possess. That doesn't sound right. Possess people. I hope not. But we can't like have like no one is really like ours. We can have beautiful relationships with people. We can love them so deeply, but like everything and everyone is kind of on loan to us in this life. So, I don't know, that always stuck with me when she said, you know, it's time. She had shared the insight in that book, like it's time to to give them back. So, yeah, that is, you know, that's the Yamas. That's how we interact with the world around us, according to Patanjali and his wisdom. And the greater idea around all of these Yamas is really that, you know, through practicing the Yamas, individuals not only like enhance their own well-being, but they can also cultivate this like deeper sense of inner peace, of like integrity, growth, of evolution, which are all big central goals kind of when you're in the yogic path. And a lot of this, like the final Yama is kind of this like awakening, union, enlightenment, all of this, like that's kind of the last limb. And all of this just helps us to kind of prepare to walk that path to ultimately get to that final step, like self-realization. And the Yamas are, you know, not excluded from that. They really just help you to kind of dig deeper and to evolve and to kind of see how you are a key player, can be a key player out in this world and how everything that you do matters and can have an impact. So definitely food for thought with the Yamas. Now, switching gears into the Niyamas, which is the second limb that we're going to talk about. So remember, if the Yamas are kind of like how you interact with the world around you, then the Yamas are going to be more of like personal observances, self-disciplines, like. How do you interact and treat like yourself, so it's more like me focused, so there's five Yamas as well. The first one is kind of cleanliness and purity, and this really asks us to kind of, of course, like they talk about like in the sutras, like maintaining good hygiene, things like that. But also kind of trying to create this clean, pure state, kind of try to find clarity and like cleanliness in someone's body, like in their life, in their environment, in their thoughts. Like, how can we kind of declutter and purify and clear? And I want to just make a little like pause here for a second, because I think sometimes this is where. We can go off the rails a little bit again, my opinion here, but this is not me saying that you need to necessarily like eat in a certain way or do certain practices or like go on this journey to become like the most pure vessel that you can ever be in your entire life. I think sometimes that can become a little bit of a slippery slope. So if you are reading like the Yoga Sutras, it will talk about some of those elements. But of course, always like grain of salt and doing what feels best to you. Like full disclosure today, I went to brunch and let me tell you, I did not necessarily feel my body was the most pure food ever. However, was it phenomenal brunch? Absolutely, especially for someone currently, as you know, I'm still pregnant as heck, like waddling around. Did I eat a glorious brunch and then have to come home and take a nap after that? Yeah, absolutely. It was like things that like ladies right on their to date dream of. It was fantastic. But anyways, I just want to do that little pause there is that this is not me saying that you need to do certain practices in a certain way. No, no. I like to think of this as like in terms of like cleanliness and purity for like body and environment, thoughts, all of that is like basically where can I remove some of the gunk? And that will look different for everyone. Maybe it's what you're eating, but also maybe it's kind of clearing out your, you know, the way that you think about yourself. Maybe it's even just like decluttering your home, like, you know, that has like that kind of like clean, like pure feeling does feel really good, like not just in body, but also like in thoughts and in environment, too. And then we have contentment, which is one of my personal favorites. Contentment, I really do think is like one of the secrets to like happiness in life. The practice of contentment, just being satisfied with what you have in the present moment, finding fulfillment just with what you have and little moments instead of kind of looking outward for it. Yeah, just contentment of like. Finding just happiness in the little things. Also, I think about this a lot in terms of contentment of like if you've done something that's really great, like you hit a big milestone or you had something really great, like just allowing yourself to be content in the celebration, the excitement of that moment instead of looking for the next thing or looking for where's the potential bad, like. Finding little moments of contentment, I think, at least for me, has been extremely transformational for like my well-being. And I think it's just something that is seems so simple, but is really hard to actually implement. Kind of this like just being content with things and you don't have to do it blindly where it's like, oh, I'm just content with everything. Everything's fine. I'm never going to try to improve anything. It's all just good. But like in little moments, just being like, you know, can I be content or like can I be content with just being here with myself is something we talk a lot about on retreat, especially retreats that incorporate like extra silence and alone time. Like how can I just be content sitting with myself and my own thoughts? It's such a hard but powerful practice. But contentment is a favorite one of mine. Then we have self-discipline. The Sanskrit term is tapas, which translates to like fire. And it's really kind of like this idea of like, like I think of tapas as this idea of like a controlled prairie burn, where sometimes you have to kind of burn some things down intentionally so that new and better and fresh can grow through. That's how it was described to me. That's always resonated with me. And this is kind of like the idea of practicing perseverance, self-discipline, kind of a willingness to endure some discomfort against some discomfort. I'm not asking you to do anything like crazy here. And, you know, in the pursuit of like goals or in the pursuit of like bettering yourself. And this can be as simple as like when you're doing a physical yoga pose, maybe holding it for like one more breath cycle, even though your legs are burning a little bit in the hopes of making them a little bit stronger. This could also look like, you know, getting knocked down, getting up and trying again, like that kind of stuff where it's like perseverance, self-discipline, even if you're like, you know what, I don't feel like getting out of bed and meditating today. Like if you want to really reduce your anxiety through meditation, you're just going to have to get up and do the practice anyway, like that kind of stuff. Then we have a self-study or self-reflection, and this is really kind of what it sounds like, you know, encouraging yourself to look inward, to study yourself, to reflect, to be introspective, explore your inner thoughts, emotions, beliefs, explore them, question them, come to your own conclusions, those type of things. This one is really about kind of gaining a deeper self-awareness and understanding of the self. And the last Niyama is surrender. And this is really kind of like surrendering the ego, letting go, like trusting, maybe acknowledging whatever you believe that maybe there's something bigger at play, letting go of that need to just like always like hold on to something. I believe it's in the surrender chapter that Deborah Adele says, like a bird can't hold on to its perch and fly at the same time. Like you can't like hold on to that certainty and that grasp of, you know, I know this is here all the time and also why. The reason that line has always like stuck with me too is that sometimes you just need to let go of what we know and trust that there's something else and kind of surrender to something bigger. And so the Niyamas are really significant in yoga for a few different reasons. There's, you know, the personal growth element, right? So the Niyamas, how we're interacting with ourself, how we show up every day, that's all about personal growth, self-improvement, evolving, kind of cultivating some of these deeper qualities within yourself. Also, you know, looking for balance in life, looking for kind of internal harmony and kind of that inner peace and then sort of that deeper development as well. And the Niyamas are really essential, like to the practice of yoga and helping someone kind of move towards their own self-realization and their own self-understanding, because yoga is like a practice of the self through the self. And there's really no other way to journey through, you know, to the self than through some of these different practices, you know, introspection, turning inward. Surrendering all of that, same with how Niyamas are essential to how we show up in the world. So Niyamas and the Niyamas, very big. I think that, again, this is one of those things that you're always just continually working on, like something you've ever fully mastered, like complete surrender or you or you've never in your whole life or at some point like never create harm in your life. Like these are things that we're always working to improve upon. And they're kind of these elements that we're just weaving into our life as best we can for our own like personal growth and showing up as kind of the best way that we can. So I'm moving on to limb number three or the third one we'll talk about. These are the Asanas or the yoga poses. So this is what we're probably most familiar with when we think of yoga, right? We think about, you know, that Instagram picture of like a bendy woman on the side of like a mountaintop doing some wild pose with an inspirational quote. The Asanas, that just refers to the physical postures or the yoga poses. So it's the practice of like the physical exercises that. Yeah, that's what this one is. And it's funny because the poses, like I said, in the Yoga Sutras, it only talks about kind of what we would call like an easy seated or like meditative positions. It's not until we get to the Hatha Yoga Pratapika, which is the next kind of yoga how to I think we get like twenty one or twenty three poses. But the poses themselves, like as we know them today, like if you're going to go to just like any studio and take like a yoga class and do a lot of poses, those are all designed to help prepare the body to sit in meditation. So it's designed to open the body, you know, make it kind of like supple and fluid so that you could sit in meditation for longer. So the poses are absolutely a part of yoga. But I really want to highlight that not the only part of yoga, all of these limbs kind of have equal importance and significance when practicing like a well-rounded yoga practice. So the poses, I mean, we know them. I don't have too many notes on this because this is usually what we're most familiar with. But, you know, we're doing these to increase our flexibility, improve our strength, have better posture, kind of like physically take care of our body and then also prepare ourselves to really be able to sit in meditation. There are some main groups of yoga poses, as I think is just kind of like a fun fact. If you're someone who hasn't done like yoga teacher training or like studied yoga classes, once you learn about these, the different categories of poses, it's really easy to see it in classes. So the big ones are going to be like standing foot balances. There's also going to be backbends or heart openers, forward folds, twists, inversions, hip openers, and then shavasana, which shavasana honestly could get its own freeform episode because it's one of those things that's like really overlooked, like you're just laying there. It's so much more than that. But then shavasana is always its own kind of category of poses and shavasana is that one where like you lay on the ground at the end and kind of like rest, maybe do a little meditation. That's what that is. And the poses are really kind of just cultivating the mind-body connection, preparing the body. We have a big piece of kind of that like tapas as well, kind of that self-discipline. So this is how we then like physically, like outwardly physically express our yoga pose. And then we move on to breathwork, which we did do a freeform episode on breathwork recently. It was back in July specifically on like breath meditation. So if you really want to deep dive into like breathwork, breath meditation, pranayama, it is the episode called Breath Meditation 101, I believe it was in July. But this is one of the limbs of yoga. So breath, breathwork is an important part of yoga. And pranayama is a Sanskrit term, excuse me, and it involves breath control and regulation, usually consists of like different breathing techniques, and it's all around kind of enhancing the flow of prana or life force. So pranayama, the word, it comes from two words actually, prana, which means life force or vital energy, and then yama, which means extension or control. So pranayama is kind of like the control of life force or vital energy. And so there really is, especially in yoga philosophy, this idea of like our breath is connected to our energy. So when you're working with like, you know, the different energy lines, the energetic highway, that one of the ways to really access that is through, is through breath. And in yoga philosophy, the breath is considered like the bridge between the body and the mind. So it's a vital force that sustains life and connects us to our inner being. And pranayama practices aim to harness and direct this life force for various physical, mental, emotional, spiritual benefits. Usually, you will not only, well, hopefully you're breathing throughout your whole practice, hopefully you're breathing just like throughout life, because if you don't breathe, we die people. So we have to breathe. But there are some common pranayama techniques that you'll see a lot in the yoga world, like things like alternate nostril breathing, even like ujjayi pranayama, which is kind of like that ocean breath, that slightly audible one. You usually see that in the vinyasa yoga class. There's like bellows breath, which is where you kind of like inhale and then do these little like, like short little exhales. Bumblebee breath, that's the one where you are trying to like calm the mind, reduce stress. And you do this by inhaling naturally, but then you use your hands, use your thumbs to plug your ears and your hands like cover your eyes. And then you kind of hum and it almost sounds like kind of just like the humming sound in your mind. That's one that's used a lot in yoga, too. And again, if you really want to dive into breath, breath meditation, breath practices, there's an episode all on that. But some of the benefits, just high level pranayama really offers a lot of different benefits, improved respiratory function, enhanced lung capacity. It is really good for the nervous system, stress reduction, increased energy, mental clarity, heightened awareness. And again, in yoga, we believe that it's kind of that connection between like mind and body, like the bridge between those two things is going to be the breath and doing breath practices in a yoga class or practice. Very common, it's one of those kind of foundational things that people are familiar with the like the physical aspect poses. Usually the next thing that comes is then they're familiar with like the breath or some of these breath practices they've done during yoga. So that's a limb. The next thing that we're going to talk about, another personal favorite of mine, that is pratyahara. So pratyahara is withdrawal of the senses from external distractions. You have heard me talk about this in the magic of yoga nidra free from episode, which is a couple of years old. But yoga nidra is a really intense practice of pratyahara. So withdrawal of the senses really involves like turning your attention inward, disconnecting from kind of like. Sensory like stimulus and really just like letting the external world fall away so that you can turn inward. So the word pratyahara, it comes from two Sanskrit words. So prati, which means away or against, and hara, which means like stimulus. So turning away or against stimulus. It's really about just redirecting your attention, shutting down the senses and experiencing the inward. And so the reason that I say yoga nidra is such a strong practice of pratyahara is that you really do take this journey and what you're intentionally journeying inward and like shutting down your senses. It's like, you know, you try to like kind of put the body to sleep, like the breath to sleep, all this stuff you try to put everything to sleep because yoga nidra translates to yoga, yogic sleep so that you can go deeper on an internal. Level, so it's really about withdrawing the senses, releasing from the external world, and it's important to note here that like you can have kind of like a big practice of pratyahara, which would be like a yoga nidra practice, or you can have like little pratyahara moments that can even be as simple as like if you're feeling overstimulated, you close your eyes and you just withdraw the sense of sight for a little bit. Or like if things are too loud, like cover your ears, put in your AirPods with noise cancelling and don't listen to anything. Just let it kind of dampen the sounds a little bit. Any kind of withdrawal of the senses or a sense is a practice of pratyahara, but then you can have these kind of like big intentional practices of it, like yoga nidra are getting like a really, really, really deep meditative state where you're trying to basically shut the senses off so that you aren't getting that like sensory stimulus anymore. And one of the key points of significance in terms of withdrawal of the senses, how it applies to yoga, is that when you can withdraw your attention from kind of external stimulus, that's where then you can focus inward and create stillness within, connect on a deeper level. So it really allows the mind to focus and settle. And then it allows you to be able to gaze on the internal instead of being so focused on what's happening on the external. It's also really good for helping to improve concentration. I think it's really good for if you're wanting to do some self-reflection, like, you know, as is explored in the yamas and the niyamas, you need to, in order to do self-reflection, you need to be able to turn inward to quiet the external world and be able to turn inward to do some of that reflection and that deeper work. It's also really nice for the nervous system, giving it a break, we're stimulated all the time. So pratyahara is great for that. So it can really just help you kind of create this more profound, introspective relationship with yourself and then cultivate the skill of being able to quiet and soothe your senses and kind of reduce the external stimulus. So the next two limbs I want to talk about together because I think they get confused for one another. I often sometimes struggle to see the difference or to articulate the difference. So I want to talk about them together because they're similar, but not the same. So that would be concentration, which is its own limb, and then meditation, which is its own limb. I'm imagining that if you're listening to this podcast, you're pretty familiar with meditation, have dabbled in it a little bit, pretty experienced with it. I guess I shouldn't say experience with it, but have experience with it. Not that you do not need to be like an expert meditator by any means to be a part of this mindfulness community. You can be an absolute beginner, but I'm assuming that we at least have had some kind of an experience with meditation, at least like a little bit. So I'm not going to talk as much about meditation. It's just a single point of concentration, the practice of sustained uninterrupted focus on a chosen object or thought. That's really kind of what meditation is, single point of concentration, just kind of letting you know, I like to describe it as if the mind is a light bulb. When we meditate, we take that light bulb and we turn it into a laser pointer and we focus it on one thing to kind of go to that deep meditative state. So then circling back to concentration, because they sound similar and they definitely are related, but they are different. And I'll explain kind of what Patanjali says is the difference between the two. So concentration is like focused attention. So it does involve fixing the mind on a single point. You know, it also can kind of help you to achieve like this mental stability and it just allows you to stay with a point of attention, whether it's like physical. You can look at like a flame that you're looking at, like candle gazing, a sound, a mantra, a visual image, something that's internal. You focus on your breath or like a different chakra or something. You know, just focusing on one thing at a time. And it's really about kind of cultivating that mental discipline, that mental control, learning how to direct and sustain the mind's attention on one thing and reduce distractions. Sometimes people will talk about this idea of concentration as like or the way that Patanjali describes it as kind of being in that like flow state where you're really like dialed in, you are focused, you are concentrating and you are just like in it and you're in that flow state, everything else kind of disappears and you're just absorbed in your point of focus. So, again, that sounds really similar to meditation, right? And I'll say I personally think that these two kind of go hand in hand. It's almost like you start with concentration and then that can get you into that more meditative state where you're like meditating and remembering that this is coming from Patanjali's lens, right? So 200 BCE, where we're thinking of meditation as being like in this really deep. Like meditative state, like you've heard me describe this before, but like deep, deep, deep meditation where it's like you maybe feel like you've been meditating for 10 minutes, you open your eyes, it's been two hours. And so I think of it when when I've read the sutras and I explore it is like concentration gets you to meditation in a way it kind of opens the door to really focusing the mind. And then a meditation, you kind of dip deeper into that meditative state. So Patanjali kind of says that the difference between the two is going to be that concentration is a practice of focus, concentration, where the mind is trained to remain fixed on a chosen point. So it's an active process that then leads you to the state of meditation, which is a deeper, effortless state of meditation where the mind naturally rests just in that state of meditation. So I also found kind of when I was looking, I was looking through some of my books that I have that are different interpretations of the Yoga Sutras, and it was saying concentration is like aiming a spotlight on a specific target where meditation is then the experience of being fully illuminated in the spotlight. So you can be like fully absorbed in what the spotlight is focusing on. So when I think when I personally teach meditation using kind of Patanjali's lens, I'm definitely using both concentration and meditation together and kind of calling that meditation. But in the eight limbs of these two separate practices is the practice of concentration, kind of that like flow state, that focus state. And then there's just the state of meditation, like that state of just like being. So Jon Kabat-Zinn kind of describes this as like dropping in. So like. Maybe the concentration is like the dropping in, but then the meditation is like once you've like dropped and you're just in it, it's like this state of meditation of being. And again, open to being wrong, open to interpretations. I personally do think that you kind of need both together. I do lump these together a lot where you kind of start with concentration that can lead to deeper states of meditation. But in the eight limbs of yoga, they're two separate limbs and we should be practicing like. These two, and if it still seems a little bit confusing or you're not sure how you feel about that, that's not a problem. I change my mind on this sometimes, too, and I think it's kind of like one of those things where they're really closely related, but not quite the same. And I kind of think about. I don't know, I think about those two and the difference a lot, and sometimes I change my mind, but that's the general conclusion that I've come to as to like. The difference between concentration meditation is kind of like concentration is that first step, which then can lead you to deeper states of meditation, and we have now arrived at our final limb, our eighth limb, which is Samadhi. You will see a lot of different interpretations as to what that term actually means. But Samadhi is really my understanding of it is that it's kind of like this ultimate state of like union with your highest self. So it's like the deepest awareness. Sometimes you'll see it called like pure bliss. It's like where the ego self and like the highest self kind of merge. It's all about this kind of self realization that sometimes you'll see it. People will say that it translates to like awakening or enlightenment, liberation of the self. But this one, this is the only one where I do feel like this would be like the last step or the last level in a way. All the other ones I think we're consistently working on and they're kind of preparing us for this moment of sort of like liberation, of union, of higher evolution, higher consciousness, this kind of Samadhi state. All the other the seven other limbs are kind of these vehicles where we're refining ourselves, we're working on ourselves, we're turning inwards, we're improving. Patanjali describes it, at least in one of the interpretations that I've read, describes it as like. If you're a piece of coal and the other seven limbs are kind of like that pressure that you put the coal under and then Samadhi is like then when you emerge a diamond in a way, so you're doing all of these other things to really kind of create that pressure to refine the coal. And then when you emerge as a diamond like that's kind of Samadhi. So that's the only one I don't think you start there. I think that's more of like Samadhi is the destination. I think it would be really hard to be in that state, to be enlightened, if you will, to be, you know, your highest, greatest self when you haven't even dabbled in like non harming or like taking a deep breath or anything like that. So this is the only one where I'm like, OK, this I think is definitely like the final step in a way. And we're working on all the other seven limbs to kind of work towards this higher being state, this like diamond state where the other seven are like putting pressure on the piece of coal. And so Samadhi is the final limb. And again, if you look deeper into this, there's a lot of different interpretations as to what that word actually means or what that kind of final state is. But it's really just about like union with the highest self, like union with the divine, liberation, bliss, like reaching a higher state of consciousness, really getting kind of self realization, like transformation of the self. It's it's really where like the individual self kind of merges with like the greater self or the highest self. And you know that you can have then sort of this awakening of like truth and like being and evolution. And it's something that. I imagine it's hard to describe, I can't say that I hold this closure, I do not feel like I'm this like awakened, enlightened being, I'm like, oh, let me tell you people what it's like. I don't know. I'm so I'm still working towards this. I'm still working on practicing my yoga in all of these other seven ways. And then hopefully one day then I will understand some of this sort of Samadhi state. Something that I also in. One of the versions of the yoga sutras that I've read, and this has always stuck with me, is that reaching Samadhi or reaching this like final state, it is a process. And the way that it was described to me is like when you're starting your yoga journey, you're starting in this like dark room, totally dark. Maybe you just wake up, you're in this dark room and you try to gather some information. You know, maybe you're like, oh, maybe I'm sitting on a chair. Right. You kind of feel around and you know, you you come to conclusions based on the information you have. And then through the practice of yoga, it's like letting in a little bit of light in that room. So then maybe a curtain raises an inch and it lets in a little bit of light. And then you can look around and you're like, oh, I wasn't sitting on a chair. I'm actually sitting on a bench or I'm sitting on a bed or something like that. And then the light, there's a little more light that comes in. You're like, oh, and not only is this bench that I'm sitting on here, it's this color and like you're letting in a little more light, a little more light, a little more light over time. And then you're able to gather more information and get a clearer picture of what's happening kind of within you and around you. And then ultimately, when you reach Samadhi, you'd be like that curtain hasn't been raised like all the way and the room is flooded with light and you can just like clearly see what's happening. And that description is always kind of stuck with me is like when when we do different things, we do our meditation, we do our breath work, we practice non harming, all of that. It's like we're trying to let a little more light into the room so you can get a clearer picture of what's happening. So a few takeaways about the eight limbs of yoga other than I personally just think they're really interesting. They're all equally important. Definitely, you will see some depicted more commonly than others like poses, breath and meditation, but they're all equally important. They all make up the practice of yoga. Yoga is so much more than poses. So if you're thinking about yoga as a whole, according to Patanjali, you need to be working on all of these things at once. Again, taking that piece of coal, refining it, ultimately working on turning it into a diamond and that it's in that it is a process. It is a long process. It's constant, you know, evolving, changing, growing, turning inward, doing something different, challenging yourself, honoring yourself. It's just constant again, like wheel this cycle of working towards this sort of more. I don't know, enlightened, it feels like such a big word to use, but more. Just evolved version of yourself that you need to do all of these things, and that's really what encompasses the practice of yoga. So that is the eight limbs of yoga. Hopefully you found that is interesting. Everyone is like, oh, I'd love to just sit and talk about the eight limbs of yoga for an hour. I could probably talk about them for like multiple. I have talked about them for multiple hours. I just think it's really interesting because we have such a narrow definition of what yoga is. And we often think of yoga and meditation as like being separate. And they are. They're different practices, but we often don't realize that, like in some of these foundational texts, they put meditation as a piece of the practice of yoga. A lot of what we first know of as, quote, yoga is what we would call meditation. Now, like again, Patanjali only talked about kind of an easy seated position, a meditative position. The poses were kind of the last piece to really come to all of this, at least the ones that we know of today. You know, Patanjali, I don't imagine is doing a lot of down dogs or tree poses or anything like that. We just looked at yoga differently then. So I just find all this really interesting and maybe just like picking one element out of these and being like, you know what, I want to explore the yamas in my life a little bit this week. I want to maybe try some breath or I want to really cultivate concentration and just kind of dabbling, trying something new, I think is really fun. Or if you are a yoga lover, maybe this gave you some different insight into what, you know, yoga really is. So that is where I will leave you with the eight limbs of yoga. I appreciate you. Sunday's meditation is going to be an ahimsa or non harming meditation, a peaceful heart meditation. That's going to be our companion meditation for this. So picking one of the yamas and creating a meditation practice around that and that is it. Thank you for being here. Thank you for listening. I appreciate you so much and I hope that wherever you are that you're having a beautiful day.