Aṣṭāṅga Yoga is not limited to a sequence of postures: it unites eight limbs that act together. Yama, niyama, āsana, prāṇāyāma, pratyāhāra, dhāraṇā, dhyāna and samādhi are not abstract steps, but a living path of unification.
Eight limbs, not eight steps
This letter was written in November 2012 in Athens.
“Yoga is the union of the individual soul with the cosmic soul.”
B. K. S. Iyengar
Many imagine the eight limbs codified by Patañjali as the steps of a staircase, to be climbed one after the other. This is a mistake: the “limbs” (aṅga) form a whole, an undivided set. To strengthen a body, we do not work one arm one year and the other the next: we offer a gradual but global work. Likewise, the eight limbs are cultivated together.
The eight limbs
- Yama: the universal laws of life (non-violence, integrity, purity of thought…).
- Niyama: the rules we set ourselves (simplicity, purification, contentment…).
- Āsana: the postures.
- Prāṇāyāma: the breathing exercises.
- Pratyāhāra: the withdrawal of the senses inward.
- Dhāraṇā: firm, stable attention, concentration.
- Dhyāna: meditation, presence to oneself.
- Samādhi: the luminous consciousness that has rejoined the Absolute.
A global practice: rāja yoga
With yama and niyama, we leave the profane space for the sacred; with āsana and prāṇāyāma, the daily discipline on the mat leads to pratyāhāra; dhāraṇā keeps the mind concentrated, helped by the drishti and the breath; then comes dhyāna, a deep peace, and when it crosses the body, the heart and the soul, it is samādhi. This is why the practice is called rāja yoga, the “royal yoga”: whole, not fragmented. Meditation is not a technique, but an awareness of what we truly are.
“We are not in a moral, political or financial crisis: we are in an evolutionary crisis. We are dying to humanity to be born to something else.”
Satprem
Om Shanti,
Jean-Claude Garnier
In short
The eight limbs of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga form a global path: posture, breath, ethics and meditation advance together towards unity.
