Thanks to Patanjali: The king of serpents — the remover of impurities of the mind

Every ardent yoga practitioner knows Patanjali. How? Because of a text that he had penned down on Yoga. A single piece of text, that has immense power to transform you, your life in turn.

Patanjali is known to be a mythological character because his origins have no concrete proof. His work is so divine that he is seen as an incarnation of God himself. And he looks like this:

Now, being an ancient text, what is in the Yoga Sutra for a modern learner?

Why is the Yoga Sutras still profound?

1. The Yoga Sutras are applicable for everybody — regardless of their caste, religion, age, sex, etc.
2. The text never asks for beliefs from the reader. IT just lays down pure facts about how the human mind works and how to be at peace with oneself. No prerequisites here – Except that you empty your mind before learning from this text:)
3. It is timeless. The text was written down sometime between 500 BCE and 400 CE, but it is still relevant to us even today! Because it is based on human nature which hasn’t changed much right from our evolution.
4. The same Sutra can mean different based on the reader — because the level of understanding the same Sutra differs from person to person, their age, and stage of their life. What I understand from the text right now will be beaten by what I understand three years down the line.
5. The Ashtanga yoga, Kriya yoga and all the baby yoga forms that branched out of them, sprouted from this text.
6. I am sure you will not touch another self-help book after this. Because this book beats all. No kidding!

Personally, The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali is a text that I go to, whenever I feel there is a Duhkha (conflict) in my life. I open the book and chant it with a question in my mind, mostly about the problem I face.

I have experienced that somehow all the problems boil down to my attachment to results or wanting the result of my actions to be a certain way, wanting people around me to act a certain way.

The seed of the problems I face, is always within me!

When I keep going back to the text, there is this overwhelming feeling of gratitude that I have for the one who gave us this knowledge, Patanjali.

I owe him a lot 🙂

But I can do nothing but show my love and devotion for him across time and realms that separate us. Or maybe he is right within each of us — Within everybody that appears before me to teach life — every single minute.

All of life is education and everybody is a teacher and everybody is forever a pupil — Abraham Maslow

And for all the knowledge that Patanjali has given us, I just cannot say enough how much I am thankful — all I can but do to show my devotion is by this chant:

Yogena cittasya padena vacam
Malam sarirasyaca vaidyakena
Yopakarottam prvaram muninam
Patanjalim pranjaliranato’smi
Abahu purusakaram
Sankha cakrasi dharinam
Sahasra sirasam svetam
Pranamami Patanjalim

To the noblest of sages, Patanjali,
who gave us yoga for serenity of mind,
grammar for purity of speech and
medicine for the perfection of the body,
I salute.
I salute before Patanjali whose upper
body has a human form, whose arms
hold a conch, and disc and a sword,
who is crowned by a thousand headed
cobra. Oh incarnation of Adisesa my
humble salutations to thee

What epiphanies about life have you had because of the Yoga Sutras?

How thankful are you to Patanjali?

Namaste!