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Chapter 2

Transformation of the Body through Yog

Yog transforms the physical body. Forbearance (Yama), which includes veracity and chastity; religious observance, which includes internal and external purity; posture and Pranayam play an important role in this transformation. Regular practice of Yog keeps the physical and mental organs active and maintains their natural condition.

Needless to say that natural functioning of organs is the main mantra for a healthy living. The life dependent on artificial organs cannot be stable. Over medication, especially allopathic medicines finish the chances of rejuvenation of physical organs in their natural form leaving aside their sensitivity. A medicine taken to cure a particular disease, gives rise to a new disease. These physical diseases finally give birth to mental diseases.

Different yogic processes like posture, Pranayam, devotion, mudras, bandhas, Shatkarma etc. are used in order to purify the blood, vital life energy, nerves, glands etc. All the diseases and disorders are removed from the body totally. The life including proper diet, sleep, and celibacy is always enjoyable and healthy. The philosophers of Yog have included forbearance and religious observance as the two primary branches of Ashtanga Yog, and are actually the basis of a healthy society and people. Forbearance, which includes not doing injury to living things, not veracity, avoidance of theft, chastity and non-acceptance of gifts is helpful in all round development and building a good civilized society. Religious observance which includes external and internal purity, cheerfulness or contentment, austerity, chanting Vedic hymns, devoted reliance on the lord are determinants of personal progress. It should not be understood that non-violence and other acts of forbearance have no purpose in personal progress. Ultimately, acceptance of people’s disciplined and civilized life is acceptance and discipline of the society. Non-violence and other forbearance except celibacy are with reference to the society whereas, religious observance are with reference to individual. Saint Patanjali has called forbearance as the greatest religious vow on the basis of this aspect. The meaning is very clear that the people inquisitive of learning Yog should not be impatient in following non-violence and other acts of forbearance in the name of place, period and condition. However, the suitable place, period and condition could be necessary with respect to external and internal purity, austerity and chanting Vedic hymns etc. The word ‘austerity’ used with respect to religious observances has been elaborated in great detail in Indian literature.

Saint Patanjali has given a very brief note on the form of yog in the form of Kriya Yog. Austerity is also an important part of this Kriya Yog along with chanting of Vedic hymns and devoted reliance on the lord. It has been mentioned clearly that austerity is the developed form of physical and mental energy and consciousness not just exploitation of physical organs. According to Patanjali, tolerating confusion is austerity, energy at physical level and logical thinking at mental level give a person the ability to tolerate confusion. Indian sages have recognized these confusions at physical and mental levels in the form of hunger-thirst, cold-hot, happiness-unhappiness, loss-gain, fame-defame victory-defeat etc. The continuous widening of the ability of tolerating confusion is patience, which is known as the basis quality of personal, family, social, political, religious and spiritual life of the individual. Lord Krishna further elaborates austerity. He included the factors of forbearance and religious observances under austerity and declared it as physical, verbal and mental. Actually, luxurious life full of pretense deteriorates the moral values of a person. A person habituated to leading a comfortable life cannot imagine leading a life without these comforts. The person feels handicapped in the absence of comforts even if he is a fully able person. This attitude makes a person diseased. At this point the nature appears like an enemy. Austerity is an invitation to forbid luxurious and comfortable life style and live in proximity with nature.

Posture or aasan is a popular branch of Yog to maintain the physical balance. Saint Patanjali is very generous and simple while defining aasan. According to him, stable and comfortable position is aasan. Different writers have different opinions with respect to number of aasan and the most interesting is the one given in Dhyanbindupanishadkar According to it, the number of postures is equal to the number of species of life. It is necessary to strengthen the muscles and nerves in order to keep the body healthy. Posture and exercise strengthen the muscles and nerves. Exercise plays a very important role in supplying the nourishment to different parts of the body obtained through food. Absence of exercise gives rise to imbalanced body. Posture and light exercises strengthen our respiratory system. The therapists are using different yogsana in the successful treatment of various diseases. Different diseases occurring in stomach, neck, spine and knees are cured with popular aasans. Yog is fully capable of transforming the physical body.

Health, Exercise and Yog

The human body is the chariot and the sensory organs are horses. The mind makes the horses ride the chariot, in other words the sensory organs are the driving force for the mind. They make the mind wander in all direction, in heaven and hell. If the wheels of the chariot become weak or lose, if the reigns do not have the strength to drive it then the journey of life becomes difficult.

The great poet Kalidas has said, “sariramadyam khalu dharma sadhanam“, this means the first source for duty is a healthy body. If the body is not healthy then the mind is not healthy. If the mind is not healthy then thoughts are also not healthy. If the thoughts are not healthy then how can one fulfill the duties? Therefore it is necessary to keep the body healthy, this is the first duty.

Sushrut Sanhita mentions the following qualities for healthy body – the body where the tridoshas i.e., vata, pitta and kapha are in equilibrium, the digestion process is functioning properly, the process of evacuation, bowel movement and humors is carried properly, the sensory organs, soul and mind are healthy.

samadoshah samagnishca samadhatumalakriyah

prasannatmendrivyamanah svastha ityabhidhiyate

Actually health is most important for all the activities. An unhealthy person cannot enjoy the worldly happiness. A sick person cannot enjoy the taste of delicious food items, wear good clothes, cannot take part in celebrations and other festivals. All these things have no value for a sick person. Therefore it has been aptly said that the first happiness is a healthy body.

Proper exercise is necessary to keep the body healthy and strong. Those who do not do exercise they become lazy and inactive. Exercise makes the hands legs and the whole body strong, it makes the body active and fit. The digestion process is maintained, the appetite improves, the mind remains happy and the person feels like working. The blood formulation is proper and the person gets a good figure. Regular exercise reduces the weight of the person due to vata dosha. The person who enjoys exercise does not fall sick. His body is strong like a diamond. His heart is always filled with enthusiasm, self-confidence and he is brave hearted.

Saint Charak says that regular exercise makes the body healthy, gives glow to the cheeks, develops the muscles, increases the digestive fire, gets rid of laziness, gives stability, evacuates faeces (bodily waste matter derived from ingested food and the secretions of the intestines and discharged through the anus) and other waste and makes the body light.

Therefore, exercise is the main basis, which provides rasa to the tree like body and maintains good health. The deeper the roots of the tree, the stronger and long-lived it is. In the same way the person who practices exercises regularly, his life is full of zeal and happiness. Exercise not only makes the body health but it also strengthens the mind and brain. The strong mind and brain glows the personality of the person and becomes capable of being called a good human being. This is not important that a person is at a good position and is related to a special religion or community, what is important is that he is a good human being and he has the feeling of helping others.

There are different ways of doing exercises. Dips, wrestling, running, horse riding, swimming, short put, football, kabbadi etc. games and sports are prevalent in India since the ancient times.

Yog Aasan and Pranayam also Make the Body Healthy

Brisk walking is also beneficial for the overall health. Exercise should be practiced depending on the condition of the person. All the exercises are not helpful for everyone. Running and jumping exercises are beneficial for the children, the youth can benefit from sports, the old and people related to the mental work should go morning and evening walk. Cricket, hockey, football, volleyball, tennis and polo are some of the popular sports. There are good sources of exercise. Dancing, grinding, drawing water from the well and simple yog aasan are beneficial for the women.

Some people work very hard throughout the day for sake of living. Such people enjoy good health, but the people working in sedentary jobs have poor health. Every person should practice exercises depending on his physical requirement and strength. Over exercising can be very harmful. Charak Sanhita mentions the harmful effects and says – over exercise can result in tiredness, weariness, deterioration, bleeding piles, vomiting, palpitation, cough, and fever.

shrama klama kshayastushna raktapitta pratamakah

ati vyayamatah kaso jvarachardishva jayate

Some rules should be followed for doing exercises, for example

1. Exercises should never be done after taking meals.

2. It should be practiced in open air, gardens etc.

3. The mouth should be closed while doing exercises and deep breaths should be taken through nostrils.

4. Massage the body with oil and then take bath for activeness.

5. Eating simple, pious food and having pure thoughts is the basis for healthy life.

The habit of doing exercises should be developed from childhood itself. Those who practice exercises from young age, have sharp brain, healthy and fit body. Sports and exercises should be compulsory for the students in the schools. The schools where this type of provision is not available there it should be implemented. Every person has a desire that he should live up to 100 years with name and fame but this is possible only when his body is healthy. The body can remain healthy only when the person practices exercises regularly. Hence proper exercise is a must for a healthy body and they are supplementary to each other.

Yog of the Mandukya Upanishad

We observe that the human individual is a microcosmic specimen of the entire creative process of the cosmos. The layers or degrees of reality which constitute the composition of the universe of creation are also to be found in the human individual in the form of the Kosas or the sheaths, as they are called – physical, vital, mental, intellectual and causal-known in the Sanskrit language as Annamaya Kosa, Pranomaya Kosa, Manomaya Kosa, Vijnanamaya Kosa and Anandamaya Kosa. These are the five layers of objectivity which, in a gradational form, externalize consciousness. The grosser the sheath, the greater is the force of externality, so that when consciousness enters the physical body we are totally material in our outlook, physical in our understanding and assessment of values, intensely body-conscious, and know nothing about ourselves except this body. It is only when we go interior that we have access to the subtler layers of our personality – not otherwise. The Taittiriya Upanishad dealt with subject of the five layers, known as the Kosas; and the Mandukya Upanishad, which is another important Upanishad, sometimes considered as the most important, deals with the very same Kosas in a different way, namely, by the elucidation of the involvement of consciousness in these Kosas.

The five have been classified into three groups – the physical, the subtle and the causal. In the waking state in which we are now, for instance, the physical body is intensely operative and we always think in terms of physical body, physical objects and physical sensations. This physical sensation is absent in the state of dream, but three of the Kosas operate in dream. In the waking condition, all the five are operating, concentrating their action on the physical body mostly. In the dream state the physical body is not operating, but the vital, the mental and the intellectual sheaths are active. The Prana is there, the mind is there, the intellect also is there also in a diminished intensity. We breath, we think and we understand in the state of dream. That means Prana, Manas and Buddhi all are active in the state of dream, minus the physical element, namely the body consciousness. In the state of deep sleep, none of these are active; neither the body is operating there, nor the mind, nor the intellect, nor is there any consciousness that we are even breathing. The consciousness is withdrawn entirely from all the sheaths – physical, vital, mental and intellectual. There is only one sheath that is operating in the state of sleep – that is the causal sheath, called in Sanskrit.

In the waking condition the senses are very active, physically and materially. The Anandamaya Kosa Mandukya Upanishad tells us that we enjoy, experience and contact things in nineteen ways in the waking state. Consciousness has nineteen mouths through which it eats the food of objective experience. What are these nineteen mouths? They are the five senses of knowledge – seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting and touching. With these five sensations we come in contact with things in the world outside, and enjoy them with actions and reactions produced thereby, by means of such sensory contact. These five mentioned are called senses of knowledge – Jnanya Indriyas. They are so called because they give us some sort of knowledge – either of sight, or sound, or taste, or smell, or touch. Apart from these five senses of knowledge, there are five organs of action; they do not give us any independent knowledge, but they act. The hand that grasps is one organ of action. The speech that articulates words is another organ of action. The feet that cause locomotion or movement are also organs of action. The generative organ and the excretory organ also are two of the active elements or organs of action. They act, but they do not give any new knowledge. Whatever idea, knowledge, experience, etc. we may have through any one of these organs of action comes through the sensations already mentioned, namely, the Jnana Indriyas. Even when the organs of action act and we are conscious that they are acting, this consciousness is available only through the Jnana Indriyas and not separately though the organs of action, which do not give additional knowledge. It looks as if we have some sensation even through the organs of action, but actually it is not so. The sensation, the experience of the action of the Karma Indriyas as they are called, arises on account of the simultaneous action of the Jnana Indriyas or senses of knowledge. These five senses of knowledge and five organs of action make ten mouths of consciousness.

Then there are the five Pranas – the Prana, or the vital energy in us, operates in five ways. When we breathe out, expel breath, the Prana is acting. When we breathe in, when we inhale the breath, the Apana is acting. The Vyana is a third form of the operation of this energy, which causes circulation of blood and makes us feel a sensation of liveliness in every part of the body because of the operative action of the bloodstream, which is pushed onward in a circular fashion throughout the body by the action of a particular function of Prana, called Vyana. There is another action of the Prana, which is Udana; it causes the swallowing of food. When we put food in the mouth, it goes inside through the esophagus and it is pushed down by the action of a Prana called Udana. Udana has also certain other functions to perform. It takes us to deep sleep. Our ego consciousness, our individualized consciousness is pushed into a state of somnambulism, sleep; that also is the work of Udana. Udana has also a third function to perform, namely the separation of the vital body from the physical body at the time of death. Three actions, three performances are attributed to Udana. There is another, fifth one, Samana, which operates through the navel region and causes digestion of food. It creates heat in the stomach and in the naval region so that the gastric juices operate and we feel appetite. Hunger is caused and food is digested by the action of this Samana. So, there are five Pranas – Prana, Apana, Vyana, Udana, Samana.

Five senses of knowledge, five organs of action and five Pranas make fifteen. There are four functions of the psychic organ. The internal psyche, which we generally call Manas or mind in ordinary language, has four functions. In Sanskrit these four functions are designated as Manas, Buddhi, Ahamkara and Chitta. Manas is ordinary, indeterminate thinking – just being aware that something is there. Manas is the work of the mind. Buddhi determines, decides and logically comes to a conclusion that something is such-and-such a thing. That is another aspect of the operation of the psyche – Buddhi or intellect. The third form of it is Ahamkara – ego, affirmation, assertion, ‘I know’. “I know that there is some object in front of me, and I also know that I know. I know that I exist as so-and-so.” This kind of affirmation attributed to one’s own individuality is the work of Ahamkara, known as egoism. The subconscious action, memory, etc., is caused by Chitta. It is the fourth function. So Manas, Buddhi, Ahamkara, Chitta – these are the four basic functions of the internal organ, the psychological organ.

So, we have five senses of knowledge, five organs of action, five Pranas and four operations of the psyche, totaling nineteen. These are the mouths through which consciousness grasps objects from outside, and we feel secure and happy because all these nineteen things are acting at the same time in some form or other, with more emphasis or less emphasis. Anyone can act at any time, under special given conditions; and inasmuch as anyone can act at any time, it is virtually saying that all are acting at the same time. Therefore we are objectively conscious through the nineteen operative media of the individual consciousness acting in the waking condition. We are aware of this vast world of sensory perception, and we go on contacting these objects of the world through these media.

It is also mentioned, in this connection, that we can conceive this form of perception in a cosmic way. Cosmic consciousness can be conceived to be operating in this manner in a cosmic waking condition. In the same way as we are individually conscious of objects in our waking condition, in a similar manner we can conceive that the universal consciousness is awake to the world of daylight. The whole universe is the object of the consciousness of a consciousness in its manner, similar to an individualized, circumscribed world becoming the object of our individual consciousness in the waking state. The waking state is called Jagrat Avastha-Jagratsthan. Technical words are used, which may be remembered or not remembered. For instance, Visva is the word used to designate consciousness in the waking, individualized state. Our consciousness, the Jiva-tattva, this individuality of ours at this moment of waking, is called Visva. This very waking world of universal expanse in space and time, animated by a universal consciousness, is called Vaishvanara, or sometimes the word used is Virat. There is a consciousness pervading all things, as we know already. If this consciousness, which is universal and hidden behind all things, is to be aware of the whole cosmos as we perceive in our waking condition, that cosmic awaking or awareness of the whole universe may be regarded as Virat-tattva-cosmic consciousness of the whole physical world, the entire cosmos of physicality.

We have heard that Sri Krishna manifested the Viratsvarupa before Arjuna. In the Purusha-Sukta we also have some sort of description of the Cosmic Being conceived as animating the whole physical cosmos. By ‘physical cosmos’ we have to understand here not merely this physical earth, but all the layers of externality which are computerized, as it were, into fourteen categories known in Sanskrit as Bhuh-lok, Bhuvah-lok, Svah-lok, Mahah-lok, Jana-lok, Tapah-lok and Satya-lok. The whole cosmos, in all the levels of its manifestation, is at once an object of the awareness of this Cosmic Being. Such an awakened, waking state, as it were, of the cosmic consciousness is Virat, also known as Vaishvanara in the language of the Upanishads. Individually, the microcosmic aspect of this Virat is Visva – your own or my own waking experience as it is available just now, for instance.

Through nineteen mouths we experience objects of the world in this waking condition. We can conceive for our own intellectual satisfaction that the universe operates also in this manner, and God-consciousness, imagined to be operating through this waking condition everywhere, is an expanded form of our individualized consciousness. While we in our waking state know only certain things, God as the universal consciousness knows all things at the same time. This is briefly a description of consciousness involved in the waking state; a total physical perception in which the consciousness is involved is the objective world of waking state of consciousness.

In the dream state something else happens. The actual physical world which is seen and contacted through the sense organs in the waking state is absent, but by an action of the mind it looks as if it is present even in the dream state. Without the assistance of the gross senses and the organs of action which are active in the waking condition, the mind alone concocts, imagines, projects a world of its own in the dream state, and we see a world in dream. We exist there in the same way that we exist in the waking state. We can see ourselves now, seated here, in the waking state; in a similar way we can see ourselves observing certain things in the dream state also. There is a dream ‘me’ in the same way as there is a waking ‘me’, and there is a dream world. We see all sorts of things in the waking state – mountains, rivers, sun, moon, stars, and people of all kinds. We can see all that in the dream world also. There is space, time and externality in dream, as we have also in the waking state. The difference between the waking and the dream is that the mind has created this entire world of external cognition and perception of its own accord, without the existence of physically external objects or the physical sensations. There, also, nineteen mouths are operating. We have dream eyes, dream ears, a dream nose, a dream tongue that tastes, dream touch; and dream legs, dream hands, dream organs of every kind. We run in dream with the legs, we eat a good meal in dream, we can even live and die – even that experience is possible in dream. One can feel that one is born, or one can feel that one is dead. One can observe one’s own cremation in dream. All kinds of fantastic things can be experienced in dream. A new world is projected by the mind – space, time, causation, objects, people - all blessed things. They are in the dream world because the psyche is operating through the vital energy, the mind, the intellect in a diminished form, not in an active way. The only difference is that the physical body is not there as an object of awareness. Sometimes people sleep with open mouths. If a few particles of sugar are put on the tongue of a sleeping man, he will not feel the taste of it, because his mind is withdrawn. The mind is the main operative organ which causes sensations of seeing, hearing, tasting, etc. Even the ego will react in dream. If somebody calls us, either in dream or in sleep, by a name that is not ours, we will not listen to it. We will not wake up. If John is sleeping and he is called as Jacob, he will not wake up. John must be summoned as John only. That is, the ego is so intensely identified with this particular name-form complex that it is acting even there in a submerged condition of dream and sleep.