Inside Yoga 158 (15/2/2016)
How good is your concentration? Can you pay attention? These are very important questions in yoga and its application is one of the most important factors in yoga. If there is no concentration our yoga practice will not be effective, it will not be yoga.
One of the eight limbs of yoga is called dharana, which is the sixth of these eight parts which are the ingredients of yoga according to the yoga sutras written about 4,000 years ago by Pantanjali.
Dharana is translated in various forms, the simplest being the words: concentration, attention, or focusing, while a more in-depth explanation is: “the state of mind in which the mind is oriented toward one point.”
What patanjali is highlighting is that whatever we want from our practice, whether it is the wish for enlightenment, or just greater clarity about our life, or for others the desire to feel better about our self and health. Whatever the motivation, none of this can be achieved without training ourselves to concentrate.
Focussing on one point is not where the answer lies but by concentrating on one point we are able remove from our mind all those thoughts which prevent us from concentrating and simply distract ourselves. And as a result we might find ourselves in the state of yogic union which is at the heart of practice.
This is why we spend so much time and energy on paying attention to our breathing and body, because at the heart of our experience are these two aspects of our life. It is quite simply the best object of focus and concentration to use.
Additionally, by using the body and breath as the focus it helps to ground ourselves, because thoughts are simply day dreams (however important we think our thoughts are) which take us away from what is happening at the moment as we practice – the other reason why we concentrate.
It might not seem relevant while we try to get our body into a yoga posture but this is the heart of why the postures work. We are not so concerned about how strong or how flexible we are, but are we concentrating on the action of the posture? For example, in a triangle posture we are asked to be aware of every detail of the physical posture, the sensations of the muscles supporting the posture from toes to finger tips, and make adjustments to improve the efficiency of the posture.
In other words, keeping the mind still and focussed on our body in the posture is what we are meant to be doing, not thinking about what we will do this evening or at work late on. It is about paying attention to the one point, to the exercise. And we keep doing this through a range of positons and gradually our distracted state disappears and we become steadier with our focus, and eventually we are still in the mind and body, and perfectly aware of this experience – and as a result of our efforts we have achieved a state of dharana.
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