The Yoga Sutras

The past month has been an interesting time and feeling the weather cool has had me dive back into some yoga sutra study. So I thought it might be nice to share some of my understandings with you.

The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are an integral and primary text of yoga study. As teachers, reading and beginning to understand the sutras is fundamental to our training and we might take a lifetime to understand them. These 196 sutras are a guide to yoga practice, the underlying philosophy of yoga practice, what yoga means and the how and the why of yoga?

If you have attended our Beginners’ Course you will have been introduced to a few of the teachings from the sutras. In every class at CYS, your teachers have woven the teachings into their classes. This may not be obvious but they will be there as you begin to understand the threads and layers of yoga practice.

These teachings allow us to become more interceptive and conscious in our observance of our body-mind connection. Our Asana practice allows us to use the vehicle of our body and movement to observe more deeply this connection and thus we can observe the fluctuations of the mind and in time control and still the chita vriti, constant thinking and fluctuations of the “monkey mind”

In this context Yoga means Union. The subsequent 194 sutras are a guide as to how to achieve this stilling of the mind.

Over the coming months, I will endeavour to share my understanding of some of these sutras as I take this personal journey of study again.