Patanjali Yoga Sutra 2.18 - What Is Prakriti? | Yoga Teacher Training | Anvita Dixit

Transcript

namaste everyone in today's video we're going to focus on muni patanjali's yog sutra 2.18 in this particular sutra muni patanjali is helping us to understand the concept of drishya or creation and how this core relates to our yogic sadhana and our overall understanding of yoga so let's take a good look at this sutra break it up into words and start understanding it a little bit deeper so the sutra itself goes pratasha kriyasthiti shilam bhutendriyat makam bhoga pavargarthan all right so that is the sutra now let us hear each of the words and start breaking them up step by step so the first word that we introduce to over here is prakash and prakas refers to light or illumination the second word is kriya which refers to action or an action-oriented process the third is stiti and siddhi refers to a stability or a particular position the next word is sheila and this is indicating a property or having the property of finally we come to the next two words which are some of the most important words in this entire sutra which is indriya now bhuta is referring to the pancha mahabhutas from the sankhya theory if you haven't studied that already it refers to the five elements and then of course we introduced to the indriyas which are referring to our five sense organs then as we move forward we come to the next word which is and here is given the understanding of what is the nature of what is it composed of its inner essence and then we come to bhoga and upper varga now goger refers to something that we're experiencing we've even heard this word in a couple of previous sutras so it's talking about our experience and then of course we come to the next word which is upper burger and here we're told the liberation process the final death not well i don't want to say final destination but the absolute liberation process or the absolution and then we come to the next word which is artha and artha is for the purpose of and finally of course the last word is this year which is referring to that which is seen or the creation process so overall what this is trying to tell us is that there are a few key elements that form drishya and these key elements have the qualities of light action stability and as well as a few others like the pancha mahabhutas and the indriyas so it's kind of giving us like a summary of what are the key qualities that help us to form the drishya so now that we know this let's get into understanding the sutra a little bit further and see what it means so first things first the sutra is quite a lot influenced by the sankhya theory and it's talking to us about light which is illumination it's also talking to us of action and stability so this directly correlates to sattva which represents light rajas which represents action or kriya and tamas which represents stability but sometimes also inertia so this there's a direct correlation between sankhya theory and the yoga theory in this case and then we're also told how do these three key elements or principles work together to give us certain formats now in the first case when these three come together and if they come together in a very inert non-animate way they form the mahabhutas or the elements which they're not living organisms but they're still chemical compounds and they exist and we need them for the world to function if a creation to exist and so everything in nature is ultimately a creation of the five elements the pancha mahabhutas and depending on whether those mahabhutas are arranged in a satwik rajasik or tamasic way all of that comes together to kind of give us the bunch of mahabhutas and the elements however if these elements come together in a more um animate way and they begin to form an organism in a very organized structural format with systems digestive system respiratory etc and then they also add in the sense organs then that goes one step further than the mahabhutas so now you have actual living organisms with the five sense organs with all of the different processes and functions of their body parts and therefore that's the second type of creation that nature has so why are we understanding all of this we're looking at it to understand what is creation what is the role of drishya and what does nature create and so the sutra is answering our question by telling us that hey the first thing it does is through the five elements it creates compounds and everything that is inanimate and then it goes a step further to create animate living beings like just like you and me so that is the essential understanding of the sutra and then it answers the next question which is well that's great right we have these five elements we have living beings but what happens why like why do we have to why do we have the process of creation in place and i think this is one of those existential questions which we're asking ourselves in which philosophies have tried to answer for years on end which is why why does creation exist what is the meaning of all of this and how do we add some structure and some relevance to it so according to the yoga sadhana creation exists for each one of us to go through a process of bhoga through bhoga we experience things in creation we experience life and our experiences teach us something and those teachings ultimately lead us one step closer to the process of liberation and final absolution so this is really important because sometimes we think what is the point of all this you know if everything's impermanent if everything's going to change why come into creation at all and so what yoga is saying is that it's not that you're not supposed to renounce it you're not supposed to say oh this is irrelevant you know why am i even here instead you're supposed to appreciate what it's offering you which is a chance to learn and to grow and yet not get attached to it when the time comes to leave so that's a very very tricky road because it's so um subtle it's so difficult to recognize when you're getting attached versus when you're actually just going through experiences as your duty in life so it's a tricky one but that's what it means and finally it's explaining to us also that what tends to happen is we look at poger you know the experiences of life and we get fascinated and we feel like wow this is amazing i want to keep coming back and that's why the cycle of birth and death keeps going forward the karmic cycle keeps moving because we keep wanting to come back but what the sutra is trying to say is that if we realize that there is pain as well in bulgar it's not all um you know hunky dory it's not going to be like that all the time there's coming into burger is pain and sometimes just staying um you know staying with that liberation process is much more liberating uh when we come to that realization that's when we we choose not to want to enter into the process of birth and death again and we just take a step back enter deeply into the yogic satan and move towards liberation but this is a very long journey spread across lifetimes it takes a long time to think that way and to come to that realization so the sutra is just making us aware it's not saying that that's it you've chosen yoga now you have to go on this ultimate path and immediately reach the end goal it's not that it's a journey and it takes time and we kind of have to stick with the process until we finally feel like i don't even want this vogue anymore i just want to move towards the liberation process and that takes a lot of time so this is what the sutra is trying to tell us it's just shedding light on the process of drishya what it's all about and how we can understand it a little bit better is yogg sadhuks i also want to add that each of us are modern day yoga practitioners we live in cities we live in settlements it's difficult to apply everything from the sutras into our lives but we're trying to understand it a little bit better and be as honest as we can as yoga students to really kind of nourish our understanding of yoga much better so that's all for today's video i hope you enjoyed it if you did please don't forget to give it a big thumbs up drop your comments in the comment section below to keep supporting and to see new videos and we look forward to seeing you in the next workshop or in the next class link is in the description and we're going to see you very soon take care of yourself until then and i'll catch you soon namaste [Music] you