Fall Back

To "fall back"....it's an interesting phrase and our hint, this time ofyear, as to which way we wind the clock: We fell back on Sunday (andsome of us "fell back" to sleep. Divine!). "Fall back" can also mean toretreat, to recede, to withdraw. Which seques me neatly to pratyahara, or "the withdrawal of the senses."

Pratyahara is the fifth limb in Patanjali's eight limbs of yoga, and is a kind of loading dock between the physical limbs (asana, pranayama) and spiritual limbs (dharana, or concentration and dhyana, or meditation). It also lies smack in the middle between the external practices (yama, niyama, asana and pranayama) and the internal practices (dharana, dhyana and samadhi.)It's a tricky one. Withdrawing our senses—Sight, sound, touch, taste,hearing... how are we supposed to cut all of that off? And do we reallywant to? If a fire starts in our house, don't we want to be able tosmell the smoke? If we eat a piece of chocolate don't we want to be ableto taste it? Yes and yes.

It has to do with how the senses feed the mind.

"Just as a tortoise withdraws its limbs, so when a man withdraws hissenses from the sense objects, his wisdom becomes steady." -BhagavadGita

It's instructive to look at pratyahara within a contemporaryand realistic context. Not to minimize its spiritual heft, but to findreal-life, practical context. As I explore seated meditation with arenewed sense of purpose, I am finding this relevant and timely.

The word pratyahara breaks down into "ahara", which means food, and"prati" which means away. "Food" is anything we take from the outsideand bring to our inside. The senses feed the mind constantly withinformation. We are literally "stuffed" with it. How can thisinformation always be truth when it is biased by our interpretations?The untrained senses, governed as they are by past experiences andinstinct (desire, fear, cravings), latch on to the pleasure or aversionof the moment and don't consider the bigger picture.

 "For the mind which follows in the wake of the wandering senses,carries away one's discrimination, as the wind carries away a boat onthe waters.
Therefore, Oh Arjuna, his knowledge is steady whose senses are completely restrained from sense-objects."
(2:67 Bhagavad Gita)

Without a disciplined mind and right understanding, we suffer from the distractions of our uncontrolled senses.

So if we know it's a good thing, how do we accomplish this? How do wewithdraw the mind from the senses, and exert some control over thesenses themselves?

The first and obvious example: limit digital sensory input by making aconscious decision to turn off your electronic devices for a period oftime. Turn off facebook for an hour. Or a day! shut off your phone. Howabout abstaining from speaking for a day? You could practice Yoni Mudra(see photo of drawing above), which uses the fingers and thumbs to blockthe senses. You could meditate, as this trains the mind and the senses,simultaneously. You could devote your next yoga practice to seeing ifyou can internally connect with every single cell of your body, feelingthe soles of your feet, the depth of jaw relaxation, the ends of yourhair. And my current "must do": Being a chronic insomniac I shut down mycomputer and all electronics by 8 pm. Before I go to sleep, I spendsome time trying to say nighty-night to my senses one at a time: sight,hearing, smell, taste, touch.

Perhaps most effective: I am finding that the practice of meditationitself slows and refines the pace of my sensory reactions to the worldaround me, makes me more observant of what I am seeing, hearing,tasting. Rewires response time to allow for more time between stimulusand response, and in this experience, I feel I am beginning to moreviscerally understanding what pratyahara is.

I invite you to ask yourself the question: how can I find a little pratyahara in my own daily life?