Book 1 Part 2: Yoga Sutras of Patanjali
When we still our emotions and Mind we know our true self
written by Dr Elena Bacash
In sutras 3 and 4 Patanjali tells us that when the emotions and lower mind have been stilled, that we come to know who we are in reality – the atman or Soul. The analogy often used is the sky on a cloudy day. The sun is the Soul or consciousness and the clouds are the mental emotional turmoil that block the blue sky. Even though the clouds block our view and we focus on them, the light of the sun is still there and so the light of our awareness is still there but the mental/ emotional turbulence is blocking our Soul's wisdom. The ancient wisdom teachings tell us that the earthly, physical life is an illusion because we the Soul (the eternal aspect of ourselves), confuse our thoughts and emotions with who we really are. This can be a difficult idea to grasp until we awaken to an awareness that we are the Observer watching our daily lives rather than feeling powerlessly embedded in it. The Observer or Soul is the first spiritual aspect of ourselves that we become aware of. In the Christian tradition we would call this the birth of the Christ principle within us (which is in everyone and was expressed by Jesus the man over 2000 years ago – he was showing us the way to greater consciousness that we too will follow).
The Christ principle is the first awakening to the understanding that we have an inner reality, that we can sit in the seat of the Self and look out onto what we are creating in our lives or look back at the realm of this Higher Self to remember who we are and where we came from. Patanjali says when the turmoil of the mental emotional life is quiet we can live and act from the centre, the atman, the seat of wisdom and intuition which is always present.
The spiritual process, also referred to as the expansion of consciousness, happens gradually over lifetimes and is like an unveiling process to the light of the Soul. But what are we unveiling? In esoteric anatomy we have sheaths or bodies: the mental body, the emotional body and the physical/etheric body clothe the Soul in its journey in this physical world. The bodies increase in density from the mental to the physical. This is how we ‘clothe’ the Soul to sense and feel, learn and navigate our world, much like a space suit that is needed to traverse to the depths of space. When we understand that we have control over this unveiling process (kind of like cleaning a dirty window to let the light in) in the physical, emotional and mental bodies, we can apply the practices that Patanjali gives us to unblock the light or the inner awareness. The main technique is through concentration – the concentrated effort to hold steadily as the Perceiver, creating a separation and distance between us and what we are perceiving whether it be an object, a feeling or a thought.
NB: Atman, Soul, Perceiver, Seer, Observer, Higher Self are all used interchangeably.
References
Patañjali, & Bailey, A. (2013). The light of the soul : its science and effect : a paraphrase of the Yoga sutras of Patañjali. London.
Bryant, E. F. (2015). The Yoga Sutras of Patañjali. North Point Press.
Iyengar, S. (2012). Light on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. HarperCollins UK.
Paramhansa Yogananda. (2013). Demystifying Patanjali: The Yoga Sutras. Crystal Clarity Publishers.
Satyananda Saraswati, Swami. (2013). Four chapters on freedom : commentary on yoga sutras of Sage Patanjali. Yoga Publications Trust.
Sounds True. Second Initial. Michael Singer 2024-2025 The Michael Singer Podcast [Audio podcast]. Website. https://resources.soundstrue.com/michael-singer-podcast/