The goal of yoga

 

Answering a challenge to formulate the goal of yoga in a single page, I can start by saying that it won’t even take me a page.


Yoga has many meanings and the first reports on yogis were as miracle-workers. However, the very first recorded definition of yoga, in the Katha Upanishad, has nothing to do with paranormal powers. It describes yoga as “silencing the mind, shutting out all thoughts”. A similar definition is given in the synthesis by Patanjali, the Yoga Sutra: “Yoga is the stopping of the modifications of the mind.” Some technical explanation about the preparations may then be given, but the definition itself is very simple: emptying the mind. Not too easy (“next week, don’t think of a monkey”), but certainly simple, like the zero among the numbers.

No goal need be defined. Silence is just silence, it is not in the service of anything else: "What's the use? No use! I just sit."

The conjunction with the doctrine of reincarnation (which also exists in cultures that don’t know of yoga), central to Jainism and Buddhism, is now generally believed east of the Indus, and also among Western yoga practitioners. It says that the goal of yoga is the stopping of the wheel of reincarnations. Possibly this is based on empirically-gained knowledge of the reincarnation cycle by practising yogis. The Buddha claimed to know all his incarnations, but accomplished yogis I know, report never to have had such experiences. At any rate, reincarnation is a separate doctrine not necessary for the notion and practice of yoga.

The conjunction with the doctrine of kundalini (energy lying coiled at the base of the spine which can be awakened and raised to the crown) is even younger, and was unknown to the first yoga writers. Here again, kundalini exists separately from yoga: it has been reported to rise in non-yogis, spontaneously or under the influence of drugs, and is known in cultures that don’t know yoga, such as those of the San (Bushmen), who dance to create a “warm feeling in the back”, or the Australian Aboriginals. In China, it was applied in a meditational practice, the “microcosmic orbit” where energy is led up the spine by the attention and the breath. I suspect that “kundalini yoga” came about as a variation on this Chinese practice, but am still looking for more relevant information. At any rate, yoga can be understood without reference to kundalini.   

In China, a practice of yoga (meditation) existed in parallel with the yoga outlined in the Upanishads and the ensuing Indian tradition. Zhuangzi speaks of “turning your eyes and ears inwards”, “shutting out your own thinking” and “remaining silent”. His simple definition is “sit and forget”. So, let’s cut out all the crap, all the visions and “spiritual experiences”, and focus on this demanding but very straightforward practice: emptying the mind.