|
As a built-in feature, our new car has
a GPS system which I was reluctant to embrace. Why was it necessary, I
thought. And then I realized this summer, driving in Quebec’s Eastern
Townships on the unfamiliar way to a yoga retreat, how great it was to
have this automatic map indicating my route. I could rest and follow
the navigation system to the destination. Wouldn’t it be great if we
had such a life map!
What draws us to yoga? Often we are
unsatisfied in some way, in some aspect of our life or our life journey
is stuck. We then end up in a yoga class and start to feel better. The
connection between these may at first seem intangible and yet yoga
philosophy tells us that the koshas provide a map for transformation
and our yoga practice facilitates this.
The koshas, first written about in the
Upanishads some 3000 years ago, chart such a navigation system. The
yoga sages who outlined this map suggest that humans are made up of
five sheaths that navigate a path from the periphery of the physical
body to the core – the embodied Self or Atman.
To better understand this, picture
a lamp with five lampshades. The lampshades provide covering for the
light and individualize the lamps creating difference but they also
obscure the pure light of the lamp. Yoga then is the process of moving
through these lampshades or koshas to experience the pure Light of the
Self.
The sheaths range from dense to more
subtle. While we often talk of them as separate, the lampshades are
more like the threads of a tapestry woven together. There is overlap
and connection between the sheaths and so in our journey working on one
layer automatically impacts the others.
The first and “outermost” layer, the
annaymaya kosha is the densest. Translated, anna means food so this is
our physical self (what we can touch) or our food body. The Upanishads
recognized that we are made up of elements or food from the Earth and
our physical body will return to it. In yoga, we spend a lot of time
connecting to the physical body in detail: arches of the feet, lower
back ribs, back of the neck, heart centre and on and on. This is an
important first step since developing a keen awareness of the first
kosha makes the others more accessible.
The following layers are the subtle or
unseen layers. While they cannot be touched, they however can
definitely be felt. For example, the second layer is the pranamaya
kosha or life-energy body. It is the breath that enters and leaves our
body and energizes our annamaya kosha. It is deeply connected to
emotions and you can notice how the presence of a strong emotion
impacts the breath. As you know, we cannot touch the breath but we can
certainly feel its presence. So, when your yoga teacher is telling you
to breathe, she/he is connecting you to the pranamaya kosha.
The manamaya kosha is the mental body
where we process our thoughts. When we talk of stillness in a pose, it
is our manamaya kosha that we are often most challenged to still.
Resting in a yoga pose, wait to see how long before a vritti or thought
enters into the stillness. Often it is not long.
The vijnanamaya kosha or wisdom body
provides insight and reflection. When some sense of the other koshas
have been integrated into our yoga practice, we can then have a sense
of what deeper meaning this pose might have in our life or what it
might be telling us of ourselves. This is the wise witness who observes
our practice and also takes us deeper into the experience. Finally when
the witness dissolves into the full experience of the moment, there is
a glimpse of the anandamaya kosha or bliss body.
Often the bliss body or anandamaya
kosha is thought of as our destination, the end point of the map. Yet
this kosha too may obscure the true destination: contact with the Atman
or embodied Self. The Atman is the Light in the lamp metaphor that
burns eternal and transcends the differences and separatenesses of the
different lampshades.
In February 2009 Carla Wainwright and I
will explore the koshas in detail at a week-long yoga retreat in
Mexico. (In addition, the kleshas [obstacles to enlightenment] will be
investigated – more about this in an upcoming newsletter). Together we
will integrate awareness of the koshas into the daily yoga, pranayama
and meditation practices. Come join us to go deeper into the philosophy
and the experience of yoga’s road map to the Self and the obstacles we
meet along the path. For more information on the retreat, see Mexico retreats
|
Yoga
Teacher Training Programs
