It happened: Vivekananda, before he went to America and became a world-famous figure, stayed in Jaipur Maharaja’s palace. The Maharaja was a lover of Vivekananda and Ramakrishna. As maharajas go, when Vivekananda came to stay in his palace he made a great festival out of it, and he called prostitutes to dance and sing in reception… as maharajas go: they have their own minds. He completely forgot that to receive a sannyasin with the singing of prostitutes and dancing of prostitutes doesn’t suit. But he couldn’t know anything else. He always knew that when you have to receive somebody, drinking, dancing has to be done.
And Vivekananda was still immature; he was not a perfect sannyasin yet. Had he been a perfect sannyasin, then there was indifference – no problem – but he was not indifferent yet. He has not gone that deep into Patanjali even. He was a young man, and a very suppressive one who was suppressing his sex and everything. When he saw the prostitutes, he simply locked his room and would not come out of it.
The Maharaja came and he asked his forgiveness. He said, “We don’t know. We have never received any sannyasin. We always receive kings, so we know the ways. So we are sorry, but now it will be too much of an insult, because this is the greatest prostitute in the country – and very costly. And we have paid, and to tell her to move and go will be insulting to her, and if you don’t come she will feel very much hurt. So come out.”
But Vivekananda was afraid to come out; that’s why I say he was still immature, still not a seasoned sannyasin. Still indifference is not there – a condemnation: “A prostitute?” – He was very angry, and he said, “No” Then the prostitute started singing without him, and she sang a song of a saint. The song is very beautiful. The song says that “I know that I am not worthy of you, but you could have been a little more compassionate. I am dirt on the road; that I know. But you need not be so antagonistic to me. I am nobody – ignorant, a sinner. But you are a saint – why are you afraid of me?”
It is said Vivekananda heard from his room. The prostitute was weeping and singing, and he felt – he felt the whole situation of what he is doing. It is immature, childish. Why is he afraid? Fear exists only if you are attracted. You will be afraid of women if you are attracted to women. If you are not attracted, the fear disappears. What is the fear? An indifference comes without any antagonism.
He opened the door: he couldn’t contain himself, he was defeated by the prostitute. The prostitute became victorious; he had to come out. He came and he sat, and he wrote in his diary that “A new revelation has been given to me by the divine. I was afraid… must be some lust within me. That’s why I was afraid. But the woman defeated me completely, and I have never seen such a pure soul. The tears were so innocent and the singing and the dancing were so holy that I would have missed. And sitting near her, for the first time I became aware that it is not a question who is there outside; it is a question what is.”
That night he wrote in his diary that, “Now I can even sleep with that woman in the bed and there will be no fear.” He transcended. That prostitute helped him to transcend. This is a miracle. Ramakrishna couldn’t help and a prostitute helped him. So nobody knows from where the help will come. Nobody knows what is evil and what is good. Who can decide? Mind is impotent and helpless. So don’t take any attitude: that is the meaning of being indifferent.
THE MIND ALSO BECOMES TRANQUIL BY ALTERNATELY EXPELLING AND RETAINING THE BREATH.
Patanjali gives other alternatives also. If you can do this – being happy with happy people, friendly; compassion with the miserable, joy with the virtuous, indifference with the evil ones – if you can do this, then you enter from the transformation of the mind towards the supermind. If you cannot do – because it is difficult, not easy – then there are other ways. Don’t feel depressed.
Says Patanjali: THE MIND ALSO BECOMES TRANQUIL BY ALTERNATELY EXPELLING AND RETAINING THE BREATH.
Then you enter through the physiology. This is entering through the mind – the first: the second is entering through the physiology.
Breathing and thinking are deeply connected, as if they are two poles of one thing. You also sometimes become aware, if you are a little mindful, that whenever the mind changes, the breathing changes. For example, you are angry: immediately the breathing changes, the rhythm is gone. The breathing has a different quality. It is non-rhythmic.
When you have passion, lust, sex takes over, the breathing changes; it becomes feverish, mad. when you are silent, just not doing anything, just feeling very relaxed, the breathing has a different rhythm. If you watch, and Patanjali must have watched very deeply… he says if you watch deeply you can find what type of breathing and its rhythm creates what type of mind. If you feel friendly, the breathing is different. If you feel antagonistic, angry, the breathing is different. So either change the mind and the breathing will change, or you can do the opposite: change the breathing and the mind will change. Change the rhythm of breathing, and the mind will immediately change.
When you feel happy, silent, joyous, remember the rhythm of the breathing. Next time when anger comes, you don’t allow the breathing to change; you retain the rhythm of breathing as if you are happy. Anger is not possible then because the breathing creates the situation. The breathing forces the inner glands in the body which release chemicals in the blood.
That’s why you become red when you are angry: certain chemicals have come into the blood, and you become feverish. Your temperature goes high. The body is ready to fight or take flight; the body is in an emergency. Through hammering of the breathing, this change comes.
Don’t change the breathing. Just retain as if you are silent; just the breathing just has to follow a silent pattern – you will feel it impossible to become angry. When you are feeling very passionate, lust, sex takes over. Just try to be tranquil in the breathing, and you feel sex has disappeared.
Here he suggests a method: THE MIND ALSO BECOMES TRANQUIL BY ALTERNATELY EXPELLING AND RETAINING THE BREATH.
You can do two things: whenever you feel the mind is not tranquil – tense, worried, chattering, anxiety, constantly dreaming – do one thing: first exhale deeply. Always start by exhaling. Exhale deeply: as much as you can, throw the air out. With the throwing of the air the mood will be thrown out, because breathing is everything.
And then expel the breath as far as possible. Take the belly in and retain for a few seconds – don’t inhale. Let the air; be out, and you don’t inhale for a few seconds. Then allow the body to inhale. Inhale deeply – as much as you can. Again stop for a few seconds. The same should be the gap as you retain the breath out – if you retain for three seconds, retain the breath in three seconds. Throw it out; retain for three seconds. Take in; retain for three seconds. But it has to be thrown out completely. Exhale totally and inhale totally, and make a rhythm. Retain in; retain out. Retain in; retain out. Immediately you will feel a change coming into your whole being. The mood is gone. A new climate has entered into you.
What happens? Why is it so? For many reasons: one, when you start creating this rhythm, your mind is completely diverted. You cannot be angry, because a new thing has started, and the mind cannot have two things together. Your mind is now filled with exhaling, inhaling, retaining, creating a rhythm. You are completely absorbed in it, the cooperation with anger is broken: one thing.
This exhaling, inhaling, cleanses the whole body. When you exhale out and retain for three seconds or five seconds – as much as you want, as much as you can – what happens inside? The whole body throws all that is poisonous into the blood. Air is out and the body gets a gap. In that gap all the poisons are thrown out. They come to the heart, they accumulate there – poisonous gases, nitrogen, carbon dioxide, they all gather together there.
You don’t give a chance for them to gather together. You go on breathing in and out. There is no gap, no pause. In that pause, a gap is created, an emptiness. In that emptiness, everything flows and fills it. Then you take a deep inhalation and then you retain. All those poisonous gases become mixed with the breathing; then you again exhale and throw them out. Again pause. Let the poisons gather. And this is a way of throwing things out.
Mind and breath are so much connected – have to be, because breathing is life. A man can be without mind, but cannot be without breathing. Breathing is deeper than mind. Your brain can be operated completely; you will be alive if you can breathe. If the breathing continues, you will be alive. The brain can be taken out completely. You will vegetate, but you will be alive. You will not be able to open the eyes and talk or do anything, but on the bed you can be alive, vegetating for many years. But mind cannot. If the breathing stops, the mind disappears.
Yoga found this basic thing – that breathing is deeper than thinking. If you change breathing, you change thinking. And once you know the key, that breathing has the key, you can create any climate that you want: it is up to you. The way you breathe it depends on it. Just you, do one thing: for seven days, you just make a notebook of the different types of breathing that happen with different moods. You are angry: take a notebook and just count breathing – how much you inhale and how much you exhale. Five counts you inhale, three counts you exhale – note it down.
Sometimes you are feeling very, very beautiful – note it down, what is the proportion of inhalation and exhalation, what is the length, is there any pause – note it down. And for seven days just make a diary to feel your own breathing, how it is connected with your moods. Then you can sort it out. Then whenever you want to drop a mood, just use the opposite pattern. Or, if you want to bring a mood, then use the pattern.
Actors, knowingly, unknowingly, come to know it because sometimes they have to be angry without being angry. So what will they do? They will have to create the breathing pattern. They may not be aware, but they will start breathing as if they are angry, and soon the blood rushes in and poisons are released. And without being angry their eyes are red, and they are in a subtle anger state without being angry. They have to make love without being in love; they have to show love without being in love. How do they do it? They know a certain secret of yoga.
That’s why I always say a yogi can become the most perfect actor. He is! His stage is vast, that’s all. He is acting – not acting on the stage, but on the stage of the world. He is an actor; he is not a doer. And the difference is that he is taking part in a great drama and he can remain a witness to it and he can remain aloof and detached.
Tags: Patanjali Yoga Sutra 10 Breathing And Thinking
