Hinduism’s Path to Liberation: Yoga and the Eight Limbs
The Path to Liberation in Hinduism
Practice is the discipline that allows the breaking of samsara and spiritual union with the absolute within Hinduism. The method of yoga means union, the path, and the goal. This is the path to salvation where the Atman experiences spiral renaissances. Hinduism offers three ways of salvation, i.e., three types of yoga, as described in the Bhagavad Gita.
Yoga of Selfless Action (Karma Yoga)
This consists of breaking the fatal link between actions and their results. Thus, a person acts only with their duty, without seeking any reward.
Yoga of Wisdom (Jnana Yoga)
This is about achieving, through mental experience, a knowledge-wisdom that makes you realize that “Atman is Brahman,” that “everything is Brahman.” When one goes through this experience, they no longer have fear and know that they lived under the veil of Maya, the cosmic illusion.
Yoga of Devotion (Bhakti Yoga)
Due perhaps to the difficulty of the two previous paths, Hinduism offers liberation through devotion and love through a comprehensive divinity in its manifestations, whether gods, men, or any living creature of nature.
The Classic of Yoga: Yoga-Sutra
Patanjali is the author of the Yoga-Sutra. The Yoga-Sutra is a text that is concise, clear, thorough, and accurate. It has been mentioned until now. It emphasizes the need for asceticism, practice, art, and exercise, ending with the wrong identification of the subject with the mind and body. The ordinary state of mind is moving and dispersed.
Aim of Yoga
The cessation of fluctuations of the mind.
Yoga: Union and Conjunction
Yoga means union and conjunction.
Discipline of Yoga
Mind control or subject, that meet in a unification dispersed.
The ordinary state of mind is said to disperse the mental distress, irregular breathing, and body agitation.
Ten Types of Fluctuations of the Mind
Painful and not painful.
The cessation of the fluctuations is achieved through constant practice and detachment. The attention on one point wants to end the two causes of movements of the mind and the subconscious sensory activity.
Eight Limbs of Yoga
- Yama: Abstaining from negative actions (not causing pain, not lying, not stealing, sexual abstinence, and not being greedy).
- Niyama: Prescriptions of the positive (purity of body and mind, contentment, energy).
- Asanas: Postures should be firm and pleasant.
- Pranayama: Inhalation, exhalation, and retention of breath, which are gradually made prolonged and subtle.
- Pratyahara: Internalization of the mind. Withdrawal of the senses. Total domain of the senses.
- Dharana: Concentration of mind on one point.
- Dhyana: Meditation, uninterrupted flow concentration on one point.
- Samadhi: The mind of its nature remains empty. Samadhi must interpret a state of mind, not knowledge.
Sep Cakra (wheel centers) are located in a central axis that follows the spine connected by a series of channels (one of two central and intertwined that left and right). The energy rises by the central channel across all Cakra until the thousand petals of lotus, making up the release.