“Bhakti Dhyānam uses Japa to build a bridge
over the fear bringing streams of the mind.”
– Paul Harvey on Yoga Sūtra Chapter One verse 28

“Anguish arises from the illusion feeding
the conflation of I-ness and Am-ness,
the consequences of pleasure and suffering,
and underpins the fear of not feeling alive.”
– Paul Harvey on Yoga Sūtra Chapter Two verse 3

“The outer layer of meditative reflection,
as in Dhāraṇā, can reveal psychic symptoms,
which we might compare to the branches
of a tree, such as confused attractions,
confused aversions and the fear of loss.”
– Paul Harvey on Yoga Sūtra Chapter Two verses 7-9

“Abhiniveśā is the extra-ordinairy
instinctive urge to survive at any cost.
No one is spared. In a way,
it is a dislike about one’s death.”
– T Krishnamacharya’s on Yoga Sūtra Chapter Two verse 9

“Survival is self–prevailing
and constantly underpins,
even in the wise person.”
– Paul Harvey on Yoga Sūtra Chapter Two verse 9

“Āsana alone can be a support for
our outer relationship with living.
However, can Āsana alone be a support
for our inner relationship with dying?
Especially as our disposition towards
clinging to life is continuous, as well as
being deeply buried within our psyche.
This is why Yoga offers vehicles beyond Āsana
for the inner and especially the final journey.”
– Paul Harvey on Yoga Sūtra Chapter Two verse 9

“Pratyāhāra is not feeding the tendency of the Citta
to automatically form a positive, negative, or neutral
identification with whatever stimuli the senses present to it.
From that, we can begin to understand how their external gathering
activities stimulate our conscious and especially, unconscious choices.
From this, we can begin to understand how the impact
of this sensory knowing can lead us to travel in different directions
and trigger different levels of response, often without us being really
conscious of how deeply their input stimulates our psychic activities.
From these responses, there will be the inevitable re-actions,
again quite possibly unconscious and multilevelled,
according to our psychic history in terms of our memory,
habit patternings and deeper memory processes.
From those initial insight, we can begin to understand
and interact in how we can resist unconsciously slipping
into the trance states that can so often culminate with
the  Kleśa manifesting fully in the entrancing dance of
Udārā Rāga, or Udārā Dveṣa, or Udārā Abhiniveśa,
the potent and profligate children of Avidyā.”
– Paul Harvey on Yoga Sūtra Chapter Two verse 54

“What is the role of Dharma
in the face of survival?”
– TKV Desikachar speaking with his
senior Western students London 1998

Links to Related Posts:

• Reflections on TKV Desikachar’s Teaching and Svatantra……
• TKV Desikachar talks on Śraddhā in the light of the Yoga Sūtra……