How all these things that are contrary to the facts are possible is explained by the phenomenon of the mind itself. The mind can construct situations which are contrary to reality and which create an imaginary problem. This imaginary problem, when continued for a long time, becomes a kind of truth. Often a lie which is uttered many times takes the form of truth. We go on telling a lie a thousand times, and then people imagine that it is a fact. Likewise is this work of the mind. It constructs an imaginary circumstance or environment around itself as it does in the analogy of the dream. The mind goes on doing it again and again for days, months and years together. It is a matter of lies and more lies, and we get habituated to this way of thinking and think it is the only thing possible and that there is nothing else.

The only thing that seems to exist for us is this world of objects. All the things that people talk of in terms of religion, philosophy and yoga seem like stories told to us which convey no proper significance, because we have become so accustomed to the erroneous ways of thinking for years and years together that this erroneous thinking has covered us like a thick cloud. To be away from oneself therefore is only thinking that one is different from what one really is. In a drama we may put on the garb of someone else, we may speak like another person and play that role completely. If we go on playing the same role day and night for years, perhaps we may become only that. It is like a king playing the role of a beggar in a drama for so long that he forgets his kingship and becomes a real beggar. Thought processes can solidify themselves as it were, and thoughts can become veritable objects.

This is what has happened to us. Our bodies are nothing but a solidification of our thoughts—not one day’s thought or two days’ thought—but for years and years we have been thinking wrongly, and it has materialised itself in the form of this body. What we have thought has been responsible for the formation of this body and our relationships with things outside. This is the entanglement and the hypnosis into which we have sunk. The work of yoga is the disentanglement and the de-hypnotisation of ourselves. For this the mind has to be weaned from its usual processes of thought.

We ought to undergo a thoroughgoing psychological analysis of our own self before any attempt at yoga can be done. If we are shrewd enough, we can do this ourselves; otherwise we will have to seek the help of a master. A good guide is very essential in yoga, because we cannot analyse our own minds. We never think that we are wrong, and under these circumstances a competent master or guru is essential. He only can know what is wrong with us. The processes of the mind, which are the vrittis, take a concrete shape in the form of perception and identification with the objects and make self-awareness impossible, and we are constantly in a state of anxiety, restlessness and unhappiness and even go to the extend of constantly being born and dying through the physical body. All this is the effect of the mind’s identification with things—first psychologically, then physically.

Yoga is therefore a subdual of the mind, in the sense that self-consciousness in its true sense of universality would be impossible as long as the mind functions in its usual ways. The vrittis are the great obstacle in yoga. We cannot be aware of our true being as long as the vrittis function objectively or externally. When we are absorbed in a thought of another, how can we be aware of ourselves? To come to the dream analogy again, we are so much absorbed in a wrong perception of a so-called object in dream that we cannot know that there is such a thing called waking. As long as we are in the dream, which is the absorption of the mind in an imaginary set of objects, we cannot even be told that there is such a thing as the waking state.

Such is the identification of the mind with imaginary objects. Whatever be the worth or intensity of the teachings of yoga, the mind is unable to understand or grasp it because it is so much involved with the objects. No one can tell us that there is waking as long as we are in dream. So also it is that nobody can tell us that there is such a thing called the Absolute or the Universal Self, or the possibility of waking from this world, because we are so involved in the world—as we are involved in dream perceptions.

The involvement is simple enough to understand if we compare our experiences with the dream world. We are able to see the dream world as if it were an external reality merely because of the intensity of the false identification of the mind. The intensity of the aberration of the mind from itself in dream is such that thoughts appear as objects in a dream. We can see a mountain, and we can see a stone or an object against which we can hit our heads. In a dream we can fall from a cliff. Even though all these are thought constructions, the elimination of the self from the mind can be so intense that it can convert itself into an external object.

Scriptures tell us that God became the world in this manner, and consciousness assumed the form of variety in this way. To return from the variety to the unity is yoga. This can be done only by a careful study of the processes of the mind by which it has assumed the variety, and then by finding ways and means of turning the mind back to the unity. In the beginning therefore the purpose of a student of yoga would be to kill the passions of the mind, and then to investigate its ordinary weaknesses in the form of the general vrittis of perception. There is no use thinking of concentration of the mind or doing yoga when any kind of passion, whatever it be, takes possession of us.

There is a particular as well as a general modification of the mind. The particular is the impetuous modification which I called a passion, and the general is the ordinary perception of things, which is what we call consciousness of an object. Both these are obstacles and both must be overcome on the path of yoga. The overcoming or the subdual of the passions of the mind is the moral preparation that we are called upon to make in the practice of yoga, and the control of the general vrittis of the mind is the actual meditation itself. Meditation is a higher process, and it cannot be attempted as long as the lower passions are taking hold of us.

It is very difficult to know that we have certain passions, though we are always in the state of one passion or the other. It is nothing but a name that we give to the intensity of a desire whose form the mind may take at any time. Passions may be of the senses or of the ego. Both these are equally passions, and once we are under their grip we cannot concentrate the mind on anything else. We have five senses, and any one of these may be in a state of passion and virulent opposition to the state of concentration. Each sense has to be countered properly, because each sense is a mischief-maker. Like a judge who carefully and dispassionately examines witnesses individually in a court, we ought to take each sense organ individually in its isolated structure as it identifies with objects.

What is each sense doing at any given moment? We may have to watch it for days together, and then we will know how it operates. When we prevent a sense from functioning for days together, which is called tapas, we can know what a sense organ desires. When we fast for some days, we will know what foods we really want. We become strongly filled with appetite, and even small things look delicious after a three-day fast. Likewise, we can fast the senses for a few days and know what they are really after. It is difficult to know them in their usual performances, just as the real nature of a person cannot so easily be understood when in society and the person’s nature comes out when he is isolated from other people and watched carefully.

We cannot know ourselves when we are in the thick of society’s activities. This is why many people take to seclusion and isolation, because in that circumstance we can know what we really are, what it is that we have been after all this time, and also what our weaknesses are. If we live alone for two or three months in some isolated place, to some extent we can know what our minds are because we are cut off from the usual enjoyments of the world, and the desires can take proper shape when we are alone.

A careful isolated analysis of the sense powers and our ambitions is a proper preparation, ethically and morally. We should not think that morality is a kind of imposition that is inflicted on us by society, though many people are sometimes under this impression. One may think, “What is this stupid thing called ethics and morality? Is it a kind of torture inflicted on us by society? Why should we not be free to do what we want to do?” It is not just a social imposition on us. Morality inflicted on us from outside will not stand long. That is why there are rebellions.

It must be a spontaneous morality of the yogin which he wants to observe for its own sake—merely because morality is in consonance with reality, and immorality is in dissonance with reality. Whenever we are in conformity with Truth, we are supposed to be moral, and we should not think that society is inflicting this upon us. Why should they inflict upon us a punishment to be in consonance with Reality? People who think in such childish ways think that all laws are impositions from outside. Laws may look like impositions from outside in the beginning, but later on they become spontaneous necessities felt by each one for oneself. The rule of law does not originate from outer society. It first originates from ourselves, and then it is extended to what we call “society”. If we are not prepared to be consistent with the demands of the nature of Truth, we are not going to realise Truth.

The first prerequisite in yoga therefore is to be consistent in one’s behaviour with the demands of the nature of Truth. Our conduct should reflect the nature of Reality. This is morality. If our conduct is dissonant with the nature of Truth, it means that we do not want it and are only talking about it unnecessarily. Our heart does not long for it, and our behaviour shows that this is so. Ethics and morality in yoga are a conscious endeavour to reflect the nature of Truth in one’s own behaviour in life.

So it is that the understanding at which we have arrived by the analysis that we have made up to this time should be reflected in our lives outside. “I seek it not only in a process of intellectual analysis; I seek it also in my practical life.” This should be the attitude of a student of yoga, because truth is not an object merely of intellect or emotion. Truth is that which is the sum and substance of life in its totality—external as well as internal. Hence passion of any kind is inconsistent with the nature of Truth. Vehemence or violence of any kind whatsoever is an activity of the mind which denies the very existence of Truth.

We have certain basic desires from which other desires originate, and which may assume large proportions at times. These few are generally called creature comforts, a few which are the longings of the ego, a few which are biological needs, and a few which reflect our longing for higher 1ife. The creature comforts are the need for food, clothing and shelter. These are needs but they can also become luxuries, in which case they become obstacles. We need a strip of cloth to cover ourselves against nature’s onslaughts, and we need a little diet for the upkeep of the body. These are what we call “creature comforts” or the needs of the body. Though these needs are very few, they can assume the proportions of luxuries later on, and we mistake luxuries for needs.

A yoga student therefore should be cautious as to distinguish between luxury and necessity. Luxuries become obstacles because we will be thinking of them. We should not possess those things, the loss of which will disturb our minds. Is there anything we have, the loss of which will annoy us, worry us and upset our minds? Then it is better that we don’t possess it. Keep only that, without which we cannot get on in life, and these things will be provided to us. Don’t go for more. Bodily and vital needs must be properly distinguished from luxuries and comforts which are not necessary.

In addition to the bodily and vital needs, there are longings of the ego like name, fame, power and authority. These are obstacles to yoga. These are reactions of the ego to the outer environment, and these have to be properly analysed with great caution. These are not necessities. They are mere pamperings of the ego because we can exist without them, although we may not be able to exist without the creature comforts. The egoistic reactions or the ambitions as we call them are obstacles in yoga, and these have to be overcome. The biological necessities of sleep and sex are two other factors which need careful attention in yoga. They may look simple, but they assume difficult forms sometimes. One cannot completely close one’s eyes to these phenomena, because these become difficult to handle when they are wholly ignored. Anything that we totally ignore becomes a difficult situation for us. Neither can we completely identify ourselves with the desire, nor should we ignore it completely. We ought to tackle it properly with shrewdness and caution. There are desires which take different shapes when they are fulfilled and other shapes when not fulfilled. There are desires which we can fulfil harmlessly and desires which will bind us if we will try to fulfil them. Harmful desires and harmless ones have to be distinguished.

Therefore the bodily, the vital, sensory and egotistical needs have to be carefully detailed and made objects of study, and we have to be sure that we are not caught up with any kind of passion in our lives for or against anything. Sometimes, as I have said already, we seem to be incapable of living without something, and sometimes we seem to be incapable of tolerating something. These are two extremes of the mind. We feel that we cannot bear certain things and that there are certain other things that we can’t live without. We have to be very subtly conscious of both these extreme dimensions. We should not allow the mind to take vehement forms of either love or hatred. We see that once a desire becomes vehement it becomes difficult to handle. A lion’s cub can be handled when it is small, but when it becomes big it becomes dangerous. We cannot go near it because it will attack us. The preferences of the mind operate in a similar way. In the beginning there is a preference, then it becomes a need, and then it becomes a passion. Hence, it is better to nip it in the bud when it is a mere preference. If one must have a preference, it should not be allowed to assume large proportions.

When we are calm and quiet, not engaged too much in any object or event of the world, we have to make this analysis within ourselves. The preparation of yoga is ethical and moral in the beginning, and the actual practise comes afterwards. There are stages of the practice of yoga. We have been up to this time busy with the philosophical analysis. I mentioned that there are at least three stages of yoga: the philosophical, the psychological and the practical. Up to this time we have been carefully noting down the details of the philosophical foundations of yoga, and we have been touching to some extent upon the borderland of psychological analysis. We have not yet come to the practical aspects of yoga, which we have to see a little later on. But we are now considering the prerequisites of this actual psychological analysis and practice. The ethical and moral preparations are most important, and they are essential to the practice.