Samskaras

I'm reading this fantastic book called "Light On Life" by BKS Iyengar. I have read lot´s of books on yoga, and I have to say that this is one of the most comprehensive and interesting books I´ve read on the subject.

Right now I am reading a chapter on samakaras. Iyengar gives the example of the conciousness being like a lake. If you are for example dissapointed by something, this creates a ripple on the surface. Since the ripple is on the surface, you can handle it. But if you are repeatedly dissapointed, the ripples create waves that go down to the bottom of the lake, and create little sand banks, or mounds. These mounds will in turn send out new waves of dissapointment to the top of the lake. It becomes a conditioned reflex. Whenever you are triggered by a certain situation, the mound automatically sends off little waves of dissapointment, or whatever kind of samskaras you have. The respons is not a direct and adequate reaction to a situation. You have not seen the situation as it really is, but you respond with a conditioned pattern, coming from the bottom of the lake, and not from the surface.

Yoga is about reducing these mounds, and setting us free from these negative habits, or waves in our conciousness. These have been built up over time, and take time to reduce. So, how to reduce them? Well, through yoga you become more aware of your thought patterns, and so you are able to observe your negative thinking patterns. When you have become aware of them, you can start replacing them with positive thoughts. When these positive thoughts are repeated, they in turn create positive mounds, and since the negative mounds don´t get any feed back, they start to diminish. Eventually, the goal is to have no mounds at all. To be able to respond unconditioned to a situation. Total freedom.

This is hard work, especially if you have a lot of negative samskaras! But it is another good reason for getting up early in the morning to do your yoga (hmm, this morning I was trying to find a reason why not to get out of bed...when I suddenly remembered my samskaras! I jumped out of bed:-)