Hathayoga Summary

Read more about Hathayoga from the works of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo.

Different Schools of Yoga

Bhakti Yoga in itself is as wide as the heart-yearning of the soul for the Divine, resolves itself simply into these four movements:

• the desire of the Soul when it turns towards God and the straining of its emotion towards him,
• the pain of love and the divine return of love,
• the delight of love possessed and the play of that delight, and
• the eternal enjoyment of the divine Lover which is the heart of celestial bliss.

The triple Path of Works, of Love and of Knowledge is a direct commerce between the human Purusha in the individual body and the divine Purusha who dwells in every body and yet transcends all form and name. We perceive that as Hathayoga, dealing with the life and body, aims at the supernormal perfection of the physical life and its capacities and goes beyond it into the domain of the mental life, so Rajayoga, operating with the mind, aims at a supernormal perfection and enlargement of the capacities of the mental life and goes beyond it into the domain of the spiritual existence. the spiritual life, too much associated with the state of Samadhi. Object of Integral Yoga’s is to make the spiritual life and its experiences fully active and fully utilisable in the waking state and even in the normal use of the functions.

In Integral Yoga it is not a specialised process, but a spontaneous uprush of the whole lower consciousness sometimes in currents or waves, sometimes in a less concrete motion, and on the other side a descent of the Divine Consciousness and its Force into the body. This descent is felt as a pouring in of calm and peace, of force and power, of light, of joy and ecstasy, of pure wideness and freedom and knowledge, of a Divine Being or a Presence—sometimes one of these, sometimes several of them or all together. “ Integral Yoga” is in its principle a taking up and summarising and completing of this process, an endeavour to rise to the highest possible supramental level and bring down its consciousness and powers into mind, life and body.

Read more about Hathayoga from the works of the Mother and Sri Aurobindo.