THE VIBHUTI PADA BEGINS
Chapter 82THE EFFECT OF DHARANA OR CONCENTRATION OF MINDAt the very commencement of the Vibhuti Pada of this great work, the Yoga Sutras,
Patanjali introduces us directly to the quintessential essence of the practice of yoga.
In comparison with this attitude which is adopted in the Vibhuti Pada in such right
earnest, everything that has been said and explained in the Sadhana Pada should be
regarded as preparatory. In fact, this is exactly what the author feels. When we come
to the point of concentration of mind, which is the subject with which the Vibhuti
Pada begins, we are face to face with a tremendous atmosphere. It looks, as it were,
that everything is up in arms against us, and every atom of creation becomes aware
of our existence. What actually happens, and what one has to encounter at the time
when one is ready for the concentration of the mind according to the techniques
prescribed in yoga, is not clear to many people. This is because we have the
commonplace notion of the concentration of the mind, such as the type that we have
when we are solving a mathematical problem, or building a bridge across a river, or
thinking deeply about some issue, and so on. These are types of concentration which
are different from the type that we are concerned with in yoga. It is not a particular
point in an isolated capacity that we are trying to think in concentration, while this
appears to be the case ordinarily in the workaday world.
What actually happens in yogic concentration is that we exert a pressure at a
particular point, which immediately communicates a message to everything else with
which it is connected. This is very important, a feature which distinguishes yogic
concentration from every other type of concentration. It is something like
encountering a ringleader directly. When he is faced openly, we can imagine what he
will do. He will immediately send a message to all his cronies that he is caught. There
are ways and means of doing this, which is a subtle secret of nature. The activity of
natural forces is different from the activity that we are accustomed to in the
workaday world. Communications do not require any kind of physical medium in the
case of the working of natural forces. There is no need for an electric wire or cable, or
any such conceivable material medium. A reverberation of forces is automatically
created on account of a disturbance felt at a particular point in space. Any pressure
intensely felt at the bowels of the ocean will be communicated to the entire ocean.
The manner in which it is done, the ocean only knows. We may say, in a sense, that
this world is like a reverberating chamber where everything echoes in every corner,
and not even the sound of a pin dropping can go unheard. Not only that, sometimes
it seems that this pin-drop sound gets magnified in certain corners according to the
circumstances of the case; and forces are alerted immediately to do the needful on
account of this disturbance that has been created.
I am advisedly using the word ‘disturbance’ because of the peculiar reactions that are
set up when concentration is commenced. Though ultimately, in the sense of the goal
that is in view, it cannot be called a disturbance but a tendency to a readjustment of
things, in the beginning it looks like a disturbance. Suppose there are a thousand
soldiers standing in a chaotic manner—anyone is standing anywhere in any manner
whatsoever, without any order or system—and the general issues an instruction that