dent ten years ago, the spontaneous recall of which may continue to
trouble the present as latent, hidden impressions resurface." There is
no countervailing positive sandbank we can build up, and so we would
seem to be imprisoned by an unchangeable past incident lodged in
memory. We are not. Everything I have said about strengthening the
nervous system and stabilizing the mind holds good. In addition there
is the old nostrum "time heals." It does, but only if we allow it to. In
Western psychology one recites and reflects repeatedly on one's prob
lems. This rumination reinforces and exacerbates the problem. While
revelation can help one to see the samskara, rumination only continues
to reinforce it. We all know that a scab that we constantly pick will not
heal. In the same way we have to let old wounds in memory heal over.
This does not mean repressing them. It means that what is not fed will
wither. A sandbank that we do not add to will gradually erode. The
right practice of yoga speeds this process, by enabling one to identify
the impulses rising from the old imprint and by severing the mecha
nism that feeds it. Acting on subliminal impulses reinforces them and
so the ability to intercept the rising wave is itself a progressive means
of relief. As the rising impulse is stopped before causing a disturbance
in our consciousness, we stop it from making a ripple on the surface
that will in addition return to reinforce the sandbank at the bottom.
I can offer at least a small example from my own life. During my
early travels abroad as a young man invited to spread the knowledge
of yoga, I was on occasion subjected to demeaning and, to me,
shocking racial discrimination. At my small hotel in London I was
asked not to eat in the restaurant as it might upset the other guests, and
at the airports in America, I encountered the ugly face of institutional
ized racism. Although I have strong feelings about racism and equality,
those incidents in no way altered my behavior or my warmth toward
the people of England or the U.S.A. The wound on my youthful self
left only a healthy scar, no lingering resentment, no decision to avoid
II K .� IYFNI;AI\