Pratyahara is the step 5 of Yoga. Actually, it is not a step but a stage. It describes the state of the mind, in which all sense input processing stops. What it means is that the mind does not perceive an external object even when our senses function properly. For example, our eyes don’t ‘see’ an object. even when our eyes are wide open, and so on.
You probably might have experienced such a state quite often. Imagine that you are walking on a street, totally engrossed in your thoughts. Your eyes are wide open. Suddenly, some friend of yours happens to pass by. But you fail to recognize him till your friend alters you of his presence. You were looking at him, your eyes have captured your friend’s image. But your mind fails to record that event.
Why does it happen?
Actually, seeing something and perceiving what is seen, are entirely two different activities. Seeing is the act of the eye. Your eye is like a camera that captures the image in front of you on the retina. Retina is like the film in an old-style camera or the image sensor grid in a modern-day digital camera. This image is then continuously transmitted to the brain through a bundle of optic nerve fibers connected to the retina.
These images are finally transmitted to various regions of the brain called vision processing regions. The processing takes place in two main streams – often called the ‘what’ and ‘where’ streams. The job of ‘what’ stream is to identify what is seen. Similarly, the job of ‘where’ stream is to identify the spatial location of the object. These processing take place in stages, each stage passing on its output to the next stage, and finally the gathered image reaches the memory for further action. Simultaneously, there are regions on these paths which try to detect motion in the object – is the object still? or is it moving? etc.
Throughout these stages, various previously stored memories in the brain have to be checked to get relevant information about similar objects seen earlier. This may be required either to identify the object or to assess its location, or assess any other detail about previously stored memory of the same object or something similar.
You can see that a simple act of ‘seeing’ involves whole lot of processing that takes place at various regions of the brain. All these regions may or may not be directly connected to each other.
However, for these regions to work together, these regions have to be connected to each other at least till they exchange information. Fetching information from various memories definitely needs new connections to be established between those memories and the region that needs the information in those memories. Sometimes, the intermediate results may need to be stored into memories for later usage.
All this calls for a dynamic connectivity between various regions of the brain. Once these regions are connected, the necessary data can flow from one region to another. Multiple steps of processing, establishing connections, fetching required information, disconnecting, further processing etc. could go on till the entire processing achieves the goals, namely “what did I see? Where is that object? Is it moving? Can that object be threatening to me?” etc.
But these connections between various brain regions cannot be setup permanently, since, depending on the occasion, different regions need to be connected. They need to be connected and disconnected to accommodate for another information sharing.
Whatever I listed out is very broadly what takes place when we see something or when our visual senses function. Almost similar operations go on when our other senses operate, the regions involved and the processing may differ though.
Now how do these regions of the brain get connected or disconnected when needed? That is the job of a special part of the brain called thalamus. Thalamus is not a single structure but a group of structures each in charge of a specific function. There are bi directional connections that connect the entire cerebral cortex i.e. the outer surface of the brain – to thalamus so that thalamus can setup the necessary connections as and when needed. These connections happen when you pay ‘attention’ to some aspect of processing or when regions involved in the processing ‘draw’ the attention of the thalamus.
But now, thalamus is a shared brain resource which has to serve multiple regions of the brain. When the thalamus is preoccupied with some region that makes great demand, or when there are conflicts between the needs of two or more regions that need thalamus ’s attention, thalamus may not be in a position to meet the demands of all those contending brain regions.
If that happens, then the thalamus fails to make the necessary connections. The processing that needs such a connection gets blocked for want of information or connectivity.
This is what happens when you were too engrossed in your thoughts and some friend appears before you. Your thinking process had kept the thalamus busy giving no scope for the visual processes to proceed. Your friend’s image had been captured by your eyes, but it could not be processed further since the vision processing regions are stuck for want of attention by the thalamus. Since this processing is paused or interrupted, the brain does not register the arrival of your friend. So, you won’t even be able to say ‘hello’ to your friend since your brain is not aware of his presence.
This is also what happens in the state of Pratyahara. It is a state in which the sense processing gets stuck even though the sense organs perform their functions. It is like a ‘crashed’ computer which fails to respond to any keyboard or mouse inputs. Mouse or keyboard may be perfectly Ok and may even do their job, but the operating system fails to recognize their inputs and process further. Probably you have had this experience several times 😉
Patanjali succinctly describes this stage of Pratyahara when he says
“sva vishaya asamprayOgE cittasya svaroopaanukaara-iva indriyaaNaam, pratyaahaarah”
That means
“The stage when the sense processing does not proceed, due to the restrained state of the senses, in consonance with the restrained state of the mind, is called Pratyahara.”
-- Yoga Sutra 2. 54
The commentator of Yoga Sutra namely Vyasa, further adds that
“The way the bees follow their Queen and either fly with her or get back into the hive, the sense processing also gets automatically restrained when the mind gets restrained.”
The senses are compared to the bees and the mind is compared to the queen bee. The senses get restrained because their ‘master’ (in a figurative sense) namely the thalamus or the attention center of the brain, is in a ‘well focused’ or Ekaagra state.
Why does it happen? That is the result of previous step of Yoga, which we will discuss in the next episode.
But does this restraining of the senses need to be done consciously, by force, etc. as many Gurus claim? Not according to the Yoga Sutra. In Vyasa’s words
“There is no additional effort needed to restrain the senses once the mind is restrained.”
That means that it happens automatically if you have attained a well-focused mind as a result of practices in the previous steps of Yoga. That is why I said that Pratyahara is not a step, but a stage.
But many Gurus talk about Pratyahara differently. They talk about effortfully restraining the senses. This could be a hangover from Hatayoga where Pratyahara is defined that way. But that does not make much sense since, if someone has understood the beginning steps of Yoga properly, there is no need to apply any force. Unfortunately, the core theme of Hatayoga is ‘Hata’ or force. And you need to forcefully withdraw the senses.
Further, many of these Gurus don’t even recognize the 8 components of Yoga as steps to be undertaken in an ordered sequence. They totally ignore the beginning steps.
Some Gurus even go to the extent of defining Pratyahara as dietary restrictions! They take its literal meaning – Prati aahaara – restricted food! They give a long list of foods that are forbidden for a Yogi, and so on. That is fine. But that is not what Pratyahara is meant, not at least by Patanjali 😉
How does the mind get into this state of Pratyahara? How do we achieve that? That is what we will be seeing in the next episode.
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