The 8 Limbs: Dharana

The 8 Limbs: Dharana

Welcome back to another enlightening episode! Today, we explore Dharana, the sixth limb of Patanjali's 8 limbs of yoga. Often confused with meditation, Dharana is the step before meditation, where we strive to quiet the mind's recurring thoughts. Instead of clearing the mind completely, we concentrate on a single object, excluding all other thoughts. It can be an internal image or an external object like candle gazing. By consistent practice, concentration becomes natural and effortless. Join us on this captivating episode as we unlock the power of concentration and delve into profound insights.

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Welcome back! Today is all about Dharana or concentration. This is the 6th limb in Patanjalis 8 limbs of yoga. Dharana is very often confused with dyana, which is meditation. Whilst similar, they are not quite the same.
Dharana is the step before meditation as it is here where we attempt to remove the recurring thoughts of the mind, This is very much where the ‘clear your mind’ concept comes in.
Instead of clearing your mind completely, as this is near impossible, we can focus or concentrate our mind onto a single object or thing. In this way we can exclude all other thoughts, and our mind becomes completely absorbed with concentrating on this one thing.
Generally this object of concentration is usually an internal image that we hold in the front of our mind, while the eyes are closed. Yet it can also be an external object, think of candle gazing or tratraka. However, the mind tends to wander more easily if it is concentrating on an external object, but concentrating on an external object is very useful for those people who have difficulty in visualising an internal object.

If we can concentrate on an external object (for example, in trataka,) for a reasonable length of time daily, or at least regularly, it will eventually be possible to close the eyes and visualise the image of that object internally.

From a yogic perspective the mind should not be completely fixated. The mind is soft so that it is aware of one object, but it should move when it realises deeper aspects of the object, like when it realises aspects of the object that were not perceivable before, when the mind was wandering from one object to the next. For example, think about when you are in an art gallery, glancing at the art works yet not actually taking the time to study each one, in this sense we miss at the subtle details of each work. Yet if we were to spend half an hour studying one picture, the finer and more subtle details will be revealed. It is the same with our own minds.

To hold our mind on one single object can be quite difficult, yet the benefit of deeper insight into the object of concentrations great. Concentration on one object is not impossible. It simply requires consistent and persistent practice. When the mind has been purified by the practices of the previous limbs, concentration will come by itself, naturally, without any special effort being required.