The Yoga of Patanjali

Lesson - 6 99usually be undesirable because the average teacher emphasizesthe technique of the breath and not the ideas upon which theenergy that breath engenders. That is, the principles are nottaught. The detail is taught many times. The entire science ofthe breath is built around the use of the sacred word ‘OM’.The use of the word is intended to be confined to those aspirants,who are earnestly pledged to tread the way. But it has beenpassed on and its use enjoined by many unscrupulous teachers.The word is often used with no spiritual intent but simply as asound. That’s the trouble. The utterance of OM is mechanicallydone but not with any spiritual sense. When carried on, thebreath produces psychic results which indicate to the gullibletheir deep spirituality. The trouble is that breathing is inevitablyrelated to the OM, but the effects are dependent upon motiveand fixed inner intention. So the motive should be purified beforewe practise this. The use of the life-breath, is the whole art atwhich the aspirant, the disciple and the initiate work bearing inmind however, that the science of the physical breath is theleast important aspect and follows sequentially upon the rightuse of energy which is the word we apply to the divine breathof life”.First of all let us try to understand the mechanism ofrespiration. It comes down as a living being from life. Thatmeans there is the pool of life that is allotted to this earth, whichis a solvent of the principles of the Sun and the other planets.The solvent makes a solution of all the planetary principlesand, is governed by a great Law called the ‘Law of Pulsation’.It comes down to continue as breath in a unit-existence, and itis what we call respiration. It does not belong to us, we belongto it, we owe our existence to it. It proposes and it disposes.In between we propose many things some of which are disposedand some are not, by it and by us. The only right we have overour respiration is that we know that it is there. As long as it is