1.1 Ahimsa: The First Yama

Ethical Teachings of The Yoga Sutras of Patanjali (YSP)

The codes of ethics that emerge out of classical yoga create a foundation for the entire path of self-inquiry practices that build upon each other and become more and more streamlined until the student achieves the highest spiritual states of divine integration.  These teachings are highlighted in Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras from about 200CE but many appear much earlier in Vedic literature and religious teachings from the early Axial Age (about 800BCE).  

These codes offer us a way to interact with others and also a way to understand and investigate ourselves.

Before we dive into the ethics themselves, it’s important to understand the framework of the yogic path because it is extraordinarily beautiful, logical, and even meticulously scientific.  The highest state of Yoga is the deep cessation of identity with the changing human self. 

Yoga is a word that describes both the pathway to this goal and also the end result of stillness and inner peace that marks the completion of the goal: practice yoga to achieve yoga.  Yoga is stillness of self-realization and it is the internal movement that alchemizes us into and toward that stillness.  Stillness and movement toward That.

So the first step on the path to get us into our highest divine state matters a lot.  If your spiritual focus resides inside yourself in the cave of the silent heart then you might picture a giant arrow pointed in that inward direction. 

I like to think of an pyramid from the ground up that turns our attention into ourself and collects all of our thoughts, perceptions, emotions, and sensations from the scattered air around us and gently guides them away from being constantly projected outward into a u-turn that uses those faculties toward inner sight, or insight.

The spine itself is a pyramid: here the great allegory of the practice and the physical body itself align and unite in this practice that has so many such synchronicities that at some point you might just start to wonder if we were physically designed with the blueprint hidden in the plain sight of the body.

Just as the bones at the bottom of the spine are thickest and widest and then they taper upward toward the heart, so too is the ground of the yoga practice the structure that supports and gives rise to a path of practice that, when followed sincerely, can land us in the sacred center of freedom at the heart.

In this pyramid the widest base at the earth are our codes of ethics.  In Yoga these are called the Yamas and Niyamas.  The Yamas come first because these describe exactly how we interact with the people and the world around us: how are we behaving with others, in community, in family life, at the checkout line?  If the spiritual hand is scooping us into that soft u-turn, it’s logical that we should begin with our daily habits and how we interact outwards.  Start to shift these habits and create consciousness there and the rest of the inward path will follow.

The Niyamas, then, describe how we interact within ourselves.  How we build, create, and support the spiritual foundation within our own hearts and practicing techniques.

From here- after we have gained some mastery over our relationships to others and to our own inner world- we can focus on the deeper-in practicality of the body, the breath, the restraining or pulling in of our sense-perceptions, and the medium of concentration itself.  This inward path, make no mistakes, is scientific in its precision and in its purpose.  

Ahimsa

So what is the first foot on this path that will somehow turn and return us back in to ourselves?  Magically, it is a concept and a practice that I believe contains one of the most gorgeous of the yoga principles and, if done correctly, can itself take you all the way through the moving and tending of Yoga (the path) into the deep stillness and divinity of Yoga (the goal).  This is Ahimsa.

What is Ahimsa and how do we live it?

Ahimsa is the principle of non-harming, non-injuring, or non-violence.  ‘Himsa’ means harming, and ‘a,’ in common Sanskrit form, means ‘non,’ or ‘the absence of.’ The word and its meaning most likely come out of other early and shared Indian religions and philosophies, especially Jainism and Buddhism.  Ahimsa is described as a primary practice both in Jain texts where it appears as the first of the sacred Pancha Mahavrata, and in Buddhist texts as the first of the five precepts.

Why five?  We could discuss the metaphysics of this point alone.  The five Yamas as the foundation of Yoga correlate in mystical religious reference to the human body: the five-pointed star of two arms, two legs, and head.  This numerology is picked up in many of the ancient yogic texts, including in the Mahabharata and especially the Bhagavad Gita, where the five Pandava brothers (who stand for righteousness) stand up and fight against the rival 100 brothers of thought, form, sense, and earthly distraction that are so tempting and so difficult to overcome on the spiritual path.

Back to Ahimsa: we understand that non-violence is important.  That we should not hurt others.  When a small child hits, bites, pushes, or grabs at another the first instinct of a sane parent would be to guide that child away from harmful action and encourage them to see that non-harmful ways of interaction are almost always healthier.

What we sometimes don’t remember is that non-harming, when taken seriously and practiced earnestly, relates to thought, deed, and self also.  In what ways do we harm others by judging them?  In what ways do we talk about others and their great successes and failures, comparing those to our own successes and failures?  Who gets hurt here?  Certainly someone: probably both of you, but at the very least you will be injured or your subject will be upon any and all judgment. 

What is it in you that accepts yourself as you are?  What part of you feels unwelcome? Is there injury in that?  Has the injury been inflicted onto you, turning you into a victim and someone else into a perpetrator?  Are not both roles nourishing the deep choking tendrils of kindlessness?

In our physical bodies we apply ahimsa in ways subtle and obvious.  It’s clear that we should not push our bodies to the point of physical injury or inflict physical pain on those around us, but what about those small pushes that leave us just outside of our boundaries?  When we are breathless in movement, we cannot recalibrate before moving on to the next physical challenge, and we do not know our boundaries.

Kindness toward ourselves must include strong boundaries.  Is it kind to put your body or your choices into situations that your intuition warn against?  We have a lot of fear of saying no to people and to social contracts.  But when you have a strong boundary you are expressing the highest form of kindness on behalf of your heart.  I often remind myself that “no” can be my heart deeply sighing “yes.” Being skillful in your boundaries means speaking clearly and kindly and with firm boundaries.  This alone is a skill worth utilizing.

The heart can rest in a deep, spacious peace when we are in a complete ahimsa practice. You start to trust your intuition; you start to observe the mechanism of your thoughts and how frequently they pay service to judgments toward ourselves and toward others, allowing this dysfunction to soften and melt away; you develop boundaries that express how fierce kindness and justice must be in its greatest glory. 

Most importantly, you create the foundation that draws power away from the mind and into the heart.  Since this is the parallel goal of Yoga itself, can you see that Ahimsa has the potential to express and encompass the complete practice?  What is yoga after all but the deep plunge into the core of the heart and the fidelity to that heart in all parts of yourself, all parts of your life, in service to the divine human life that you so preciously get to live?

Where do you feel the most connected to the practice of Ahimsa?