Praise of the Practice of Yoga
1-2. Ganesha spoke -- O King! He who performs the actions
prescribed in the Shruti and Smriti without desire for their fruits is superior
to those yogis who renounce actions. O Mighty-armed one! In my opinion, for the
attainment of yoga, actions are the cause; for the achievement of yoga's
perfection, tranquility and self-restraint are the causes.
3. He who performs actions while contemplating on sense
objects is an enemy to his own soul, and he who performs actions without
desiring them attains perfection in yoga.
4. The soul alone is the friend and the enemy of the soul;
this knowledge leads to liberation, while ignorance of this binds; there is no
other.
5-6. One should maintain the same attitude towards respect
and disrespect, happiness and sorrow, kin and saints, friends and foes, neutral
persons, hateful ones, a clod of earth, and gold, etc. The seeker who has
conquered his senses, is knowledgeable, and has mastered the self, should
always practice yoga until he achieves its mastery.
7-9. One who is distressed, tired, agitated, hungry, or
restless should not practice yoga. In extreme cold or heat, in places with
excessive fire, wind, or water, where there's much noise, in a dilapidated
place, near a cowshed, near fire, water, a well, a crematorium, river, a wall,
where dry leaves rustle, under a sacred tree, in an ant-hill, or in a place
haunted by spirits, a yogi devoted to meditation should not practice yoga.
10-11. Loss of memory, muteness, deafness, slowness, fever,
inertia - these are all defects that arise in a yogi from ignorance regarding
yoga practice. A yoga practitioner should abandon all these defective places;
failing to do so surely leads to defects like memory loss.
12-13. O King! The yogi should always eat little, not remain
without food, not sleep too much, nor stay too awake - by always practicing
yoga in this manner, he attains perfection. He should abandon all desires and
cravings, eat sparingly, be vigilant, control all senses with his intellect,
and gradually withdraw from sensory objects.
14-16. Wherever the mind goes, pull it back from there and
with patience bring it under control, for it is very restless. The yogi, always
doing this, attains supreme peace and sees the world in himself and himself in
the world. By yoga, he who attains me, I respectfully attain him, and he who
does not abandon me, I do not abandon him and liberate him from the world.
17-18. He who sees all beings with the same soul in
happiness and sorrow, hatred, hunger, contentment, and thirst, who knows me as
the all-pervading, and who is solely attached to me, he is liberated while
living and is worthy of salutations from deities like Brahma in the three
worlds.
19. King Varenya spoke -- O Lord! I see both kinds of yoga
as extremely difficult because the mind is very wicked and fickle, and
controlling it is hard.
20-21. Ganesha said -- [O King!] He who governs this
hard-to-control mind, he becomes free from this wheel of worldly existence,
which spins like a potter's wheel. This firm wheel is made of objects of
senses, fixed well with the nails of actions, therefore ordinary men are not
capable of piercing through it.
22-23. Extreme suffering, dispassion, abandonment of the
thirst for enjoyments, the grace of a guru, and the company of the holy - these
are the means to conquer the mind. Through practice for the attainment of yoga,
control the mind; O Varenya! Without conquering the mind, yoga practice is
extremely difficult.
24. Varenya said -- O Lord! What world does the one who has
fallen from yoga attain, what is his fate, and what fruit does he receive? O
Omniscient one! O holder of the wheel of intellect! Dispel my doubt.
25-26. Ganesha said -- [O King!] Those who have slipped from
yoga, taking a divine body, go to heaven, there they enjoy superior pleasure,
then again take birth in the lineage of pure-conducted yogis. And then, due to
the impressions of previous lives, they become yogis. No one who performs
meritorious actions goes to hell.
27. O King of men, a yogic practitioner is superior to
practitioners steadfast in knowledge, austere practices, and actions; and my
devotee is the most superior among all of them.
Thus ends Chapter One Hundred Forty-two named "Praise
of the Practice of Yoga" in the Krida Khanda of the glorious Ganesha
Purana.