How To Keep Your Senses In Check!

Keeping our senses in check

- Smt. Simone Preuss

Yoga is a way of life". How often do we hear this expression, about ourselves? maybe say it proudly But do we actually follow it, integrate yoga completely, not only physically by doing a few Asanas, Pranayama and Kriyas every day, but also in our behaviour, following the Yamas and Niyamas? And what about the fifth step in Ashtanga Yoga, Pratyahara? How well can we or do we care to control our senses?

This starts by understanding that in Yoga, we do not only have five senses but eleven of them.There are the five "conventional" senses that we learn about in school - vision, hearing, taste, smell and touch. They are called the Jnanendriyas or instruments of knowledge as they constantly provide us with information about the outside world, our environment (Jnana means knowledge and Indriya sense or instrument).

Then we have five more senses, the Karmendriyas or organs/instruments of action: our speech, hands or ability to grasp, our legs or locomotion, the excretory organs (skin, liver, large intestine, lungs and kidneys) and the generative organs, allowing us to make a copy of ourselves, another human being - as opposed to any other living being like a tree, dog or a plant, which we are not wired to do. Karma means action and Indriya sense or instrument.