The Eightfold Path of Prenatal Yoga: Pratyahara, Dharana, Dhyana and Samadhi
Part Three: Pratyahara, Dharana, Dhyana and Samadhi
I’ve split up the eight limbs over three posts to offer an in-depth look at each of them through the lens of Yoga and Motherhood. This is the final post in the series. The first post covered the Yamas and Niyamas and the second covered Asana and Pranayama.
“Parenting is a spiritual path that can bring you great pain and great joy and that can have a tremendous positive impact on your personality and your behavior.”
If you’ve been practicing yoga for a while, you know that the path of yoga goes much further than the physical postures. Ashtanga Yoga, or the eight limbs of a full Yoga practice, are laid out in the Yoga Sutras. They act as a kind of practical roadmap for you to follow in order to reach enlightenment. Each of the eight limbs is as important and necessary as the others, and there is a logical order to them.
It was during my first pregnancy that I fully realized the beauty of the eight limbs of Yoga. As my physical practice slowed and I was unable to practice Asana the way I used to, I was able to focus more easily on the other limbs and truly practice Yoga. Imagine my delight when I was able to connect these limbs to motherhood, thus deepening my fulfillment of both yoga and motherhood at the same time.
The practice of the eightfold path of Yoga through pregnancy prepares you for conscious motherhood. Moving through them sequentially builds a strong moral and ethical foundation for living well, promotes physical strength and a healthy body (ideal conditions for a growing baby), increases self-awareness, focus and attention and fills you with a sense of contented bliss. Of course, working with the eight limbs of Yoga isn’t a one-and-done practice. It’s a journey, as these limbs weave and shift to create a life filled with purpose, meaning and contentment.
Pratyahara
Pratyahara means turning inward by controlling your senses. This occurs naturally as you prepare for meditation. When you turn your attention to your breath, you are removing the distractions your senses can provide.
Our senses become extremely heightened during pregnancy. Smells can be overpowering, itchy fabric can be unbearable, and aversions to foods we used to enjoy are all common while pregnant. The practice of pratyahara allows us to better manage our reactions to the senses.
In addition, it allows us to better notice and control emotional reactions to senses. Sometimes an emotional response to sense perception is enjoyable: smelling the scent of your grandmother’s perfume or the coziness of a soft sweater. But sometimes our senses bring a strongly negative emotional link: hearing the song that reminds you of your ex brings anger or sadness, or smelling French fries results in overindulgence. Not only are our senses heightened during pregnancy, our emotions can sometimes seem out of control. A regular practice of pratyahara allows you to recognize when an unhelpful emotion is caused by an external sense and allows you to quickly resolve it.
Dharana & Dhyana
Dharana means concentration, or focused attention. Dhyana means meditation, or observation and reflection. These two are closely intertwined as one must utilize concentration to get into a meditative state. The eight limbs are all in preparation to get us here; to the place where we can be content with our own self, sit comfortably, breathe easily, and control our senses in order to turn inward and meditate.
Meditation during pregnancy has many benefits. Better sleep, increased relaxation, positive preparation for labor and many more. Meditation allows us to see things clearly and view reality beyond the illusions of the ego. This is where you become still and listen to your inner self, where you learn to trust your intuition. Sitting in stillness and in silence allows all the clatter and chaos of the outer world to fall away, leaving only truth and wisdom. Practicing meditation while pregnant prepares you to be the kind of mother who just knows what to do, or at least the kind of mother who can easily course correct during challenging moments.
Samadhi
Samadhi is the absorbed state of mind we sometimes reach during meditation, where time falls away. It is also a super-conscious state, sometimes receiving spiritual illumination, or perfectly tranquil bliss. While samadhi is the result of following the eightfold path, it isn’t something that can be forced. It’s one of those tricky things in life, the more you try to grasp it, the less you’re able to attain it. (Remember aparigraha, one of the yamas? This is exactly what non-greed, or non-grasping refers to.)
But samadhi can also be thought of as recognition that we are all part of something bigger and more powerful than ourselves. This is where it fits in with the path of pregnancy. Acknowledge the supreme, indescribable miracle that you are capable of - you’re MAKING a HUMAN! Samadhi is the awareness of your own intuitive wisdom as a mother.
Our society tries to diminish this wisdom. Childbirth is no longer considered a miracle, but a medical event to be attended to by a doctor. Motherhood is not the joyful relationship that a mother and child share, learning and growing from each other; now it’s an experience that leaves mothers isolated, bearing the burden of perfection and the blame for the ills of society. But through achieving samadhi, a mother begins to recognize her own authority, to stand in her own strength and power, and to lead her children consciously to a life filled with purpose and meaning.
Conclusion
The study of Yoga is vast and deep; it is a lifelong practice of self-awareness and self-improvement. Motherhood offers us the same opportunity for growth and enrichment; not only for ourselves, but for our children. These two journeys travel hand-in-hand, informing and enhancing each other. Spend time in contemplation to understand how your Yoga practice can benefit your pregnancy, and how your pregnancy can benefit your Yoga practice.
