Selected Yoga Sutras

Yoga is the settling of the mind into silence. When the mind has settled, we are established in our essential nature, which is unbounded Consciousness. Our essential nature is usually overshadowed by the activity of the mind.

The mind becomes clear and serene when the qualities of the heart are cultivated:

friendliness toward the joyful,

compassion toward the suffering,

happiness toward the pure,

and impartiality toward the impure.

Ignorance is the failure to discriminate between the permanent and the impermanent, the pure and the impure, bliss and suffering, the Self and the non-Self.

Life is uncertain, change causes fear, and latent impressions bring pain--all is indeed suffering to one who has developed discrimination.

But the suffering yet to come should be averted.

The cause of suffering is that the unbounded Self is overshadowed by the world.

The laws of life are five:

Nonviolence,

Truthfulness,

Integrity,

Chastity, Nonattachment.

These laws are universal. unaffected by time, place, birth, or circumstance, together they constitute the "Great Law of Life."