aster Pantajali wrote the “Mother Book” of all Yoga nearly 2000 years ago. This great yogi mastered all the physical poses and pranayama techniques comprising the “Yoga of the Body”, yet was also a great thinker, scholar, and meditator. Considered the father of Indian Classical Dance, he was also a great Sanskrit scholar, and author of Indian Medical treatises.

Dancer, Doctor, Yogi, Thinker, Master of Ancient Words; what do all these different disciplines have in common?

As we learn in this book, Yoga has many meanings. One is the “union of the winds within out inner body”. We unite these winds with our yoga when we think and understand. The winds will sing within us, the very first words of all (Sanskrit). They will flow free, and force us to dance, and to run to heal others.

The Yoga Sutra is divided into 4 Chapters, which may be thought of as cornerstones supporting a table. Chapter One sets forth the reason for all our suffering in this realm…“the Great Mistake” by which we label mere appearance as our reality and are thus forced to experience all of the pains of birth death and everything in between. Focusing on meditation through which this wrong view can ultimately be corrected, this chapter leads us through the steps, from morality through meditation, that we need to take which will ultimately result in liberation and will transform us into the kind of beings capable of bringing happiness to countless other beings.

Chapter Two describes the practices of the body, the asanas and breathwork, through which we gain entry into ever more subtle layers of body and mind.

Chapter Three describes the deepest practices by which we achieve true wisdom about things, the wisdom by which we are able to stop making the Great Mistake.

Chapter Four describes how this newfound wisdom will transform our bodies and minds in such a powerful way as to be able to appear in any form necessary to help all suffering beings.