A Pathway in the Mind

by Nina

Between Two Rocks by Nina Zolotow

Yesterday Timothy posted the following quote from Thoreau on his Facebook page (you can find him there at Dr. Timothy McCall Yoga), and it got me thinking: 

As a single footstep will not make a path on the earth, so a single thought will not make a pathway in the mind. To make a deep physical path, we walk again and again. To make a deep mental path, we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives. —Henry David Thoreau

This reminded me so much of the post I wrote about samskaras (see Meditation and Brain Strength). And I wasn’t at all surprised to see a quote from Thoreau that echoed yoga philosophy. After all, Thoreau read The Bhagavad Gita and other yoga scriptures, and even wrote that he considered himself “a yogi."

Free in this world as the birds in the air, disengaged from every kind of chains, those who practice the yoga gather in Brahma the certain fruit of their works. … Depend upon it that, rude and careless as I am, I would fain practice the yoga faithfully. … The yogi, absorbed in Contemplation, contributes in his degree to creation; he breathes a divine perfume, he hears wonderful things. Divine forms traverse him without tearing him, and, united to the nature which is proper to him, he goes, he acts as animating Original matter. … To some extent, and at rare intervals, even I am a yogi.

That being said, I had, a first, a mixed reaction to this quote. I tend to get a bit put off when I hear phrases like “we must think over and over the kind of thoughts we wish to dominate our lives.” As a creative writer, I think it’s important not to censor your thoughts and to allow yourself to think about anything and everything. And I tend to rebel at being told to be more positive. But then, just a few hours later, I realized that in some ways I had already been putting Thoreau’s advice into practice for a number of years. 

As a person who used to react to stressful situations with anxiety, I have found it very helpful to repeatedly remind myself of this quote (and this translation) from the Bhagavad Gita: 

You have a right to your actions,

but never to your actions’ fruits.

Act for the action’s sake.

And do not be attached to inaction.

Self-possessed, resolute, act

without any thought of results,

open to success or failure.

This equanimity is yoga.
—trans. by Stephen Mitchell

So while I haven’t been censoring my thoughts per se, when I notice myself starting to get stressed out about something, I have been developing the habit of turning my thoughts toward a more helpful way of viewing my life. I thought of this cultivating this habit more as using a new muscle that gets stronger and stronger with each repetition, not as creating a deep mental path or a samskara, but my little epiphany yesterday was: of course! It’s all the same thing.

This is why I think that yoga philosophy, which is indeed is intended to “quiet the mind,” can be as helpful for reducing stress as all the inverted poses and conscious relaxation practices that I also recommend. What do you think? Is there a piece of yoga philosophy that you find yourself turning toward over and over?

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