Yama and Niyama 1 – Why they are important

• Everything we do revolves around us…, what we are, how we view the world and the feedback we receive for our actions. Our sense of identity.
• Our sense of identity changes to the circumstance; whenever we experience an accolade, our sense of identity swells, while an experience of depreciation results in a contraction of our sense of identity.
• Therefore, our sense of identity depends completely on the environment for its existence. But, to get the attention of the environment, we needs to manifest our identity. When we do, our first experience is fear of existence, that no one will acknowledge us. When someone does, our first experience is one of happiness. We immediately try and forge a bond with whoever acknowledges us, and keep that bond even if the relationship is sub-optimal, for fear of loss of identity.
• A bond rests on the principle of “give and take”, or “stimulus-response”. Whenever we get a stimulus from another entity, we examine it against our “value-system” or “conditioning”. If the stimulus is in congruence with our conditioning, then our sense of identity gets attracted to the stimulus and the source of the stimulus, drawing the source closer to experience more of the congruence. Should the stimulus be divergent from our conditioning, then we try to push the source of the stimulus away, unless the bond that we are in is existential.

For example – Even though we may be in a company where we cannot get along with the boss, we may have no choice but to continue working in the company as the alternative might be poverty and severe deprivation for our family. However, our output will be severely hampered because much of our energy will be used in overcoming our dissonance. However, should the boss change to one we can work with, the output will change dramatically.

• It is also important that once a bond is established, our ability to remain and function in the relationship will determine the extent of peace we experience with our environment. This means yoking our sense of identity with our manifestation to be in harmony with the output and its reaction.
• This means that we need to harmonise two aspects unique to us – the quality of our interaction with our environment (Yama) and our ability to receive, absorb, assimilate and respond to stimulus to ensure harmony between our sense of our identity and conditioning with our actions (NiYama).

Share your opinion and experiences;

• How do you relate in difficult relationships?
• What are the important factors which make a relationship successful?
• What is the importance of vivekam (discrimination) and vairagyam (emotional intelligence) in difficult situations?
• How does one’s sense of identity impact one’s conditioning and behavior?