Conation: Effort, volition, impulse
Last week we looked briefly at a definition of yoga and of Mr Iyengar’s translation of Sutra I.2. In that he says that consciousness has three functions, one of which is ‘conation’. It is not a well used word. So this week I thought to clarify it a little, and also the idea of consciousness, at least as it is used in Iyengar yoga. There is a rich little book that Mr Iyengar wrote in 1988, The Tree of Yoga, where he uses the metaphor of a tree to explain the aspects of yoga and how they combine to create a rich, interlacing philosophical subject. It is very readable. The chapters are short and can be read as stand alone items. Taken as a whole the book is very satisfying. In the chapter titled “The Depth of Asana” he writes:
“When we start working on performance of asanas, we all begin by just scratching the surface of the pose: our work on the pose is peripheral, and this is known as conative action. The work ‘conatus’ means an effort or impulse, and conation is the active aspect of mind, including desire and volition. Conative action is simply physical action at its most direct level.
Then, when we are physically doing the pose, all of a sudden the skin, eyes, ears, nose and tongue – all our organs of perception – feel what is happening in the flesh. This is known as cognitive action: the skin cognises, recognizes the action of the flesh.
The third stage, which I call communication or communion, is when the mind observes the contact of the cognition of the skin with the conative action of the flesh, and we arrive at mental action in the asana. At this stage, the mind comes into play and is drawn by the organs of perception towards the organs of action, to see exactly what is happening. The mind acts as a bridge between the muscular movement and the organs of perception, introduces the intellect and connects it to every part of the body – fibres, tissues, and cells, right through to the outer pores of the skin.”
— B.K.S. Iyengar, The Tree of Yoga, p 46 – 47
Remember back to your first yoga class ever. One of the first poses you did was triangle pose, Trikonasana. Your teacher told you to move your legs in a certain way and then your trunk to the right. That movement of the legs and trunk was the conative movement. It was a very new and different kind of movement because it is not a normal way to move, taking the trunk in that relationship to the legs. Immediately this registered an impression on the skin and muscles. This is the cognitive reaction. And it sends a feedback to the mind. Usually to the beginner there is some immediate sense or worry about falling over so we instinctively lean forward and bend the front leg at least a little. So the teacher will often ask the students to repeat the pose a second time thinking about the front leg and attempting to keep that leg straight; an effort to direct the cognitive action as the conative action proceeds. That is the process of involving the intellect.
In India they often use a lovely analogy of a team of horses connected to a chariot and a charioteer holding the reins. All is fine while the horses stay on the track. But if the horses are lead astray; something in the fields attracts them and they start after it and the reins start to pull to one side and the charioteer feels it, he realizes that disaster will soon strike and the chariot will be upended in the rocky, uneven field, so he pulls on the reins to adjust and straightens out the horses and brings them back on track. The horses are like the organs of action, our arms and legs, the reins like the organs or perception, and the charioteer has arms that react. His brain is the intelligence that is the overriding ‘decider’ that makes the decision about which why to guide the horses. Left to their own, the arms may decide it is easier not to fight with the reins.
Such a process goes on in our yoga poses over and over as we move into them, stay for a moment and reflect on the pose and then make adjustments only to have the process occur again and again until at some point we arrive at a point of contentment, or stillness. Thus we are using our bodies as a means to practice coming to this point of stillness in our minds, our hearts and our entire being. At least that is the plan as it is set forth in the Sutras.
Conation
Sunday, October 2, 2011
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