Patanjali Yoga Sutra — वितर्कबादने प्रतिपक्षभावनम् ॥2.33॥

vitarkabādane pratipakṣabhāvanam॥

Disturbing or distracting thoughts, which hinder the sādhana are to be swapped by hoisting conducive opposite types of thoughts.

There are two bulls fighting against each other in our mind daily; one is positive and the other is negative. Do you know which bull wins? The one which you feed more. Hence do not feed the negative and get rid of it as early as possible.

An ascetic Guru and his ascetic disciple were crossing a river. When they were midway through, they saw a woman drowning in the water and crying for help. The disciple thought, ‘I am an ascetic and not supposed to touch the women’. Thus he abstains from helping the woman. But the Guru immediately jumps into action, puts the woman on his shoulders, reaches the bank and drops the woman on the safe bank.

Both the Guru and the disciple resumed their journey. On the way, the disciple was thinking, ‘Is this Guru dependable, trustworthy? He touched the woman and made her sit on his shoulders. There is a world of difference in his words and actions’. He kept on thinking on these lines all through his journey with the Guru. Finally, he could not control his oddity, opens up and asks –

‘Guruji, we, being ascetics, are not supposed to touch the women. You said this many times. But today, besides touching that woman, you made her sit on your shoulders. Is it not wrong?’

Guru says, ‘Oh my God, I left that woman on the bank of the river long back. But you are still carrying that woman in your head’. The disciple understood his own mistake and could not open the mouth.

The mind is like a supermarket having all kinds of things. We need to choose what we want and leave the other things untouched. Patañjali believes strongly in the saying ‘We are not different from our thoughts’. In physics, there is a rule: ‘Two things cannot occupy the same place at the same time.’ The same rule holds good even for the mind. Mind, though appears to be thinking of many things, it is not so. The truth is that series of thoughts would be cropping up one after the other. That is, in a split second, there will be one thought only.

Patañjali very wisely (like a physicist) solves the problem of disturbing or distracting thoughts: ‘Hoist and swap a favorable thought in place of unfavourable/disturbing thought, so that, you develop a conducive environment in you for your sādhana.’ In the height of intense fury, if I ever think that ‘This is my worst enemy and I should strangle him to death’, I should immediately raise a counter thought like ‘No, I don’t have any enemy at all. I love all. I like all. I will not harm anyone. I pray for his wellbeing.’ Fury subsides in no time!

What is anger? We are just one letter short of danger. It is a temporary madness; man loses his discretionary power. It is as dangerous as Agni (Fire). The fire in the firewood first destroys the firewood and then other nearby things; and gets extinguished only after full destruction.

Does it mean yogi never gets angry? Friends, yogi’s anger is sāttvik and is for correction of himself or others or society. Śrīkr̥ṣṇa gets infuriated with bhīṣma in kurukṣetra war! Śrīkr̥ṣṇa becomes furious with Duryodhana when the latter insults in Rājasabha during former’s reconciliation visit. But wicked’s anger is destructive and is dangerous!