Gateway by Marie Lossky (@Marie.Lossky on Instagram)
This post on The Witness is my sixth post in my series on the five-layer Kosha model of the human being. The physical body (Annamayakosha), the breath/energy body (Pranamayakosha), the mental/emotional body (Manomayakosha) and practices for each were covered in previous posts, which are available from the Yoga for Healthy Aging archives.The Wisdom Body (Vijnyanamayakosha) is the fourth sheath, layer, or level, in the Kosha model of the human being. It’s defined as witness consciousness or the lamp that illuminates all aspects of ourselves—personality and shadow, the good, the bad, the beautiful and the ugly—for understanding, acceptance, and integration. It’s also known interchangeably by the terms “the Wisdom Body” and “The Witness.” For the purposes of this post, I will be using “The Witness.”
A simple definition of the word “witness” from this perspective is correct knowledge or perception of a situation, condition, or fact. As with all things philosophical we can view this topic on many levels, from the mystical to the practical. This discussion will focus on the practical aspects of The Witness that we can employ on a daily basis to “see” and experience our actions in the play of life while at the same time realizing that it is a play, a relative reality, and a mere reflection of True Reality.
The Witness can also be thought of as a layered intelligence that consists of our mind and our everyday ability to think, reason, apply knowledge, and manipulate our environment as well a higher intelligence. Samkhya philosophy calls this higher intelligence Mahat or Buddhi. Iyengar refers to it as intuition that helps us choose, decide, and initiate right action. He says:
“Where our common intelligence can be called “instinctive,” we call this higher intelligence “insight or intuition.” —B.K.S. Iyengar, from Light on Life: The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate Freedom
Most of us begin the process of engaging The Witness through our everyday intelligence and our practice of asana and pranayama. Of the cleansing aspects of asana and the penetrating, pervasive aspects of pranayama Iyengar says:
“This is where we start and then gradually this level of intelligence or witnessing gradually begins to evolve into intuition,“ a supra-conscious knowing, which you know before you know how you know.“ —B.K.S. Iyengar, from Light on Life: The Yoga Journey to Wholeness, Inner Peace, and Ultimate FreedomHere are some practices that I work with and recommend:
Asana: While moving through a flow or holding an asana we observe, adjust, or correct our position and fully embody the core quality of the pose we have chosen. In asana practice we engage The Witness in order to listen to the body (Annamayakosha) and work with it to choose practices that fit our needs and limitations. Downward-Facing Dog pose is an excellent choice for this and one of my favorite asanas. According to Joseph LePage, the core quality of this pose is the integration of body, mind, and spirit. It helps to create a relaxed state of awareness, which is a key goal of yoga practice. And it is strengthening and relaxing at the same time. You can find pictures and descriptions of the full pose in Featured Pose: Downward-Facing Dog Pose, and many modifications in Downward-Facing Dog Variations.
Pranayama: One of my go-to practices to work with the breath/energy body (Pranamayakosha), is Donna Farhi’s Breath Inquiry. You can find a full description in my post Energy Body Practice: 10 Steps to Freedom, Step 3. Here, we engage The Witness by asking ourselves a series of questions as we examine all aspects of the breathing process. You can work with one or two questions if time is short or more as time permits.
Holding Space: When engaging The Witness on the mental-emotional level (Manomayakosha), I like the practice of Holding Space, an active exercise in contemplation and rumination. In this practice we engage The Witness to notice, identify, and label your thoughts and emotions and then explore any core beliefs that may be feeding the issue or situation we are exploring. You can read a full description of the practice in my post Mental/Emotional Body Practice: 10 Steps to Freedom, Steps 4 & 5.
Sometimes, during our yoga practices or when moving through our daily routines, we may experience one or more Aha! moments, (Iyengar’s higher intelligence or intuition, the “supra-conscious knowing, which you know before you know how you know”). When this happens we suddenly ‘know,’ without thinking, the basic reason why we have been held captive by a habit, an unhelpful thought pattern or troubling emotional reaction to a given situation. You can find one example of this in my post Witnessing the Self. I called this Aha! moment the “Volcano Incident.” My intuition sent me a very clear message about my emotional reaction to a frustrating situation.
When that happens and the light of understanding shines, we are able to employ skillful means to change a habit, replace an unhelpful thought pattern with a productive one, or change an emotional reaction to a helpful conscious response, resulting in increased calm and balance in the way we face the events of our lives.
Here’s another example. In my post SOS for Mental Distress I wrote about witnessing my periodic “blue funk days” while in the middle of them and how I discovered something interesting about them. While in a blue funk day I stew, grouse, bitch, and moan but if I watch myself do that while I’m in the middle of a blue funk day, I often find myself chuckling or experiencing intuitive flashes that result in deeper levels of self-awareness that lead to new understandings of why I’m in a blue funk in the first place. Because of that I can be more aware of the blues when they first make their appearance, and I’ve learned to hold space to watch and “ride that emotional wave” to see if it has anything to tell me instead of trying to cut it short and miss out on any new self-awareness that might be lurking at the back of the blues. When I can engage The Witness, I gain correct knowledge that my emotions are transient. They are waves that rise, crest, and dissipate, and I’m able to discriminate between the play of my thoughts and emotions and the fact that “I” have thoughts and emotions but that “I” am more than my thoughts and emotions.
Using everyday intelligence on or off the mat along with occasional Aha! moments that ‘pop’ in from our intuition or using higher intelligence are two ways to work with The Witness. But the Taittiriya Upanishad’s recommendation for sharpening one’s ability to engage The Witness is meditation.
“Within the mental sheath, made up of waves
of thought, there is contained the sheath of wisdom.
Practice of meditation is its heart,
And discrimination its foundation.”
—The Upanishads, a translation by Eknath Easwaran, page 253
My next post will offer a meditation practice based on Steps 6 & 7 from Joseph Lepage’s 10 Steps to Freedom.
NOTE: If you are interested in exploring more about the idea of relative reality and True Reality, the book Samkhya Darshan, Yogic Perspective on Theories of Realism,by Swami Niranjananda Saraswati will take you on a deep dive into that concept with a discussion of theoretical physics. If you’d prefer to surf, you can check out Plato’s Allegory of The Cave, which describes the material world as shadows on a cave wall. It’s fascinating and too long to describe here but Google is your friend and you can check it out on the web. If all you want to do is dip a toe in the water, consider this quote from Shakespeare’s play “As You Like It: “All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.” Then ask yourself this question: If I’m an actor in the play of life, who is the audience?
Subscribe to Yoga for Healthy Aging by Email ° Follow Yoga for Healthy Aging on Facebook and Twitter ° To order Yoga for Healthy Aging: A Guide to Lifelong Well-Being, go to Amazon, Shambhala, Indie Boundor your local bookstore.For information on Beth Gibbs' classes and upcoming workshops, see Beth's Classes and Workshops and for information about Beth, ProYoga Therapeutics, and Beth's book and CD, see proyogatherapeutics.com.
