"When I was a child, summer was an endless progression of days filled with infinite time to pursue whatever seemed interesting to me and the gang of kids who gathered each morning on our street. Some days it was swimming; others it was selling lemonade or building a fort. But the most unrealistic and romantic project was the attempt to dig a very big hole, the classic "dig to China" endeavor that all kids seem to try at some point."
"The present task I have set myself is just as impossible. The 195 verses of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras form an exquisitely sophisticated map of consciousness; to attempt to isolate the 10 most important seems as foolish as digging to China. Nevertheless, I have found the following sutras central to the study of yoga, and hope that this introduction will inspire you to study the entire text in the depth it both requires and deserves."
"The author of the Yoga Sutras is also shrouded in mystery. There is even some debate as to whether "Patanjali" was a single writer, a fictitious name, or a combination of several writers. Traditionally, Patanjali is considered to have been a Sanskrit scholar, teacher, and physician who codified the extant wisdom of yoga into a book of four chapters written in the form of terse sentences known as sutras (literally, "threads")."
Childhood summer projects like digging to China serve as a metaphor for undertaking an impossible but romantic task. The 195 verses of Patanjali's Yoga Sutras form an exquisitely sophisticated map of consciousness and resisting reduction to ten essential sutras risks oversimplification. Scholars date the sutras between 200 B.C.E. and 300 C.E., though the system is older. Authorship remains uncertain; 'Patanjali' may denote one person, a pseudonym, or multiple contributors. Traditionally Patanjali is viewed as a Sanskrit scholar, teacher, and physician who codified yoga wisdom into four chapters of terse sutras, literally 'threads.' The verses emerged when oral teaching predominated and written teachings were rare.
Read at Yoga Journal
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