Ishvara-Pranidhana:  Surrender to God/Light/Energy of the Universe/Nature/Love (absolute presence)Practice: faith, dedication, sincerity, and patience to transcend the ego, which is so resistant to surrender.Ishvara-Pranidhana, the fifth and final Niyama, is about your relationship to the divine energy of the universe.  Offer the fruit of yourself, your work, and your devotion to Divinity.  Keep self-actualization as your goal in your life, adjusting all your actions to serve this goal in some way.  Spirituality embraces the light and the dark, so don’t judge the elements of your spirit. Spirituality is in many things – it is in our hearts. Your expression may be to read poetry, listen to music, to dance, to walk your dog. Find your expression of your surrender to Spirit and celebration of this energy.The observance can be taken as advice to let go, to stop clinging to the ego (source of frustration, dissatisfaction, and tension) and to trust in the Self that is at the centre of wholeness of being.  The ego thinks it is in charge and has an inflated concept of its own importance.  Modern psychology has revealed to us that great regions of the psyche below the surface of consciousness, and C.G. Jung used the term Self over and above the ego for the organizer and integrator of the total psyche, of which the conscious part in which the ego operates is but small part.  Isvara, the Supreme Being, is probably a later interpolation into Patanjalii’s Yoga Surtras, in which he sits uneasily as a model Purusha, and inspiration, and a recipient of devotion. The ego is melted by the fire of devotion (Bhakti Yoga), just as in Jnana Yoga it is whittled away by the well-honed intellect and in Raja Yoga dissolved by stilling the mind’s agitation and modifications. In Christian language Isvara Pranidhana is ‘Not my will but Thy Will be done’, “Love God and do what you like ”, and losing your soul to find it.  In Taoist language it is floating with the flow of life and Nature, the Tao.    Isvara Pranidhana (Surrendering to God)Patanjali defines “isvara” as “Lord,” and the word “pranidhana” conveys the sense of “throwing down” or “giving up.” Thus, isvara pranidhana can be translated as “giving up or surrendering the fruits of all our actions to God.”Many people are confused by this niyama; in part, because yoga is seldom presented as a theistic philosophy (even though Patanjali states in the 23rd verse of the Yoga Sutra that devotion to the Lord is one of the main avenues to enlightenment). In fact, some yoga traditions have interpreted Isvara Pranidhana as requiring devotion to a particular deity or representation of God, while others have taken “Isvara” to refer to a more abstract concept of the divine.Isvara Pranidhana/best actions are surrenderedThe essence of Isvara Pranidhana is acting as best we can, and then relinquishing and surrendering all attachment to the outcome of our actions. Only by releasing our fears and hopes for the future can we really be in union with the present moment.Isvara Pranidhana/paradoxically, this surrender requires tremendous strength. To surrender the fruits of our actions to God requires that we give up our egotistical illusion that we know best, and instead accept that the way life unfolds may be part of a pattern too complex to understand.This surrender, however, is anything but passive inactivity. Isvara pranidhana requires not just that we surrender, but also that we act.Conclusion of NiyamasPatanjali’s teachings demand much of us. He asks us to walk into the unknown, but he does not abandon us. Instead, he offers practices like the yamas and niyamas to guide us back home to ourselves—a journey that transforms us and all with whom we come in contact. Love (absolute presence) supports and sustains all that IS…  May you be blessed by these words and may that blessing extend out to all you pass and meet on the sacred journey of your life…