Tapas: Fiery Discipline

The third Niyama, Tapas, is the willingness to do what is necessary to reach a goal with perseverance, commitment, consistency and joyful effort.

The word “Tapas” means purification by burning, which is often mistaken as self-mortification.  This observance sometimes leads to fasting, a meager diet, and other forms of asceticism. While the practice of austerities in moderation trains the will and develops body and mind, excessive asceticism and self-mortification has the opposite affect.

Tapas are one of the most powerful concepts in the Yoga Sutras.

The word “Tapas” comes from the Sanskrit verb “tap” which means “to burn.” The traditional interpretation of Tapas is “fiery discipline,” the fiercely focused, constant, intense commitment necessary to burn off the impediments that keep us from being in the true state of yoga (union with the universe).

Practice: determination to pursue daily practices while making sacrifices as necessary, enthusiasm for the spiritual path. Joyfulness with outer discipline will lead to inner discipline. In other words, other discipline lead to inner discipline.

Tapas/turn up the heat

Tapas is a practice of balanced austerity, sacrifice, discipline. Tapas means “heat” or “fire.” Go through the heat, accept it and invite it into your life.  Let discipline be the fire that burns away dysfunctional habits that keep you chained to repetitive circular patterns.

The fire of discipline brings transformation.

If you are not in stillness, you are craving or having aversion.  Discipline of the mind, emotions and body bring balance and equanimity and lasting inner peace. Transformation happens through the fire. As we burn off some layers of karma, we emerge as something new, a Phoenix.

Give yourself fully to your dharma (your life’s mission).

Discipline develops the courage, strength and simplicity necessary to stay in a challenging yoga practice or a long meditation.  On a physiological level, when physical heat is generated it “burns” the ego away by moving thru stuck prana in the body mind and spirit, revealing the true inner spirit.

 
 
 
 
 
 
Daily practices of Tapas:
1. Get up early
2. Discipline your speech
3. Do not entertain negative thought
 
Advanced practices:
 
1. Fasting
a.  Balance is the key
2. Bodily discipline
a.  Withdraw from desires
 
 
Benefits of Tapas:
 
1. Attainment of yogic powers:
a. Kaya Siddhi – body becomes healthier and more beautiful
b. Indriya Siddhi –   Five sense organs become more acute and active
c. Vasana  Dshaya – Elimination of desires
 
Tapas (Discipline vs Difficulty)

Unfortunately, many people mistakenly equate discipline in yoga practice with difficulty. They see another student striving to perfect the most difficult poses and assume she must be more disciplined and therefore more spiritually advanced.

Difficulty does not make a practice transformational.

It is true that good things are sometimes difficult, but not all difficult things are automatically good.

 

In fact, difficulty can create its own impediments, especially, in a challenging yoga practice.

The ego is drawn to battle with difficulty: The practice mastering a challenging yoga pose, for example, without the discipline to stay humble, can bring pride and an egoistic attachment of or to being an “advanced” yoga student.

A better way to understand tapas is to think of it as a joyful non-attached consistency and determination (without striving) to accomplish your goals. A few very practices of Tapas are to get on the yoga mat every day or to sit on the meditation cushion every day, or to forgive yourself or your loved one for the 10,000th time. If you think of Tapas in this vein, it becomes a more subtle but more constant practice, a practice concerned with the quality of life and relationships rather than focused on whether you can grit your teeth through another few seconds in a difficult asana.