Yoga practices like asana and pranayama, over time, take a practitioner into a non-verbal state of mind, that is, a state in which verbal thoughts have been quieted. However, some yoga practices make use of verbal thought. This is interesting because for most yoga practices that make use of verbal thought, the practitioner engages in such thought in a different way that one normally would.
1.) Name as many yoga practices as you can that involve verbal thought.
2.) For each one, explain what the practitioner is supposed to do with regards to the particular verbal thought he/she is working with. If he/she should contemplate a thought? What exactly is he/she supposed to do, moment to moment?
3.) For each, or you could answer for all at once, how is what the yoga practitioner is supposed to do different from how we normally treat verbal thoughts?
Verbal thought? That an oxymoron, isn’t it?
I have no idea what the phrase “verbal thought” refers to.
Sorry.
gordon
I have the exact opposite problem – I have a few too many options for what ‘verbal thought’ might be. But the same solution applies. . . please give us the definition you’d like to use for this conversation.
thats the problem I dont know so any ideas at all will help me better understnad and point me in the right direction
[quote=InnerAthlete;26081]Verbal thought? That an oxymoron, isn’t it?
gordon[/quote] No, perhaps not. We can think in words or images. Meditation on a mantra is one way to answer the question.
First of all, I think I know exactly what you’re talking about when you say verbal thought. It is the part of the mind that thinks in words, and is connected with both cognition and action, especially speech. It often identifies with the sense of “I”.
Second, I think you’re laboring under a false assumption. The goal of yoga is not necessarily to silence this function, but to focus it, and to cease to identify the sense of “I” with it. Cognitive activity continues even into advanced stages of meditation, although not necessarily into the most advanced stages.