Pratyahara

Pratyahara names the withdrawal of the senses from their habitual outward pull, turning attention inward before the more concentrated practices of meditation can properly begin.

It sits at the midpoint of the eight limbs, neither fully outward like the ethical and physical practices before it, nor fully inward like the concentration and absorption that follow. This hinge position is often underemphasized in modern teaching, which tends to move quickly from posture to meditation without addressing the sensory withdrawal in between.

Practically, pratyahara is closer to a skill than an event: the capacity to notice sensory pull without immediately following it, practiced first in stillness and gradually extended into ordinary, sense-saturated daily life.

From the Editors' Desk, Shastra Digest.