*** IMPORTANT ***

*** PLEASE READ THIS FIRST ***

This is the longest lesson BY FAR.

Other lessons are not this long.

However, this is necessary to lay

the foundation of yoga philosophy.

The 8 Petals of Yoga can be found in Book 2 and Book 3 of the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali. This is a time-tested system that leads to inner peace and mental clarity. Furthermore, it is the foundation of yoga itself. Patanjali is the mystical and mysterious author of the Yoga Sutras by the way. Practicing the 8 Petals of Yoga is a way to gain back control over the mind and body. Interestingly, if you look closely at the 8 Petals of Yoga, you will see that the entire system is about focus. Yoga is designed to help you master focus. Single-pointed focus with full awareness in the present moment is the primary goal of yoga. This not only leads to freedom, but it also results in the highest quality of creation. Let’s briefly go through all 8 of the Petals — first as an outline, then more in-depth.

(1) Yamas — Universal Morality

(2) Niyamas — Personal Improvement

(3) Asana — Physical Practice

(4) Pranayama — Breath Practice

(5) Pratyahara — Redirecting Focus

(6) Dharana — Cultivating Focus

(7) Dhyana — Sustained Focus

(8) Samadhi — Merging with Focus

(1) Yamas — Universal Morality

The yamas can be seen as a universal code and a guide on how to interact with the outside world. However, it gets a little deeper. There are five yamas, and they are as follows.

(1A) Ahimsa — Non-Harming and Reverence

This yama is the golden rule of yoga. It is the most important, and it is placed above the others intentionally. Although we ideally want to practice all of the 8 Petals of Yoga simultaneously (easier than it initially sounds), if there is a choice between two, go with the higher one. This is covered in Lesson 7.

Ahimsa is about not harming others. The physical part is obvious, but remember it gets a little deeper. Don’t physically harm others, but don’t harm them with words either. Don’t harm others energetically with judgment and negative thoughts directed at them, regardless of how subtle. Further, turning inward, don’t harm yourself with neglecting your physical health or with things like negative self-talk. Instead, choose reverence and respect.

(1B) Satya — Appropriate Truthfulness

The word “appropriate” may seem out of place here, and if you consider yourself a hardcore truther, this may even offend you. However, the truth is not always the best choice in every situation. Life is nuanced and complex, regardless of how binary and simple we would like it to be. The entirety of Lesson 7 is dedicated to the ahimsa-satya dynamic, but the thing to get here is that sometimes it is better to be nice than right. That is the essence of the “appropriate” placement. If someone is fat, that may be the truth, but is it the best thing to say? Be as truthful as possible with others while simultaneously respecting how it may make them feel. This is a tricky one, but you’ll get better with practice. Appropriate truthfulness is with others, and it is with yourself too. However, if there is a place for absolute truth, it would be with yourself. Yes, be as honest as possible with the people in your life, but be even more honest with yourself.

(1C) Asteya — Non-Stealing and Giving

Don’t steal the property of other people. Yes, that is obvious. However, as with the visible, don’t steal the invisible. Don’t steal the ideas of other people and take credit. The allure of doing so is a deceptive illusion. Although it appears as a potential win, it eventually becomes a loss for all and in all ways. If people find out, you will lose credibility in their eyes. Worse, enough of these instances, and you start to lose credibility with yourself. People often wonder why morality matters. Yes, it is for the other person, but it is also for you. If you are harming others, lying, and stealing, it will eventually become difficult to focus and be at peace — unless you are a psychopath of course. I’m glad you are paying attention! On that note, don’t steal the attention of others for selfish gain or for no reason at all. Don’t steal the positive emotions of others, and never commit the crime of stealing someone’s time. Instead, do the opposite — give your all in life and be a gift to others.

(1D) Brahmacharya — Balanced Sexuality and Use of the Senses

I am aware of how sensitive the subject of sexuality can be nowadays. With that being said, it can be very easy to look up brahmacharya once, see some random person on the Internet said it was celibacy (no sex at all), then never look into it again. Celibacy is not what brahmacharya is about. That is an extreme way of life that is likely to end in frustration, stress, resentment, and even rage. Brahmacharya is often misunderstood and misrepresented. According to yoga philosophy, it is balanced sexuality and use of the senses, with the latter being more important.

In my opinion, today’s world is far too hyper-sexualized, but then again, I was born in 1990. Jokes aside, celibacy — a binary switch — is not the answer to an over-sexualized culture. Balance is the answer. Balance, along with honor, is what brahmacharya is about. Sexuality should be balanced and honorable. Enjoy the dance, but don’t obsess about it 24/7, and don’t make it the essence of your identity. It is part of you, not the whole thing.

The bigger part of brahmacharya is actually concerned with your senses. In yoga, we learn that the senses are like the doors to the mind. What are you letting into the front door? Truly, a picture is worth a thousand words and can show you how too much of a good thing becomes a bad thing. Imagine one of your favorite people comes through your front door and wants to talk to you about an awesome opportunity that would greatly benefit you. Of course, you would probably be excited and happy. This is all hypothetical, but now let’s say three or four of your friends showed up at the same time and were trying to talk to you about an awesome opportunity. It would still be cool, but now it is starting to get a little complicated. Next, imagine 100 of your favorite people showed up at your front door and all wanted to talk to you about something awesome. At this point, too much of a good thing has become a bad thing. Even though these are your favorite people and they all have something fantastic they want to share with you, it is just too much all at once to appreciate, never mind integrate. This dynamic happens far too often in today’s world. How many voices are in your head trying to get your attention? It is the same thing, although more subtle. Overloading the senses overloads the mind, and eventually makes it difficult to focus. It makes it hard to relax. Again, balance is the key.

(1E) Aparigraha — Non-Possessiveness and Letting Go

Enlightenment is often more about letting go than adding more. I think it is interesting to contemplate that maybe the Buddha wasn’t enlightened because he knew more than you, but rather he knew less than you. The Buddha emptied where nearly everyone nowadays is overfilling. He let go, and we hold on. Holding on to too many things often results in not being able to grab what truly matters. This is so tough for people in American culture, and I am including myself. We were all taught to learn, learn, learn, and never stop learning. Yes, keep learning, of course! However, it must be balanced with unlearning and letting go, otherwise no true progress is made. I think it is funny to stop and think about an AI model like ChatGPT or Gemini. It is almost like they have infinite space to store all the information in the world. Don’t try to be like that with your mind because it can’t be done. Further, trying to do so will drive you insane.

Let go, and let other people be who they are. So many of these principles are tough to put into practice, but doing so results in endless rewards. Trying to control others — however obvious or subtle — is a lose-lose situation. If you want true control, direct it inwards. The only thing with the potential to have full control over is your own mind, but even that is a challenge of the greatest magnitude. Allow others to be as they are. Let go to make space and find peace.

(2) Niyamas — Personal Improvement

If the yamas are how you interact with the external world, the niyamas are how you interact with the internal world. However, remember it is nuanced and there is crossover. There are five niyamas, and as you go through these it may feel like this is the “self-help” or “self-improvement” section of the yoga philosophy library. That is a good way to look at it.

(2A) Saucha — Purity of Body, Mind, and Spirit

The first niyama, saucha, is particularly interesting because it is the only one of the yamas and niyamas mentioned twice in the benefits section of the Yoga Sutras. Out of all the yoga principles and practices, saucha is said to result in the greatest benefits. Some of these benefits include mastery of focus, permanent cheerfulness, freedom from desire, and fitness for the highest levels of spirituality. This information can be found in the Sadhana Pada (Book 2) of the Yoga Sutras — verses 35 to 45.

Like the other concepts discussed thus far, there are levels to saucha. Starting with the most obvious, purity in body will make everything easier. Eating healthy food and exercising is a simple way to practice saucha that is highly effective. It will be easier to focus and to relax. It will be easier to be happy. However, the rewards begin to multiply once you begin to practice purity in mind and spirit. Just like you wouldn’t expect to have a pure body if you ate fast food daily, you can’t expect to have a pure mind if you consume the digital version of that. Like the body becomes what you put in your mouth, your mind and spirit become what you put in your eyes and ears. Be pure on all levels, yet don’t go on a purity power trip or fall into perfectionism. Do the best you can and never judge others for being “less pure” or “on a lower level”. Judging others is actually a mental impurity or even an impurity of spirit. There are consequences of this. Everyone knows about pollution — just look on any sidewalk or street for confirmation. However, what do people know about mental and energetic pollution?

(2B) Santosha — Acceptance, Gratitude, and Contentment

You should never blindly agree with anyone or anything, and that includes me. I am doing my best to provide you with accurate and valuable information, but you should still look into these topics for yourself. You should get as many perspectives as possible, which will eventually lead you to the clearest picture.

In yoga, santosha translates to “contentment”. However, it is often much easier to talk about contentment than to practice it. A lot of this stems from not knowing how to “become content” with a situation that seems impossible to appreciate. I have had my fair share of these circumstances, and I’m sure you have too. It is easier to be content with a great situation, but the true power of santosha comes from developing the “muscle of contentment”, and being able to be okay with all situations. I actually used to be a college math tutor, and I’ve come up with a formula for contentment. It is simple, and it will help you start developing this internal skill.

Acceptance + Gratitude = Contentment

The first step is to accept the true reality of the situation. This does not mean rolling over or allowing people to do evil things. What it does mean is getting grounded in reality. It is difficult to go somewhere if you don’t have an initial starting point, and it is even more difficult if you have a starting point that is illusory. This is akin to building on sand. If the foundation is based on a false premise, every step after is potentially flawed. Accept where you truly are, then go from there.

Gratitude is the next step, and I am not saying to be grateful for bad things. What I am asking you to do is to become an alchemist. Transmute the bad external thing into a good internal thing. Be grateful for what a situation can teach you and who it can help you become. Look at bad things as potential catalysts for great things. As a simple example, consider a person is struggling financially. On the surface, it may look like this situation has nothing to offer. It is stressful, frustrating, and even humiliating. How can that be good? How are we supposed to be grateful for something like that? If we instead look at the situation as a catalyst that helps us become more skilled, stronger, and more compassionate towards other people who struggle with money, now it becomes easier to practice acceptance and gratitude. A similar thing could be said about a person with anxiety or depression. On the surface, it looks like there is nothing positive about the situation. However, going through something like this allows you to develop empathy for others on a level other people will never know. You are able to connect more deeply with others and help heal them as well. At the end of the day, contentment is a choice. I acknowledge it is a tough choice at times, but the longer you wait, the harder it gets. Accept and practice gratitude the best you can. With practice, the bad can become good, and the good can become great.

(2C) Tapas — Self-Discipline and Self-Motivation

This was actually one of the original names for a spiritual practice. Tapas is all about discipline and motivation. However, at the higher levels, it is about cultivating your own discipline and generating your own motivation. Being motivated by others or having others help instill discipline in you is a good starting point, but it is not where you should stay. Although those sources can still be good, they are finite and conditional, whereas self-discipline and self-motivation have the potential to be infinite and unconditional.

Let’s say that you are motivated by your girlfriend or romantic partner. I’ve been in love myself before, and it is an incredible motivating force while things are going well with that relationship. However, what happens if you break up? The former source of motivation turns into something more ugly and even heart-breaking. It can turn into the opposite of motivation. To be crystal clear, I am not saying this form of motivation is bad. For instance, I am highly motivated to be a good person because of my family. However, I also recognize that this source of motivation will not always be there, regardless of how much as I would like it to be.

Another great illustration of this dynamic is the personal trainer example. In addition to being a yoga teacher, I was also a personal trainer for many years. I soon realized that most people don’t get a personal trainer because they don’t know what to do. They get a personal trainer because they need external motivation. Again, there is nothing necessarily wrong with this, however if the trainer (source of motivation) is not there, the workout often never happens. Ideally, you want to be able to motivate yourself. This way, no external conditions can stop you. It also becomes limitless as you approach your spirit.

(2D) Svadhyaya — Self-Study

Paradoxically, the better you know yourself, the better you will know the world. There is tremendous value in the phrase “know thyself”. What are your tendencies and patterns? What biases do you have? In order to change behaviors that have a negative impact on your life, you must first know what they are. This is accomplished through self-study, or svadhyaya in yoga philosophy.

How do you study yourself? They are many ways — old and new. Meditation and introspection is an excellent start. Reading sacred books like the Bhagavad Gita, Tao Te Ching, and Yoga Sutras will help too — but so will modern-day psychology and self-help books. We can also learn who we are through our relationships. Be open to learning from all sources, and get creative. I was President of WPI Toastmasters for several years. Toastmasters is an organization to help people become better public speakers. A highly effective exercise is to take a video of yourself giving a speech, then watch it. There is no need to post it on social media, but you can if you want. Much of the value comes from studying the film of yourself, much like an athlete would study film. It is basically impossible to see the whole picture if you are in the frame. It is by stepping out of the frame that you see most clearly. Technology can help with this big time.

(2E) Ishvara Pranidhana — Dedication to a Higher Ideal

If you look more deeply into this last niyama, you will probably find that nearly everyone includes the word “surrender” in their translation and commentary. That word works for some, but not for everyone. I have found that a better way to look at Ishvara pranidhana is as “dedication”. If the goal or project is high enough and meaningful enough, nearly anyone can agree to get behind it. The same cannot be said about surrender. Some people will never surrender, and that is admirable.

As for the second part, I prefer to use “higher ideal” instead of “higher power” as many other commentaries on the 8 Petals of Yoga use. Similar to the surrender dynamic, some people don’t want to view a power as higher, and I don’t blame them. Without getting too deep this early in the book, yoga teaches that there is no one above you and no one below you. We are all on the same level here, and the Yoga Sutras say this even applies to “celestial beings” (Verse 52 of Book 3). They are not higher than you either. Placing others above you is a slippery slope, however dedication to a higher ideal is a way to create a brighter future for everyone.

(3) Asana — Physical Practice

This third Petal of Yoga is what many people view as the entirety of yoga. When most people hear of yoga, they think of a group stretching together. As already said, that is part of yoga. However, it is a small part. Since the 8 Petals of Yoga are in a specific order, asana would more accurately be seen as preparation for the true yoga — the yoga of the mind. If you have constant aches and pains in the body, it will be very hard to center the mind because your body will constantly be reminding you about it. However, once this is taken care of, it is time to move on to the real yoga.

I don’t want you to think that physicality isn’t important. It definitely is, especially nowadays — more so than in the past. There wasn’t much emphasis placed on the physical exercise part when the 8 Petals of Yoga were systematized because people were in much better shape for the most part. The average person in India thousands of years ago could easily sit on the ground perfectly still for hours with no aches and pains as distractions. The same can definitely not be said about today. Most people cannot sit still for a few minutes before it becomes uncomfortable. Because of this, much more preparation in the form of physical exercise and stretching is needed to get a person ready to sit and begin meditation.

(4) Pranayama — Breath Practice

One of the most legendary yogis of all time, BKS Iyengar, called breath the king of mind. It is one of the greatest indicators and influencers of mindset. Did you know that the average person takes about 20,000 breaths per day? Along with the heartbeat, it is the most fundamental thing we do on a biological level, yet people still underestimate the power of the breath. To be honest, I guess I did too until I truly experienced it.

This fourth Petal of Yoga is all about bringing higher awareness and higher quality to our breathing. It is about learning how to slow down and expand the breath — allowing you to harness more life force energy. From a more scientific perspective, more high-quality oxygen in your system improves all systems.

(5) Pratyahara — Redirecting Focus

This is where we really start to shift from physical yoga to mental yoga. For most people most of the time, their senses are directed outward and entangled with the outside world. If you are always looking out, it is difficult to see inside. I like to think of this fifth Petal of Yoga as a two-step process. First, we start fasting with the senses. Second, we bring our focus inside.

Pratyahara is a critical thing to understand moving forward in the AI Era. In yoga philosophy, we learn that the senses are extensions of the mind. We are already overloading the senses (like the eyes and ears) and thus overloading the mind. This will only get far worse as the digital world becomes more immersive. Remember, too much of a good thing becomes a bad thing. Further, the right thing at the wrong time becomes the wrong thing. “All the time” can by synonymous with the “wrong time”. Part of utilizing AI most effectively in the future will be taking breaks and giving your senses a rest.

(6) Dharana — Cultivating Focus

I remember years ago Microsoft came out with a study saying that the attention span (ability to focus) of the average person is now less than that of a goldfish. Since then, that study has received a lot of heat for being fake or impossible to prove. Whether the exact details were true or not, it definitely got me thinking. What is my attention span like? How long can I focus on something? What about other people? I am a humble person, and I honor the greatness in everyone. With that being said and with all due respect, the ability to focus has been completely destroyed in the average person if we are being honest. It is extremely difficult for most people to focus on anything for very long.

Why is this the case? There isn’t one simple answer, and there are most likely many variables involved. However, I know one thing for sure. The “what we do to fix it” is more important than the “why has this happened”. We could argue all day about why this has happened. You could say it is because of stress, social media, pollution, unhealthy living, or a myriad of other legitimate things. What is most important right now is to begin to recognize how important focus truly is. Why has the ability to focus been destroyed in modern times, and why is the entire system of yoga designed to help master focus?

This entire book could be about focus, and if you get one thing out of this book, I hope it is focus. In fact, if yoga had to be defined in one word, it would be “focus”. Your ability to focus is your ability to see the truth and create beauty. The longer you are able to focus on something, the clearer the picture becomes; the more of the truth you see. The longer you are able to focus on a project, the higher the quality becomes; the more beauty you create. Your ability to focus is the largest single determining factor in the quality of life you experience. That is why the entire system of yoga is designed to help you master focus. If you cannot focus, you will miss the opportunity to get the most out of AI. If you can learn how to focus, you will undoubtedly be one of the greatest artists, benefactors, and innovators of the AI Revolution.

This sixth Petal of Yoga is all about learning how to focus; on how to bring your focus to a single point. It will take time, and there will be times were you are distracted. Don’t beat yourself up, but instead just bring your awareness back to single-pointed focus as quickly and directly as you can. This is dharana in practice — cultivating focus.

(7) Dhyana — Sustained Focus

Meditation is a mystical thing for many people, and as a yoga teacher, I have heard “I can’t meditate” thousands of times. It is my hope to completely change how you look at meditation and get you started on the path to becoming a master of meditation. Most people cannot meditate or they say that they can’t meditate for one primary reason — they don’t know what meditation is. Think about it. How can you do something if you don’t even know what it is? Some people say that meditation is emptying the mind. This is actually a benefit of meditation and not meditation itself.

Dhyana translates to “meditation”. The seventh Petal of Yoga is meditation. Thus, meditation is a subset of yoga, not the other way around. Formally defined in the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali, meditation is “sustained one-pointed focus”. It is unbroken one-pointed focus.

Meditation is focus.

Bringing all of your focus to a single point and holding it there is the practice of meditation, or dhyana. This was repeated several times just now intentionally. It is very important to understand this point because doing so has the potential to change everything. Once you know what it is, meditation becomes much easier.

(8) Samadhi — Merging with Focus

The final Petal of Yoga is most often interpreted as “oneness” or “union”. It sounds very abstract at first, but the essence of samadhi is that you become one with what you are focusing on. You merge with the focus point. This sounds nice, but how do you merge with a waterfall if you are meditating on a waterfall?

After many years of studying and teaching yoga, I have arrived at an example that very clearly illustrates how samadhi works. Imagine a young boy who dreams of playing in the NBA. Becoming a professional basketball player is now his primary focus in life. As he goes through life, the focus intensifies. By the time this young boy has become a young man in high school and college, nearly all of his focus and energy is directed at becoming a better basketball player. He eats healthy. He works out. He reads books. He studies films. Of course, he practices actual basketball. Nearly all of his day is focused around becoming better at basketball. If the focused is sustained for long enough and to a high enough degree, this young man eventually merges with his focus and becomes the professional basketball player. He has become one with his dream. This is how samadhi works, and it was an obvious example, but the same can be applied towards more subtle things. If you are always focused on becoming a more loving person, you will eventually merge with and become one with that love if the focus is sustained for long enough. If you focus on a project for long enough and with enough intensity, it becomes real.

We just went through the 8 Petals of Yoga, which are the foundation of yoga. I hope you are starting to change how you look at yoga and starting to see how this can benefit you with regards to AI. We will look at all of the 8 Petals of Yoga in more detail throughout the rest of this book, as well as how to directly apply them to our relationship with AI.