Ep #208: The Subtle Body: Why Yoga Is More Than Stretching with Akshay Bhat
The subtle body is where yoga actually does its work. Akshay Bhat returns to map the three bodies yoga describes — the gross body you stretch, the subtle body that stores your patterns and karma, and the causal body the whole practice is pointing toward.
Akshay opens with the question that shaped his own path: why is yoga more than asana, more than a breathing exercise? The answer sits in the three shariras — sthula (gross), sukshma (subtle), and karana (causal, or witness). He brings them to life through the cave yogis of his childhood and a Mouni Baba he met in Rishikesh who has lived alone in the Himalayas for seventeen years and says he can travel anywhere in the subtle body. Then Ramana Maharshi, whose presence was so expanded that people arrived with questions and found the question itself had dissolved.
The practical half is the five chitta vrittis — right knowledge, wrong knowledge, imagination, sleep, and memory — each with an upside and a shadow. Why your neck tightens when your mind is busy. Why the real test of yoga begins the moment you leave the mat and hit traffic. Swami Satyananda's definition as the balance of head, heart, and hand. Michael admits to deleting Instagram and replacing it with a puzzle game, and Akshay explains why he'd sooner pour milk on a stone. Plus dark rooms and float tanks as modern pratyahara, how an assassin's arrow led to the discovery of acupuncture, sleep as a meditative state, and why the thing you're reaching for is already right in front of you.
Episode Chapters:
00:00:00 Introduction
00:01:49 Why yoga is more than asana
00:03:06 The three bodies: gross, subtle, causal
00:05:11 Cave stories: yogis who travel in the subtle body
00:08:21 Mental impressions and why your neck tightens
00:10:31 Karma and past impressions in the subtle body
00:12:20 The real test begins off the mat
00:16:37 Pranayama and mantra as subtle-body practice
00:17:52 Is numbness the same as peace?
00:19:45 The causal body: the ocean and the unchanging screen
00:21:35 Ramana Maharshi and the aura that dissolved questions
00:23:05 Samadhi: the real goal of yoga
00:24:54 Dark rooms, float tanks, and pratyahara
00:25:49 Why constant stimulation blocks the subtle body
00:27:03 Head, heart, and hand
00:28:13 Dopamine, phones, and swapping one habit for another
00:29:32 Pouring milk on a stone: devotion vs. the screen
00:32:03 The five chitta vrittis
00:34:36 Right knowledge and wrong knowledge
00:35:55 Wrong perception: the snake that wasn't
00:43:00 The arrow that discovered acupuncture
00:46:40 Imagination: manifestation and delusion
00:50:16 Sleep as meditation
00:53:11 Memory and samskaras
00:57:54 "It's right in front of us": rest in I Am
01:07:09 Keeping the cup empty, and fasting
Akshay's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/akshaybhatyoga/
Michael Henri’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michaelyoga.pt/
Going Pro Yoga Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/goingproyoga/
The IN Movement Website: https://theinmovement.com/
Trainings and Events: https://theinmovement.com/events
The IN Movement Instagram: @the_in_movement
The IN Movement Podcast was formerly the Going Pro Yoga Podcast — and before that, the Yoga Teacher Evolution Podcast and the Rat Race Rebellion Podcast. Same mission, evolved name.
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