Reading the third translation of Patanjali that I've read. The first one was translated by Swami Prabhavananda and Christopher Isherwood, one of my teachers was reading it so I read it, the second one was translated by Chip Hartranft, I don't think I liked this one because I thought it was "too easy" and "armchair enlightenment." (This is what I said on goodreads.)So now I am reading Sri S. Satchidananda's translation. This is the one, the cover I see most people have if I see people with a Patanjali. I also checked out the Mircea Eliade book on Patanjali, a more historical study.

Had the thought in the middle of a rather intense yoga class, or regular yoga class, but I was doing it intensely, that Ashtanga is a form of shamanism. Like we are out in the desert on a vision quest, haven't slept for 36 hours, are tripping on some weird-ass drug, and there is some nut there trying to lead us through it. Funny, people who are drawn to meditation and yoga because of the "relaxation" thing, they don't know, and I think I was one of them initially, that it has to take you through hell first. It is not ease, confronting the self. And even if you don't think that is what you are doing, it tricks it out of you, and it becomes what you are doing. The people who can't handle it are the ones that drop out, or go sporadically. I don't know that I am actually confronting the self, I think I am starting to, and in the past the confronting the self thing made me evasive within my own practice. I am still evasive but becoming more aware of what I am doing, and so evading less, I think.