The Yoga Sutras: Love, Unity & the Path Beyond Ego

The journey through the Yoga Sutras begins where it also ends — in Samadhi.

Samadhi, the final limb of yoga, is also the title of the first book: Samadhi Pada. This is no coincidence. Patanjali isn’t leading us through a rigid sequence. He’s offering us a holistic invitation — a return to unity, from the very first breath.

The Eight Limbs of Yoga, known as Ashtanga (with anga meaning “limb”), are often mistaken as linear steps. But just as our arms and legs are not stages of the body but expressions of it, these limbs are simultaneous aspects of a yogic life — alive together, vibrating in unity.

Samadhi isn’t the final destination. It’s the foundation.

Unity, Not Separation

Samadhi means absorption, integration, wholeness. It is the opposite of ego, which thrives on separation and fear — on the idea of "me" as disconnected from the whole. Ego says: I am alone. Samadhi says: I am one with all that is.

This is the brilliance of Patanjali’s vision. By beginning the Yoga Sutras with Samadhi, he sets the tone for the entire path:

This is not a journey of accumulation. It’s a journey of return.

He asks us to enter these teachings not from a place of ego — seeking knowledge as a new identity or achievement — but from a space of humility, presence, and inner stillness.

Beyond the Ego: A Path of Love

Why do we suffer? Why do we create conflict, war, division?

Because we’ve lost our connection to the whole. We’ve built lives and systems around the illusion of separation — around a small “me” trying to survive in a world of fear.

Patanjali’s teachings call us to let go of that illusion. To realize we are not our thoughts, our bodies, or our identities — but the silent witness within.

The one who never speaks, but always sees.

The one beyond time.

The one that is already free.

This is not some faraway paradise or future promise. Samadhi is not escapism. It is a radical presence. A grounded awakening.

It is here. Now. Within.

Approaching the Sutras with Love

To walk the path of yoga is to walk the path of love.

Not romantic love or fleeting affection — but love as being. Love as awareness. Love as the force that unites everything.

When you move toward unity, you move toward love.

When you move toward separation, you move toward fear.

And so Patanjali invites us to approach the Yoga Sutras not from dogma or desperation, but from love — with love, through love, to love.

“You come through love,

you exist through love,

and unto love you shall return.”

In this light, Samadhi Pada could be called The Book of Love — for it speaks of total unity, total absorption, and total connection. It asks us to see ourselves in each other, to dissolve the illusion of separateness, and to awaken to the truth that:

You are love.

I am love.

Everything is love.

A New Way of Seeing

The Yoga Sutras are not a manual to escape life — but a mirror to see life clearly. They don’t promise a distant heaven. They point us to the heaven already within.

This sacred text invites us to refine our perception, to live with awareness, and to embody the wholeness that is already our true nature.

So let us enter the Yoga Sutras not as seekers hungry for more knowledge, but as beings ready to remember. Ready to feel.

Ready to love.

If you’re called to explore the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali more deeply, check out This is That by Himalayan Master Yogi, Anand Mehrotra — a luminous guide to this ancient and timeless text.