Pratyahara Paradox: Sense Withdrawal and a Contemporary Yoga Aesthetic

The Pratyahara Paradox describes a tension between yoga philosophy's call to withdraw the senses (pratyahara) and the sensory-material experiences central to modern, commercialized yoga. Using autoethnography and Karen Barad's ethico-onto-epistemology, the author examines how branded clothing, curated spaces, and body ideals reproduce neoliberal health imperatives and whiteness, obscuring yoga's spiritual purpose. Through narratives and a makeshift yoga mat, the research reveals latent power structures in everyday yoga settings and proposes that pratyahara and self-study can serve as tools for critical reflection and withdrawal from hegemonic norms.

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Abstract

This thesis develops an understanding of the Pratyahara Paradox. Pratyahara (withdrawal of the senses) is a core tenet of yoga philosophy. Through pratyahara, a yoga practitioner can transcend the material world and unite with spiritual consciousness. While a withdrawal from the sensory-material world is embedded in the aims of yoga, it isn’t clear how, and if, pratyahara is part of contemporary yoga. Today, yoga is connected to a multi-billion-dollar industry that sells health and wellbeing through sensory-material experiences. Branded clothing, lean bodies, and curated spaces are all part of a modern re-interpretation of yoga shaped by Western health ideals. As a yoga teacher, and autoethnographic subject of this research, I am troubled by how the people, places, and things of yoga create an aesthetic that reproduces neoliberal health imperatives and neglect yoga’s spiritual purpose. The aim of this thesis is thus to understand the apparent contradiction between the withdrawal of the senses and sensory-material engagements in yoga practice today.To address this paradox, I integrate Karen Barad’s ethico-onto-epistemology with pratyahara’s onto-epistemology to craft a “spiritual posthumanist” auto/ethno/graphy. This methodology navigates inward and outward awareness, using site visits to yoga spaces, object interviews, and crafting practices to examine how sensory encounters with yoga’s material “things” shape experiences and identities in yoga practice today. In my approach, observations, reflections, interview excerpts, and yoga pants are re-configured into three narratives and a make-shift yoga mat. These creative processes bring both author and audience into the sensory, affective, and intellectual experience of the research process. Further, through this process, latent power structures such as whiteness, body-centricity, and neoliberal feminism are made more visible, audible, and tangible in everyday yoga settings. By engaging with the more-than-human world, I reveal how sensory-material engagements reinforce Western health ideals. I also offer pathways to reimagine pratyahara’s role in withdrawing from hegemonic norms. Ultimately, this thesis positions pratyahara and self-study as tools for critical praxis within yoga spaces, encouraging scholar-practitioners to reflect upon, and potentially withdraw from, dominant power structures in contemporary yoga.