सः यथा शकुनिः सूत्रेण प्रबद्धः दिशम् दिशम् पतित्वा अन्यत्र आयतनम् अलब्धम् बन्धनम् एव उपश्रयते एवम् एव खलु सोम्य तत् मनः दिशम् दिशम् पतित्वा अन्यत्र आयतनम् अलब्धम् प्राणम् एव उपश्रयते प्राणबन्धनम् हि सोम्य मनः इति
saḥ yathā śakuniḥ sūtreṇa prabaddhaḥ diśam diśam patitvā anyatra āyatanam alabdham bandhanam eva upaśrayate evam eva khalu somya tat manaḥ diśam diśam patitvā anyatra āyatanam alabdham prāṇam eva upaśrayate prāṇabandhanam hi somya manaḥ iti
As a bird tied by a thread flies this way and that and, finding no resting-place anywhere else, settles down upon the very tether, so, my dear, the mind flies this way and that and, finding no resting-place anywhere else, comes back to the breath: for the mind, my dear, is tethered to the breath."
017aff57a862 · publicado 26 jul 2026, 23:39:08 UTC
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An image worth whole treatises on meditation: the mind is a bird on a thread. All day it "flies this way and that" (diśaṁ diśam patitvā, from quarter to quarter), seeking a resting-place in things, faces, cares — and finds none anywhere: every bough it settles on turns out to be another's. Toward night, worn out, it comes down onto its only own — onto the breath, the thread of life to which it was tethered all along.
Prāṇa-bandhanaṁ hi somya manaḥ — "the mind is tethered to the breath": the formula on which the whole science of yoga rests — quiet the breath and the bird will settle. But the Upaniṣad aims higher than technique: the thread is not held by the prāṇa — the prāṇa itself, as we know (6.8.6 will say so outright), is rooted in Being. The bird is tethered — to God; its evening settling on the thread is a daily parable of the soul which, having tried every branch of the world, finds rest only with the Holder of the thread. "Return, my soul, unto thy rest" — with this movement every day of every living creature ends; bhakti makes it conscious and loving.