Dhyana What meditation means in yoga and the Bhagavad Gita

If you grew up in a Hindi-speaking home, you heard this word long before anyone taught you to meditate. Dhyān se, someone would say as you stepped off the kerb or carried a full glass across the room. Carefully. Pay attention.

That everyday word and the dhyāna of the yoga texts are the same word. Keep the kerb in mind as you read on. It's the most useful definition of meditation I know.

What does dhyana mean?

Dhyāna comes from the Sanskrit root dhyai: to think of, to contemplate, to hold in mind. In yoga texts it means sustained meditation, attention that rests on its object without breaking. In Hindi, ध्यान (dhyān) stays humble. Dhyān se means carefully, and dhyān rakhnā means take care. Strip away the incense and that is all dhyana asks for: attention, given fully and kept steady.

The word travelled with Buddhism. Sanskrit dhyāna became Pāli jhāna, then Chinese chán (禪), then Japanese zen. Zen is, by its very name, the meditation school.

Dhyana in the Yoga Sūtra

Patañjali lists eight limbs of practice (2.29): yama and niyama (ethical conduct), āsana (posture), prāṇāyāma (breath), pratyāhāra (withdrawing the senses), dhāraṇā (concentration), dhyāna (meditation) and samādhi (absorption). He defines the last three in three very short verses at the opening of the third chapter:

देशबन्धश्चित्तस्य धारणाdeśa-bandhaś cittasya dhāraṇā (3.1)Dhāraṇā is binding the mind to one place.तत्र प्रत्ययैकतानता ध्यानम्tatra pratyaya-ekatānatā dhyānam (3.2)Dhyāna is the unbroken flow of awareness towards that.तदेवार्थमात्रनिर्भासं स्वरूपशून्यमिव समाधिःtad evārtha-mātra-nirbhāsaṁ svarūpa-śūnyam iva samādhiḥ (3.3)Samādhi is when only the object shines, as if the mind were empty of itself.

Dharana, dhyana and samadhi side by side

Patañjali calls the three together saṁyama (3.4). On the cushion they blur into each other. You place attention, it holds for a while, it slips, you place it again. Every one of those returns is dhāraṇā doing its work, and dhyāna grows out of enough of them.

Dhyana in the Bhagavad Gita

The Gita's sixth chapter is called Dhyāna Yoga, the yoga of meditation (some editions title it Ātma-saṁyama Yoga). For a philosophical text it's surprisingly hands-on. Krishna tells Arjuna to sit alone somewhere quiet (6.10), on a seat neither too high nor too low (6.11), with body, head and neck straight and still (6.13). Eat and sleep in moderation, he adds (6.16-6.17). Then comes the image this whole site is named after:

यथा दीपो निवातस्थो नेङ्गते सोपमा स्मृताyathā dīpo nivāta-stho neṅgate sopamā smṛtā (6.19)As a lamp in a windless place does not flicker: that is the image of the yogi’s steady mind.

The chapter doesn't pretend it's easy. Wherever the restless mind wanders, bring it back (6.26). When Arjuna protests that the mind is as hard to hold as the wind, Krishna agrees with him. Then he gives a two-word method every tradition since has repeated in its own language: abhyāsa, steady practice, and vairāgya, letting go (6.35). I read the chapter verse by verse in how to meditate according to the Bhagavad Gita.

How to practise dhyana

Sit upright on a cushion or a chair somewhere quiet, and rest your hands in your lap. Dhyāna mudrā works well if you like a formal hold.

Choose one object. The breath is the simplest. A mantra turns the sit into japa. Or gaze at a flame for a few minutes and then hold its image with your eyes closed, which is trāṭaka.

Now place your attention on it. When it slips, notice, and place it again. At first this is nearly the whole sit, and that's fine. It's dhāraṇā, the limb before.

Somewhere along the way you'll catch stretches where attention stays without being held. Leave them alone. Grabbing at them ends them. Over weeks they lengthen by themselves, and those stretches are dhyāna.

When the bell sounds, stay a moment longer and notice how you are before you stand. For a fuller walkthrough of sitting in silence, see silent meditation.

The lamp in a windless place

Verse 6.19 also happens to describe what a sit looks like from the outside. A settled body goes quiet the way a flame does when the draught stops. Dhyaan takes its name and its picture from that line, and so does the 60-second Nivāta test. Hold your phone, be the lamp, and find out how still a minute really is.

Three common questions

What is dhyana called in English?

Meditation. More exactly, sustained or unbroken meditation, as distinct from concentration (dhāraṇā) and absorption (samādhi).

Is dhyana Hindu or Buddhist?

Both. The word and the practice appear in the Upaniṣads, the Gita and the Yoga Sūtra. They became central to Buddhism too, where jhāna names stages of meditative absorption, and they gave Zen its name.

What is the difference between dhyan and meditation?

In Hindi conversation dhyān usually means attention or care. In yoga it names the specific stage described above. The English word “meditation” stretches much wider, from guided relaxation to visualisation, and dhyana is one fairly strict corner of it.