Pratyahara

Pratyāhāra is built from prati, 'against' or 'back,' and āhāra, 'food' or 'taking in' — literally a 'drawing back' from what the senses feed upon. The image is of the mind ceasing to consume the constant stream of sensory impressions offered to it.

As the fifth limb, pratyāhāra is the withdrawal of the senses. When the mind grows quiet, the senses no longer chase outward toward sights, sounds and sensations but follow the mind inward. It forms the hinge between the outer limbs and the inner work of concentration and meditation.

Patañjali describes pratyāhāra in the second chapter of the Yoga Sūtras as the senses withdrawing from their objects and, as it were, taking on the nature of the mind itself. Its result, he says, is mastery over the senses — a settledness that makes the subtler limbs possible.

In practice, pratyāhāra is rarely willed directly; it tends to arise. Sitting for meditation, you may notice that traffic, temperature and passing sounds gradually stop pulling at you — not because they have gone, but because attention has turned inward and no longer grasps them.

Pratyāhāra is often misread as forcibly shutting off the senses or blocking them out. It is subtler: the senses remain intact and functioning, but the mind stops being dragged around by them. It is a natural disengagement of attention, not a suppression of perception.