For inspiration, I have a copy of Patanjali’s Yoga Sutra by Chip Hartranft in the stack of books by the side of my bed. We all need a slug of encouragement from the written word from time to time. That’s why svadhyaya -self-study – is one of the indispensable niyama.
There have been philosophers from every part of the globe and from all ages. The Greeks had Socrates and Aristotle…Germans had Nietzsche…Americans Emerson and Thoreau. Then there was the scientist/philosopher EnHedu’Anna from the ancient Middle East.
Our very own home-grown Michael Leunig is my favourite contemporary philosopher, well-loved enough to have been declared a National Treasure.
I could even make a case for comparison with Patanjali’s style in the way Leunig takes the infinitely complex, unravels it, and gives it back to us with poignant wit.
Leunig lives a quiet life in the Victorian bush, all the better to be reflective and synthesise his ideas. I so agree with the importance he places on connecting with Nature.

“At the very simplest, I think as Van Gogh said and St Francis would have said, we must find nature. Just to be in the presence of nature your feelings and ‘little seedlings’ start to awake. So if we disassociate ourselves from God we cut nature out, too. More and more we turn nature into a commodity, into eco-tourism. But we must integrate it into the way people live every day.”

Here’s a little treat for you that is a lovely amalgam of the ephemeral and eternal. Check this link.

Mitchells Island hills