So yoga . . . yoga means God plus myself. Plus myself. The system is: those who are too much engrossed with this bodily conception of life, for them, yoga system is very good because it is a practice to withdraw the senses from their engagement in the external world to the inside. Pratyāhāra. And yama, niyama, asana, prāṇāyāma, dhyāna, dhāraṇā, pratyāhāra, samādhi—there are eight different stages of yoga practice. The first practice is yama. Yama, niyama. Under regulative principle one has to try, endeavor, to control the senses about eating, about sleeping, about working. These are called yama-niyama. Then there are different kinds of sitting posture. They are called āsana.
So yama-niyama means the first principle of yoga is to abstain from sex life. That is real yoga. Those who are indulging in sex life, intoxication and so many nonsense things, they have no chance for any success in yoga. There . . . this is called yama-niyama.
And then, after controlling, after sitting, then one has to sit nicely in a secluded place, in a sanctified place, and sit straight, with your neck, head and body in one straight line. Then you have to see the tip of your nose without closing your eyes and not opening your eyes. If you open your eyes, then all this material manifestation will disturb you. And if you close your eyes, then you snap.I have seen, so many yogīs are doing that, sleeping.Yes. So these are the process.
Then dhyāna, then concentration of the mind. Then what is the purpose of concentrating the mind? Just to find out myself, where I am within this body, and then find out where is Lord. This is the perfection of yoga. Simply that I am doing all nonsense whole day and night and I am attending yoga class, paying five dollars to the class, and I am thinking, "Oh, I am a great yogī"—this is all nonsense. Yoga is not so easy thing. You see? So simply this . . . this is the simply exploitating, the so-called society. I tell frankly they are society of the cheater and the cheated. This is not the process of yoga.
So yoga process is very difficult at the present moment. Yoga . . . because it is stated in the Vedic literature, that is a approved method. That's all right. But that method is very difficult in the modern age to perform. And what to speak of us, even five thousand years before, when the circumstances were more favorable and people were not so polluted and they were advanced in so many things, still, at that time a personality like Arjuna, he refused. When Kṛṣṇa asked him that "You become a yogī like this," he said: "It is not possible for me. It is not possible for me." So this is an over endeavor, to practice yoga in this age, which was refused by a personality like Arjuna.
So yoga is not at all possible. It was possible in the Satya-yuga, when every man was in the modes of goodness. Every man was highly elevated. The yoga process is meant for the highly elevated personalities, not for ordinary man. So even that yoga practice is done very nicely and perfectly, that cannot take you to the Supreme Lord. That is denied here. What to speak of this pseudo yoga process, even if you perform it rightly, even if you do it nicely, perfectly, still, you cannot reach God. That is denied here. Na sādhayati māṁ yogaḥ na sāṅkhya. Sāṅkhya means just discriminate what is spirit and what is matter. That is called sāṅkhya. Samyak khyāpayate.