Existential liminality and ethical reconstruction in probationary suicidality: A philosophical reading through Mircea Eliade and Aṣṭāṅga Yoga

Edwin Shneidman's psychological theory of suicide, grounded in the concept of psychache, reorients the discourse on suicidality away from categorical psychiatric diagnoses and toward the subjective experience of intolerable emotional pain. According to Shneidman, suicide is not primarily the product of mental illness but the culmination of unresolved psychological suffering, generated by the chronic frustration of deeply human needs such as love, dignity, control, understanding, and existential meaning (Shneidman, 1993). These unmet needs create a condition in which the self becomes fragmented, relationally disconnected, and affectively overwhelmed. Suicide, in this model, emerges not from pathology alone but from a perceived collapse of inner coherence and symbolic integration, an experience of being unable to continue as one is.

This depiction closely echoes Mircea Eliade's view of modern existential suffering. In The Sacred and the Profane (1959), Eliade argues that contemporary individuals live in a desacralized world, one in which symbolic structures for integrating suffering have vanished. Without access to sacred time, archetypes, or ritualised renewal, suffering becomes chaotic and meaningless. For Eliade, this condition results in a subject who is no longer able to transform pain into passage, nor disorder into meaning (Eliade, 1959, pp. 210–212). What Shneidman calls psychache, may be interpreted, through Eliade, as the existential distress of the desacralized self: suffering no longer contained within symbolic frameworks, no longer redeemed by myth, ritual, or sacred narrative. From this combined perspective, suicide becomes not merely a mental health crisis but a ritual failure, the absence of any structure capable of metabolising pain into transformation. The individual is trapped in profane time, alienated from symbolic coordinates, and unable to pass through suffering into renewal. In this sense, Aṣṭāṅga Yoga offers more than somatic tools or stress relief; it offers a sacred grammar of reintegration that responds directly to the fragmented condition described by both Shneidman and Eliade.

The ethical and philosophical structure of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga offers a direct and integrative response to the internal conditions that constitute psychache. The first two limbs, yama (social ethics) and niyama (personal observances), are not mere behavioural codes but philosophical practices of existential alignment, designed to restore coherence between the individual, others, and the cosmos. Practising ahimsā (nonviolence) and satya (truthfulness) cultivates self-compassion and authenticity, countering the internal hostility and guilt often central to suicidal despair. Similarly, santoṣa (contentment) and svādhyāya (self-study) reframe the self not as broken or unworthy, but as a being in process, capable of reflection, growth, and integration. In Eliadean terms, these observances constitute a re-entry into sacred order, anchoring the self in ritualised, archetypal patterns that give moral shape to suffering. Beyond ethical reorientation, the aesthetic and somatic dimensions of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, realized through āsana (physical postures) and prāṇāyāma (breath regulation), provide embodied techniques for interrupting the downward spiral of emotional collapse. Āsana draws awareness back into the body, dissolving excessive cognitive identification and reestablishing presence. It becomes, in Eliade's terms, a reenactment of cosmic stillness, – a transformation of human temporality into archetypal presence, i.e., the sacred stability of archetypal forms (Eliade, 1958, pp. 4–6, 12).

The practice of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga thus appears useful in the process of defragmenting the Self, offering tools for revealing inner coherence and symbolic reintegration into a world where the internal world of the practitioner and the external world of “the Others” are inseparable, though initially perceived as opposites. The above example of yogic ethics illustrates how the practitioner “should” behave toward others and the Self. What is distinctive about Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, however, is that even the yamas, understood as social ethics, are incorporated through first-hand experience. Consider yamas like ahiṃsā or satya. We might tell someone not to behave violently or lie to others, expecting them to intellectually grasp the commandment and its necessity. However, the reasoning faculty is highly flexible and often responsible for the emergence of ethical dilemmas. Unless one inhabits a purely Kantian intelligible world, one may still find reasons to justify violence or deception in certain situations. Somaticizing or bodily incorporating ethical principles into practice is something altogether different. A yoga practitioner, through the practice of āsanas, learns to cultivate awareness and avoid reinforcing pain or suffering by applying ahiṃsā within the body. Satya is a closely related principle, as the practitioner must be aware of sensations that may cause pain or suffering. It is a subtle mechanism for learning to be truthful about one's situation, through mindfulness, recognition of suffering, and the application of techniques that prevent its intensification. This somatic practice, realised through the limbs of āsanas and prāṇāyāma, integrates yogic ethics into the practitioner's life in a subtle yet effective manner. By somaticizing and habituating principles such as ahiṃsā or satya, the practitioner holistically––not merely through reason or intellect––understands, and more importantly, experiences why non-violence and truthfulness are essential, and how violating them can lead to suffering. The practitioner also becomes accustomed to responding to these principles appropriately.

What a practitioner incorporates can also be reflected in how they conduct themselves toward the external world and others, ultimately fostering a sense of connection and belonging to the whole. This may be considered a meaningful aim of yoga practice for probationers. It is also why renowned yoga teachers emphasize the importance of orienting yoga practice from the body toward what we may call the soul – from grosser forms of existence to subtler realms: “In this way, asanas help to transform an individual by bringing him or her away from the awareness of the body toward the consciousness of the soul” (Iyengar, 2008, p. 48). The process of ethical reintegration and overcoming self-fragmentation – beginning with bodily practices – reverses the approach found in the Western intellectual tradition (whether philosophical or psychological), where the preferred movement is from the soul to the body, which is to be mastered by the soul. While this conclusion may be valid, it remains a conclusion, and thus, the process of transformation should not begin from the end. Vivekananda highlighted the limitations of this intellectualistic approach in his text on pratyāhāra (withdrawal from the senses): “There is hardly a child, born in any country in the world, who has not been told, “Do not steal”, “Do not tell a lie”, but nobody tells the child how he can help doing them. Talking will not help him. Why should he not become a thief? We do not teach him how not to steal; we simply tell him, “Do not steal”. Only when we teach him to control his mind do we really help him” (Vivekananda, 2004b, pp. 252–253). Moreover, this can most fundamentally be achieved at the bodily level. The practitioner should begin to control the mind through bodily practice, not the other way around.

This may be understood as a process of yogic reintegration with the external world through the internal world, and simultaneously, as a means of defragmenting the Self. “The union results in a pure and perfect state of consciousness in which the feeling of ‘I’ simply does not exist. Prior to this union is the union of the body with the mind, and the mind with the self” (Iyengar, 2008, p. 46). Re-establishing connection with others and the world can be achieved by attaining a state of consciousness free from the sense of “I”, which refers to the experience of being fully present in the moment – temporarily setting aside the ego – which can lead to a sense of belonging to the whole.

Aṣṭāṅga Yoga practices are tools for achieving this goal of union (yoga), which can also arise spontaneously, particularly in moments of deep immersion, such as reading an engaging book, gardening, or any other personally absorbing activity. However, the practice of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga is valuable in that it cultivates this behaviour in a nuanced way, making the sense of unity with the whole and the Self a habitual experience. This is precisely what is needed in the case of probationers who contemplate suicide due to psychache. Aṣṭāṅga Yoga can be therefore considered a “higher somaesthetic form”, which, according to Shusterman (2008, p. 44), “make pleasure the essential by-product of an ascetic, yet aesthetic, quest for something better than one's current self, […] so that one can attain still greater powers and joys potentially within us – a higher self, perhaps even a divine spirit or Oversoul”. This is precisely what is needed: The pleasure of a non-discursive experience in which the individual feels as an integral part of the Being, belonging to it and relating to everything and everyone. That the individual is whole within the Whole.

This process can be helpful in overcoming pain through liberation. “To ‘free oneself’ is equivalent to forcing oneself onto another plane of existence, to appropriating another mode of being transcending the human condition. […] liberation cannot occur if one is not first “detached” from the world, if one has not begun by withdrawing from the cosmic circuit” (Eliade, 1958, pp. 4–6).

Yet this universal suffering does not lead to a philosophy of pessimism. No traditional Indian philosophy ⁽¹⁾ or gnosis falls into despair. On the contrary, the revelation of “pain” as the law of existence can be regarded as the condition sine qua non for emancipation. Intrinsically, then, this universal suffering has a positive, stimulating value. It perpetually reminds the sage and the ascetic that but one way remains for him to attain freedom and bliss – withdrawal from the world, detachment from possessions and ambitions, radical isolation. Man, moreover, is not alone in suffering; pain is a cosmic necessity, an ontological modality to which every ‘form’ that manifests itself as such is condemned. Whether one be a god or a tiny insect, the mere fact of existing in time, of having duration, implies pain. Unlike the gods and other living beings, man possesses the capability of passing beyond his condition and thus abolishing suffering, the certainty that there is a way to end suffering—a certainty shared by all Indian philosophies and mysticisms – can lead neither to “despair” nor to “pessimism.” To be sure, suffering is universal; but if man knows how to set about emancipating himself from it, it is not final. For, if the human condition is condemned to pain for all eternity – since, like every condition, it is determined by karma, each individual who shares in it can pass beyond it, since each can annul the karmic forces by which it is governed (Eliade, 1958, p. 12).

Prāṇāyāma, through breath regulation, engages the autonomic nervous system, restoring physiological balance and inviting a ritual rhythm that mirrors the sacred pulse of existence. This breath-centred discipline functions as a contemporary rite of purification, giving the practitioner control over the boundary between distress and calm, between chaos and order. These practices are not merely coping strategies; they represent a symbolic restoration of sacred structure in a profane world. They create a time apart, a space for re-sacralization, in which the body becomes a site of presence, the breath a vehicle of order, and the ethical life a mode of reintegration. In this way, the first four limbs of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga function not only as therapeutic interventions but as a re-ritualization of existential life, directly addressing the fragmentation that Shneidman identifies and that Eliade sees as the core of modern despair. It reorients the practitioner toward a cosmology of coherence, one in which pain is not meaningless but meaningful, precisely because it can be worked through, lived through, and integrated within a structured path of return. In this light, the experience of psychache becomes a gateway to spiritual labour, and suicide, once perceived as an end, is reframed as a call for initiation, a desperate cry for the very structure that Aṣṭāṅga Yoga ritually provides.

Thomas Joiner's Interpersonal-Psychological Theory of Suicide asserts that the desire for suicide emerges when two psychological states converge: thwarted belongingness and perceived burdensomeness. The progression to suicidal action requires a third factor: the acquired capability for lethal self-harm, developed through habituation to pain and fear (Joiner, 2005). In this model, suicide occurs when an individual becomes convinced that they are not only unwanted by others but actively harmful to them, and when they have overcome their natural aversion to death.

While empirically grounded, Joiner's model points to something deeper: a symbolic collapse of value and integration, not unlike what Mircea Eliade identified as a central crisis of modernity. In The Sacred and the Profane (1959), Eliade describes the loss of sacred structures as leading to existential isolation since “man conceives of himself as a microcosm. He forms part of the gods' creation; in other words, he finds in himself the same sanctity that he recognizes in the cosmos. It follows that his life is homologized to cosmic life; as a divine work, the cosmos becomes the paradigmatic image of human existence” (Eliade, 1959, p. 165). Modern man has desacralized his world and assumed a tragic solitude. Joiner's thwarted belongingness becomes, in Eliadean terms, the experience of being cut off from sacred space and sacred community: To live in a sacred space is to participate in a reality; to participate in being, to become real, since “[T]he sacred always manifests itself as a reality of a wholly different order from ‘natural’ realities” (Eliade, 1959, p. 10). Similarly, perceived burdensomeness reflects not merely interpersonal failure but a collapse of ontological value. The person no longer perceives their life as bearing meaning in any greater context. In Eliade's framework, a life that no longer participates in the sacred becomes a life reduced to a series of accidents, a life that is no longer worth living. Profane man is the result of a desacralization of human existence. Although he is unaware of it, he continues to be haunted by the behaviour patterns of religious man, emptied now of their spiritual content (Eliade, 1959, p. 204). He forms himself by a series of denials and refusals, but he continues to be haunted by the realities that he has refused and denied. In such a state, suicide is the tragic endpoint of symbolic disintegration: the individual no longer inhabits a world of significance, nor sees themselves as capable of re-entry.

In this condition, Aṣṭāṅga Yoga offers ritualised reintegration into a moral and symbolic cosmos. The yamas (ethical restraints) such as ahimsā (nonviolence) and satya (truthfulness) restore interpersonal coherence through disciplined compassion, reducing the inner aggression and shame that fuel suicidal ideation. Asteya (non-stealing) and aparigraha (non-possessiveness) help cultivate healthy boundaries and a non-competitive orientation toward others. These are not abstract values, they are acts of participation in a reconstituted ethical field, making the practitioner once again a moral actor. The niyamas, especially tapaḥ (austerity) and svādhyāya (self-study), facilitate the internalisation of responsibility without the weight of shame. In practising īśvarapraṇidhāna (surrender to a higher principle), the individual locates their worth not in utility or productivity, but in alignment with a sacred process of becoming. This echoes Eliade's insight that the initiation is equivalent to a revelation of the sacred. Through it, the world is re-sanctified, and the neophyte is reborn into a meaningful cosmos (Eliade, 1954, p. 18). Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, then, functions as a secular initiation ritual, restoring symbolic belonging, moral orientation, and a renewed identity. Beyond ethics, āsana and prāṇāyāma provide somatic grounding. Through postures and controlled breathing, the practitioner re-inhabits their body as a site of sacred discipline, not fragmentation. Eliade wrote that yogic posture reproduces the immobility of sacred archetypes, stabilising the practitioner in a timeless form of being (Eliade, 1958, pp. 66–68). In this way, the body ceases to be a burden and becomes a vessel for presence, a temple of order amidst emotional chaos. Prāṇāyāma, through breath, aligns the individual with what Eliade calls “ absolute interiorization”, a movement away from historical suffering toward primordial awareness (Eliade, 1958, p. 67).

If we consider Aṣṭāṅga Yoga practice a secular ritual, ritual is thus a time-space in which we behave ‘as-if’ we inhabit a different world order: “The perfectly ordered world inside the ritual could never replace the flawed world of real-life relationships. It works because each participant plays a role other than the one inhabits normally”. (Puett & Gross-Loh, 2016, p. 34). This is the lens through which we should understand Aṣṭāṅga Yoga practice. Even the simple act of repeatedly rolling out the yoga mat creates symbolic meaning, establishing a sacred space and time for disengagement from daily activities. It establishes a new world distinct from the one found outside the time-space of the yoga ritual. Incorporating specific limbs of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga within that ritual time-space does not necessarily mean they will be immediately incorporated into everyday life, at least not with the same intensity as during ritual practice. This is why the world within the ritual can never fully replace the world outside it. However, the repetition is the fundamental feature of this kind of ritual. It is this repetition that fosters habituation and gradually integrates the ritual's content into everyday life. This is why the ritualistic nature of practice holds profound significance: “These ordinary as-if rituals are the means by which we imagine new realities and over time construct new worlds” (Puett & Gross-Loh, 2016, p. 53).

In Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, the practitioner's body holds particular importance in the ritualistic practice, as it performs the ‘ritualistic’ work and is central to the practice, especially in its initial stages. Through practice within the ritualistic time-space, body and mind are reintegrated, enabling the practitioner to overcome the fragmentation of the Self. From a broader perspective, however, the Self becomes connected to something that transcends it. This means the practitioner becomes so immersed in the practice of yoga that the Self is temporarily dissolved, becoming part of the ritual time-space in which they are engaged. Through bodily practice, the practitioner establishes a connection with that which transcends them and to which they inherently belong. Iyengar (2002, p. 176) views the body as a temple when interpreting one of Patañjali's Yoga Sūtras on the first of the niyamas, śaucha (cleanness): “As a temple or a church is kept clean each day, the inner body, the temple of the soul, should be bathed with a copious supply of blood through āsanas and prāṇāyāma”.

The body serves as a valuable tool for re-establishing spiritual grounding, helping probationers overcome psychological burden. When someone feels that they do not belong to the world, it is often due to a mental distinction between the Self and what is perceived as not Self – as if the Self could not be a part of it. Yoga teaches that what we constantly seek as something to belong to is already within us – and that we must re-establish our lost connection to it through regular practice. We come to realise that we have always belonged to what transcends us, because what transcends us is already within us. We are a microcosm that mirrors the macrocosm. The connection already exists; we simply need to discover and realise it. Then we will be home – then we will belong. We must understand that transcendence is more a state of personal being than an external circumstance. Vivekananda beautifully expressed this idea:

After long searches here and there, in temples and in churches, in earths and in heavens, at last you come back, completing the circle from where you started, to your own soul and find that He for whom you have been seeking all over the world, for whom you have been weeping and praying in churches and temples, on whom you were looking as the mystery of all mysteries shrouded in the clouds, is nearest of the near, is your own Self, the reality of your life, body, and soul. That is your own nature

We can take a closer look at this abstract topic through the practical lenses of prāṇāyāma, which is another key bodily practice in Aṣṭāṅga Yoga––particularly significant for its role in the symbolic reintegration of the Self into the world. There are many known benefits of breathing techniques, though prāṇāyāma is often reductively viewed as merely one of them. Consider the well-known observation: “Conscious breathing has a calming effect on the mind”, and that “The regular practice of pranayama over a period of time reinforces cortical control of the breath, a process called telencephalization, where one shifts from unconscious to conscious breathing with profound effects on one's wellbeing” (Saraswati, 2016, p. 111).

Prāṇāyāma is also important from the standpoint of svādhyāya. While the Western approach to self-knowledge relies primarily on intellectual self-reflection and on analytical methods, svādhyāya is realised somatically through prāṇāyāma. Even simple breath awareness can support the goal of svādhyāya, as “its rhythm and depth provide rapid, reliable evidence of our emotional state” (Shusterman, 2000, p. 139). The simplest breath awareness techniques can offer initial steps toward reintegration, as the breath serves as an indicator of how closely we are connected to the world. The way we breathe is, in fact, evidence of our interconnectedness with the world, it reminds us that we belong to it, right up to our final breath. Of course, breath awareness may lead the yoga practitioner to the uncomfortable realization that their connection to the world is often experienced negatively, reflected in breath patterns shaped by stress, anxiety, or fear. However, this is a necessary part of svādhyāya – the first step toward transforming these pervasive relationships with the world. This is where prāṇāyāma acquires its profound symbolic significance.

“The word prāṇāyāma consists of two components, prāṇā and āyāma. Prāṇā is energy, when the self-energizing force embraces the body. Āyāma means stretch, extension, expansion, length, breadth, regulation, prolongation, restraint and control” (Iyengar, 2002, p. 162). Therefore, the word prāṇāyāma refers to the control of the energy called prāṇa. Prāṇa is sometimes equated with breath, but this is a significant oversimplification. Breathing – like any other vital function or movement in the universe––is a material manifestation of the primal cosmic energy known as prāṇa. From the perspective of yogic philosophy, particularly its cosmology, as presented by Vivekananda (2024b, p. 223) ––“the whole universe is composed of two materials”: akasha and prāṇa. “Just as Akasha is the infinite, omnipresent material of this universe, so is this Prana the infinite, omnipresent manifesting power of this universe” (Vivekananda, 2024b, p. 24). Prāṇāyāma involves controlling the gross form of this primordial cosmic power or energy as it manifests in the body – for example, through the movement of the lungs.

The philosophical significance of prāṇāyāma is important because, through it, we establish a connection with an omnipresent power, and thus, with everything it permeates, including other living beings––via conscious control within our body. We can approach this symbolically and reflect with Berndtson (2023, p. 2) on “breathing as an experience of the perpetual relation of exchange between ourselves and that which is not ourselves, that which is outside ourselves, but which is inhaled into us”. Breathing is thus a symbolic gateway – where the “I” meets the world, is continuously permeated by it, and where the world, in turn, receives the presence of the “I”. This experiential perspective offers a symbolic tool for reintegrating the self into the world.

We can go further and suggest that the breath, through the practice of prāṇāyāma, can serve as a tool for establishing order in the world. If we accept – at least metaphorically or symbolically––that prāṇa, as a primordial force, is omnipresent, it becomes clear that if we do not control the prāṇa within our own body, the prāṇa around us will control us. In practical terms, we become recipients of external energies, manifesting as thoughts, emotions, other's narratives, or simply the presence of other beings and the external world. In such cases, we may feel disconnected from the external world – as if governed by invisible powers––because no internal order has been established. However, by controlling our own prāṇa, we establish a new form of connection with the world, i.e., one in which we feel more comfortable and integrated. It is we who give order to the world. Through the practice of prāṇāyāma, the Self can be defragmented, reintegrated into the world and endowed with order and meaning from within itself. The axis mundi can now be found where it has always been – within the self.

Joiner's third condition, acquired capability for suicide, is addressed through the higher limbs of yoga. Pratyāhāra (withdrawal of the senses) allows for emotional regulation and distancing from impulsive drives. Dhāraṇā (concentration) and dhyāna (meditation) cultivate attention and equanimity, disrupting the compulsive loops of despair. These are practices of mastery and reorientation, akin to Eliade's description of initiatory discipline: not the erasure of suffering, but its transformation into insight and autonomy. Finally, samādhi, the state of meditative absorption, completes this arc by dissolving the illusion of separateness that fuels suicidal logic. The self, no longer defined by alienation or guilt, enters a state of unity that Eliade describes as the abolition of profane time and a return to the unconditioned Self (Eliade, 1958, pp. 93–94). Even if rarely attained in full, the path toward samādhi offers a ritual horizon of hope, one that affirms: existence is not only bearable, it is sacred. Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, viewed through Eliade's sacred anthropology, emerges as a ritualised technique for restoring symbolic belonging and existential dignity. For those on probation, especially those in despair, it offers not just a therapeutic scaffold, but a symbolic narrative in which moral failure is not final, alienation is not absolute, and life remains recoverable through structured return.

Mark Williams' Cry of Pain model conceptualises suicide as a reaction to situational defeat, perceived entrapment, and the absence of rescue. Drawing on cognitive psychology and attachment theory, Williams posits that suicidal ideation emerges when a person feels trapped in an aversive state, interprets escape as impossible, and perceives that no external source of rescue is available. Furthermore, the crisis is intensified by autobiographical memory biases, in which negative experiences and failures become dominant, thereby eroding problem-solving capacity and future orientation (Williams, 1997).

This framework, psychologically sound and clinically actionable, lends itself to a symbolic and topological analysis in the tradition of Mircea Eliade. In Images and Symbols (1952), Eliade writes that one of the foundational dimensions of sacred consciousness is the distinction between space that imprisons and space that liberates. He describes the mythic and ritual logic of enclosure and exit as every captivity implies the hope of deliverance; every enclosure postulates the reality of an opening (Eliade, 1952, p. 54). Man desires to live, not only in the present but in the real; he seeks, therefore, to live in the sacred. He wishes to inhabit the Centre, and towards his own centre where he can find integral reality – sacredness. This desire is so deeply rooted in man, i.e., to find themselves at the very heart of the real, at the Centre of the World, the place of communication with Heaven (Eliade, 1952, p. 54). Confronted with existential fragmentation and ontological dislocation, the human being is drawn by an inherent impulse toward reintegration. He seeks a return to the Centre, not merely as a spatial metaphor, but as a sacred locus of meaning where the rupture between self and reality is mended, and where the possibility of communion with the transcendent reemerges.

The suicidal individual, according to Williams' model, finds themselves in a closed space with no door, trapped within memory, failure, and isolation. The psychological state of entrapment thus mirrors what Eliade calls the fall into labyrinthine space, in which the subject loses orientation and is no longer able to locate the symbolic ‘centre’ from which renewal may emerge (Eliade, 1959, p. 42). In this interpretive frame, the function of suicide becomes manifest: it is a mistaken door, a desperate act of symbolic exit in the absence of culturally available or ritually endorsed pathways of release. What is missing is not merely social support but a cosmology of rescue, i.e., the symbolic assurance that suffering is not final and that orientation can be restored. The terror of being lost, Eliade observes, is the terror of being far from the ‘centre’ (Eliade, 1959, pp. 106–107). To prevent suicide, then, is to reopen the axis, to reconnect the suffering person with a structure that allows forward motion, symbolic emergence, and reconnection with meaning.

Aṣṭāṅga Yoga offers just such a structure, particularly through its emphasis on discipline, memory purification, and symbolic centrality. In the context of Williams' model, the limbs of yoga operate as tools of internal orientation and resilience-building. They do not merely interrupt defeat but ritually reverse the logic of enclosure. In this framework, āsana becomes more than physical discipline; it is a practice of remaining within difficulty without collapse. Through challenging postures held in awareness, the practitioner learns to inhabit psychological discomfort without being consumed by it. This echoes Eliade's interpretation of sacred initiations, since the initiatory pain, when endured consciously, becomes the condition for renewal (Eliade, 1958, pp. 12–13). The yoga mat becomes a sacred stage where entrapment is symbolically re-enacted and gradually reworked into endurance and presence. Prāṇāyāma, through breath regulation, performs the role of rhythmic rescue. When the cognitive field is dominated by recursive thoughts and catastrophic interpretations, the breath serves as a portable axis mundi, a vertical thread reconnecting the subject with the centre of their being. Mirroring Eliade's thought, breath, in many archaic cultures, is the very power of the sacred, spirit, wind, and life all at once (Eliade, 1952, p. 114). Prāṇāyāma is not only physiological, it is symbolic inhalation of order and exhalation of panic, a reenactment of renewal in the midst of perceived collapse. The limb of svādhyāya, often translated as “self-study,” plays a vital role in correcting the memory biases that Williams describes. By deliberately cultivating reflective insight, the practitioner rewrites their autobiographical narrative. They no longer view themselves solely through the lens of failure but begin to reconstruct a story of discipline, effort, and transcendence. By re-living myth, one escapes profane time and restores meaning to one's history (Eliade, 1954, p. 72; 1959, pp. 68–69). Thus, svādhyāya becomes the ritual technique for transforming memory, for reclaiming a story that makes survival meaningful. Finally, pratyāhāra and dhāraṇā serve as tools for disrupting the looping architecture of suicidal cognition. Pratyāhāra creates cognitive spaciousness, allowing the practitioner to step back from intrusive mental content. Dhāraṇā builds the capacity to re-anchor attention, not in imagined catastrophe but in the rhythm of the breath, the body, or a mantra. These are not acts of suppression; they are, in Eliade's terms, acts of re-consecrating the internal world, making it inhabitable again (Eliade, 1958).

All of the limbs mentioned and integrated into practice serve symbolic assurance that suffering is not final, teaching the practitioner to face pain and suffering without resorting to the ultimate decision about their life. First and foremost, they teach practitioners to become aware of pain and suffering, primarily through non-discursive experience, which, as discussed through this text, may be more effective than engaging with it on the surface level of the mind.

It is important to note that yoga can “strengthen the individual's will and resiliency. Besides the empirical evidence of long traditions of practice and testimony that bear witness to the positive effects of these meditative disciplines, there is now further confirmation from new scientific research in experimental psychology and neurophysiology” (Shusterman, 2008, p. 174). What has been known for thousands of years through tradition, and is now supported by scientific evidence, also carries philosophical implications. These lie in understanding – or more precisely, experiencing – the nature of pain and suffering, and their impermanence.

A well-known truth in yoga – shared with other philosophical schools such as Stoicism––is that suffering is not caused by the event itself, but by how we interpret, value, or narrate it. Consider Boccio's reflection on the relationship between pain and suffering in physical yoga practice, illustrated through the āsana called Virbhadrāsana II: “When standing in WARRIOR TWO, you may become aware of an unpleasant sensation in your shoulders. Notice your resistance and aversion to the sensation. Can you begin to see that this reactivity itself is the cause of much of your discomfort?” (Boccio, 2004, p. 141). This is why body awareness is essential in yoga practice. What we experience as suffering – or psychological discomfort – is often caused by the narrative we construct around necessary but temporary pain. This narrative may be more or less conscious; yet even when we interpret pain as negative and take it personally––despite its being value-neutral, natural, and universal––it often leads to the seemingly rational conclusion that we must resist it. When the body resists, it generates additional muscular tension and alters the breathing pattern – both of which affect our thinking. Resistance to pain, paradoxically, intensifies both physical and psychological suffering.

Yoga teaches us to simply acknowledge pain – necessary under certain circumstances but not enduring – as it dissolves through the transition into another pose. This transition can be metaphorically or symbolically understood as a shift in life circumstances, or the result of mindful awareness without further evaluation or judgment. Yoga teaches us to somatically accept pain as a temporary condition that can be overcome. More importantly, it transforms our understanding of ourselves––a form of svādhyāya – and can thus reshape personal narratives through somatic means. The mindfulness-based approach to temporary pain – without adding layers of suffering – shows the practitioner that they need not identify with their temporary painful state. Suffering or psychological discomfort becomes unnecessary when pain is seen as the result of specific, transitional circumstances. Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, through non-discursive and somatic habituation, prepares the practitioner to accept pain and discomfort as necessary but non-final aspects of life. It fosters resilience – not only in ways supported by science, but also philosophically – by teaching that “there is a difference between pain and suffering – the misery or torment that we add to the experience because of our reactivity, aversion, and stories. An old Buddhist saying is that ‘pain is inevitable; suffering is optional’” (Boccio, 2004, p. 192).

Through this lens, the Cry of Pain is not simply an emotional or neurological signal; it is a spiritual utterance, a symptom of symbolic suffocation. The suicidal state, in Williams' model, is one of enclosure with no exit. In Eliade's ontology, all enclosures have a mythic counterpoint: the labyrinth implies the possibility of emergence. Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, when practiced with intention, becomes not only a behavioural strategy but a mythic map of return, i.e., a sacred geometry drawn in breath, movement, attention, and silence.

O'Connor's Integrated Motivational-Volitional model (IMV) offers a tiered understanding of suicide that reflects not only clinical dynamics but also, when viewed through a broader philosophical lens, a symbolic crisis of passage. His model distinguishes three stages: a pre-motivational phase marked by vulnerability and background stressors; a motivational phase, where feelings of defeat and entrapment evolve into suicidal ideation; and a volitional phase, where that ideation crystallises into action (O'Connor, 2011). Each phase unfolds not only cognitively but spatially and ritually, as a movement across thresholds that are either successfully mediated or fatally breached.

The motivational phase of the IMV model, where individuals feel entrapped with no escape, closely mirrors what Eliade called the ordeal of liminality, a suspension between identities that, if not ritually navigated, becomes intolerable. In traditional societies, such psychological and existential instability was contained within ritual trials that gave meaning and structure to breakdown. In the modern desacralized world, those facing legal exclusion, moral collapse, or emotional defeat (such as probationers) must navigate these thresholds without maps. In this reading, Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, offers not just psychological tools, but ritual techniques for traversing such thresholds. The ethical foundations i.e., yama and niyama, do not merely recalibrate morality but serve as preparatory rites, strengthening symbolic identity and ritual readiness. Tapas, in particular, takes on new weight in this context: it is not merely discipline, but “heat,” namely a form of internalized suffering that, in Eliade's interpretation, burns away the old self in preparation for higher transformation (Eliade, 1958, p. 12).

The suffering that occurs in the motivational phase is thus not meaningless, but potentially initiatory, if ritualised and endured within a structured practice.

To emancipate oneself from suffering – such is the goal of all Indian philosophies and all Indian mysticisms. Whether this deliverance is obtained directly through knowledge (according to the teaching of Vedanta and Saipkhya, for example) or by means of techniques (as Yoga and the majority of Buddhist schools hold), the fact remains that no knowledge has any value if it does not seek the salvation of man

In the volitional phase, where suicide planning and capability manifest, O'Connor emphasises actional momentum and disinhibition. It is here that Eliade's insights into ritual control of death become pertinent. These initiatory practices offer a structured descent into psychological and spiritual depths, enabling the individual to pass through crisis and emerge renewed. In the absence of such culturally mediated rites, however, the existential weight of suffering may lead not to symbolic rebirth, but to suicidal action.

Pratyāhāra, dhāraṇā, and dhyāna, the interior limbs of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, function as methods of symbolic containment, allowing the practitioner to confront inner annihilation without being destroyed by it. Pratyāhāra regulates sensory intrusion, dhāraṇā builds attentional precision, and dhyāna enables sustained witnessing without collapse. These are not mere meditative techniques; they are, in Eliade's terms, ritual forms for facing the void. They ritualise confrontation with death-thoughts without disintegration. The individual does not repress fear or desire for oblivion, they practice holding it, breathing through it, transforming it. At the highest level, samādhi becomes not simply meditative absorption, but the ritual conquest of death itself, not in metaphysical terms, but in the ability to no longer identify with the self that fears or enacts self-destruction. Eliade compares such states with initiatory rebirths, where identity is stripped to its essence, purified, and then restored within a higher order of being (Eliade, 1958, pp. 31–35). The suicidal trajectory, then, is not suppressed or denied, but transfigured. The drive toward death is absorbed within a symbolic and embodied process of transformation. Samyama, a Sanskrit term that connects the last three limbs of yoga – dhāraṇā, dhyāna, samādhi––is particularly important for symbolic transformation and the experience of Self-dissolution. In the final state of samyama, which is samādhi, the subject (practitioner) and the object of meditation (dhyāna) merge. “Uninterrupted flow of attention dissolves the split between the object seen and the seer who sees it. Consciousness appears to have ceased, and to have reached a state of silence. It is devoid of ‘I’, and merges into the core of the being in a profound state of serenity” (Iyengar, 2002, p. 181). Iyengar compares the state of samādhi to the experience of an artist or scientist who momentarily drops the Self during the creation of art or the process of scientific revelation. What distinguishes an artist from a yogi is that, for the artist, samādhi “is associated with the performance and realisation of a particular art form”, making it difficult to infuse “into his ordinary daily existence. For the yogi, however, whose ‘art is formless and whose goal has no physical expression […] the fragrance of samadhi penetrates every aspect of his ‘normal’ behaviour, activities and state of being” (Iyengar, 2002, p. 181). The “art” of the yoga practitioner is life itself. This is why samādhi can be transformational – it prepares the practitioner to face the void. It is a state of being that can be habituated through practice yet is not confined to specific moments like artistic performance. We must remember that the ritualistic time-space of yoga practice creates “as-if” worlds – symbolic realities that should be carried beyond the boundaries of the practice itself. What is experienced in this sacred space can gradually evolve into a new way of being. If the experience of samādhi is not tied to special occasions, is cultivated even at its initial stages, and becomes part of the practitioner's life beyond the ritualistic time-space of yoga practice, it can weaken the experience of the limiting Self or ego – the part that suffers, generates suffering, and contemplates final decisions such as suicide.

It also allows practitioners to experience temporary freedom from the narratives they hold about their identities. However, when one moment follows another, and then another, it becomes a habit. Samādhi, like the other limbs of yoga, should not be understood as a final state that remains omnipresent once attained. It is simply a tool, a means, like the other limbs of Aṣṭāṅga Yoga, since “the aim, the goal, of all this training is liberation of the soul” (Vivekananda, 2024b, p. 214). The goal of the practice is, therefore, the profound transformation of a human being – from one entrapped by conditions to one who is free––not in another world, but here and now. O'Connor's IMV model, thus, finds unexpected but profound reinforcement in Eliade's reading of initiation. The three phases of suicidal risk, vulnerability, entrapment, and action, parallel the stages of departure, liminal trial, and reintegration found in traditional rites. What is missing for many probationers today is not insight or therapy alone, but ritual architecture. Aṣṭāṅga Yoga supplies this, not as religion, but as structured symbolic work. It guides the practitioner through the breakdown of identity, teaches endurance within the void, and offers tools for return, not only to life, but to meaning.