The Extremes

• Completely stationary for years

• Subsist solely on fruits, wild plants,

roots, grain left in fields

• “Five fires”: build four fires around

themselves with the sun as the fifth

• “Spike-lying” sleep on a bed of nails

• Tyaga: relinquishing a desire for

actions to produce effects

• Samnyasa: abandoning family,

social, economic life, and the ritual

activity associated with the

householders way of life

Examples