Tapas and the Art of Heat Management

I often describe the Niyamas as “Effortful Habituations under the guidance of the Yamas.” I say this by looking both at the direct translation of the word Niyama and at the five Niyamas Patanjali recommends we cultivate. These five can be roughly translated as hygiene, contentment, heat management, continuous self-study, and surrender to the unknown. All five are habits to be consciously created.

This blog focuses on the third Niyama: heat management — in Sanskrit, Tapas.

To be honest, I didn’t initially want to write about Tapas. It feels closely related to the previous Niyama I wrote about, Svadhyaya. But intersections between my practice and personal life led me to look at Tapas from a wider angle. Whether this view is right or wrong, I cannot say — but I hope it offers something useful.

Typically, the word “Tap,” “Tapah,” or more commonly “Tapas,” is translated as heat, austerity, or discipline. Modern yoga culture comes to us largely through the English language, which carries traces of Puritan influence through its colonial and missionary history. As a result, Tapas can sound severe — as though growth comes only through grinding effort, rigid structure, and tough discipline, as if the body were the most volatile part of us.

But most spiritual masters — Patanjali, the Buddha, Nanak, Gorakhnath, Baba Sri Chand — point elsewhere. The mind, not the body, is the most volatile part of us.

In the Yoga Sutras, Patanjali does not introduce Tapas as punishment, but as refinement. If Tapas were independent of the Yamas, it could become harsh. But it is not. Ahimsa — a bias against harm — comes first. Tapas is practiced within that boundary.

Tapas is the third of the Niyamas — an effortful habituation under the guidance of the Yamas — we remember that its most direct translation is simply “heat.” Heat, in its original sense, is transformative. Fire purifies gold; warmth softens what is rigid. Tapas is the conscious willingness to stay present with friction — not to hurt ourselves, but to clarify ourselves.

Nath Yogis just chilling

For the body, this is easy to understand. It is your steady asana practice, your strong Vinyasa class, the workout you scheduled, the cycling that keeps you going. It is the penance of the Ashtanga Mysore room or the intensity of Hot Yoga.

Modern lifestyle and food habits leave the body constantly tired, fatigued and needing rest. To break through that noise, you may need toughness and discipline. Nothing I share below dismisses that reality of physical Tapas.

But for a mind already full of fire, it spirals, inflames and replays on an infinite loop, Tapas for the mind must be so different it may even seem contradictory to the practice of Tapas for the body because Tapas for the mind cannot mean “add more intensity.” It must mean doing something skillful with the heat that is already there — tempering it, redirecting it, containing it.

Tapas for the mind is meditation when you would rather distract yourself. It is journaling and getting specific when you would rather stay vague and general. It is an honest reflection instead of rehearsing your favorite point of view based narrative.

Yogis in Tapas, staying still in the cold by taking mind over matter

Essentially, Tapas for the mind is the discipline of seeing clearly, and that means Tapas for the mind is learning to reduce the heat in the mind and this is not done through suppression of emotion or some idea of spiritual toughness. You can't beat the mind into clarity in itself, it needs to be trained through intelligence born out of spiritual wisdom.

Left unmanaged, mental heat turns into irritation, judgment, anxiety, comparison — the constant “one more thing” to pacify the mind while never learning to contain, direct, vent, or illuminate. If you have ever tried to sit still for ten minutes, you know the mind is already fiery and not always easy to temper.

Here, austerity simply means tending the fire like a hearth or fireplace. Warm enough to transform the room, not so much that it burns the house down.

Patanjali, in Sutra 1.33, paraphrased, says the mind clarifies through friendliness, compassion, unsurpassed joy, and equanimity. These define applying heat to practice non-hostility (Ahimsa)—not sentimental spirituality, but mental hygiene through attitudes like friendliness, especially filtering your own mind. Hostility distorts perception; friendliness stabilizes it.

Here we can widen the lens. 

Theravsda Buddhist Monk Meditating

Friendliness and compassion are also major tenets of Buddhist practices,  when I was younger, I remember a teaching from the Dhammapada that just stayed with me, the teaching refers to the idea of hurting and harming can only be stopped when there is a stop in the actions of hurting and harming. If you really look at the words, this is not a ‘moral instruction’ as English language presents it, it just states very matter of factly that until actions that create hurt and harm stop, then there is always hurt and harm, thoughts create reality. This is not a form of social control but a personal practice, to overcome ones own mind. A reactive mind cannot see clearly, so imagine what kind of life it will bring around it?

Guru Nanak echoes this in the Japji Sahib: victory over one’s conditioned, reactive mind leads to outer victory. Not an instruction, but a blunt reality—until inner victory, you’re enslaved to outer reactions. Not as a form of withdrawal or control of others; it’s the unexamined surge of mental heat from constant reactivity. The mind thinks ceaselessly; without tempering, it burns.

Gorakhnath shares the Truth of Tapas

Gorakhnath, an OG Guru of the Nath Lineage, clarifies in the Gorakh Bani: true Tapas tempers the mind’s burning fire, the real one—without it, all other fires are smoke. Commentaries interpret this as inner yogic fire purifying thought, breath, and identity through the mind’s burning nature. The body generates heat through friction. The mind generates heat through thought. If the body needs to increase heat, it redirects the heat of the mind onto the body.

Baba Sri Chand, in the Matra Sahib, states Tapas isn’t about putting ash on the body as is done in some Yogic traditions, rather it is the burning away of the mind-driven ego within. Puritanical bodily Tapas can come across as an outward show; here, it’s presented as an inward practice.

Across this spectrum of spiritual wisdom—from Patanjali, Buddha, Nanak, Sri Chand, and Gorakhnath—discipline and austerity converge as managing inner fire through awareness for clarity. This path harnesses heat not as punishment but as a gentle forge, cultivating attitudes that refine the volatile mind while honoring the body’s needs, ultimately leading to a balanced, illuminated life where transformation blooms from presence rather than force.

There is shared clarity: discipline is not merely endurance; it is the management of inner fire through awareness.

Tapas, when guided by Ahimsa and expressed through friendliness, compassion, joy, and equanimity, becomes the art of heat management. Tapas is learning the direction of that heat — not to burn, as the mind so easily does, but to illuminate. Not to scorch the house, but to warm it. Not to destroy identity, but to soften it.

When the fire is tended well, it does not consume you. You’re able to bring steadiness and ease to that which discomforts. That is what grows and clarifies you.

It is also really what I love about the practice of Kriya and Kundalini Yoga. It brings together so many things as a practice of Tapas that translates to moments where you can filter and decide not just between reaction and non reaction, but also the right kinds of actions because you cultivate the right place to take the heat of the mind. Thank you for reading this far if you made it here. If you enjoy the read, let me know, click the heart, leave a comment or give a follow, @hipsteryogi on instagram.

Meditating at Swasti Yoga Shala in Rishikesh