Dharma is the Omnipresent law, the Archetype, the ideal. Dharma is the Way. Karma is the vehicle to tread the way. It is the means to be one with Dharma. It is the manifested dharma. If dharma is the order, karma is what keeps it alive.
Karma exists in 3 fold manifestations - the knower, the knowledge, and the known. All these three dimensions of karma can exist in the following 3 climates or temperaments - Rajas, Sattva, and Tamas.
Following words try to express the feel of Rajas:
Plurality, analysis, individuality, separation, alienation, arrogance, fear, stress, anger, nervousness, anxiety, restlessness, disbelief, meanness, stinginess, prejudice, go getter, material efficiency.
Following try to explain what constitute the Tamas:
Attachment to an individual, lust, attachment to having something or somebody, indulgence, laziness, driven by baser instincts, attachment to results, to profits, helplessness on the face of obstacles, rationalization, over intellectualization, delusion, inactivity, habit
Sattva stands for unity, integration, non attachment to the material manifest, one sighted concentration on the Archetype, the Dharma, the Ideal. From this vantage point all the three constituencies of Karma, viz - Knowledge, knower, and the known are considered as a way to be one with "Krishna" – the invisible Ideal – The Truth – The Source. From this standpoint every moment of existence becomes a worship. The action or the outcome of the action per se loses its importance. What is primary is the process of being in the act to be able to "see" the invisible in all the three material constituents - the knower, the known and the knowledge.
Life is an opportunity to practice Sattva every moment of being alive. It is about living in touch with one’s sense of Being, instead of Having. Both Tamas and Rajas are flavors based on the mode of “having”
It is easy to be swept in the delusion of having something or somebody. The way media, society and the world around imposes its noise on our minds, It is very easy to fall in the trap of the rat race of searching one’s self worth, one’s identity, in the form of one’s possession of power, knowledge, education, a lucrative job, profits, deals, relationships, etc. Not much attention is given to Be. Even if someone is giving a passing thought into one’s being, it is always weighed against what he shall “have”, out of “being” that. So, a person would prefer reading a book, if one is convinced that it would help one at work, and everyday living, manipulating life and people to achieve one’s own end. Or others might want to read, to have a stint of fantasy, to escape from one’s own reality. Not much thought is given to just Being.
The state of Being is mostly misunderstood as the state of inaction. Rather it is quite contrary. The state of being is actually as state of immense internal and external activity, which helps a person to express out who she really is. It is a journey to discover one’s real self. It is a journey of self analysis to know one’s own self, the life, and the world around. It is a life lived in deep contemplation observing and knowing life. It is about being in that profound gratitude and appreciation of the creation and grandeur of nature. It is about trying to solve the mystery of one’s own existence.
Being is what remains with man – his increases awareness, his growing respect of life and people, his enhanced capacity to love, his enlarged soul and heart, his resolution to stay with the Dharma, love, peace and harmony – no matter what. Being is that immortal sheen on one’s soul that transcends one’s life. It continues to be in this creation long after the body ceases to exist. After 2500 years of the death of the prince Siddhartha, the shine of his Being still is so young and relevant in this world. Same is the case of Beethoven, Dickens, Shakespeare, Blake, Mozart, Michelangelo, Jesus, and hundreds of masters who have made their being sublime in their lifetimes. Certainly no matter what they had, has all perished away. Nature and life has not even a passing awareness of them. But it was their Being which has remained timeless.
Today is the world of markets. It is the world of business, of industry, of capitalism. Capital is the God. It is not for wellbeing, man wants capital. But it is for capital, one needs more capital. Capital is no more just a means. But it has become an end to itself. Everything is measures in the backdrop of its salability. Even before taking up a hobby, it runs out in the mind of man, on the aspect of its salability to the society. Today, in the shelves of the best sellers, you see books which worship the men who “have” – in the form of power, capital, prestige, knowledge, or any other such forms of getting more capital in return. Unconsciously man has started measuring his own worth based on this skewed scale.
But, remembering the ageless wisdom of the Vedas, if we practice the Sattvik form of living - a living based on the way of being, life becomes a beautiful play of discovery and enchantment.
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