Facing the World

A recent news article read about a young man around 30 years, an MBA from a reputed institute and senior executive with a MNC company, who tried to kill himself out of the fear that he might get a pink slip soon. The point is - even much before his job would have been at stake in today’s turmoil reeling under the global recession, the poor fellow could not cope with the fear of something unseen and yet to happen. God saved him but the natural question is - why did such an intelligent and successful person lose all his patience and endurance?

Today, life has become quite stressful making us confused about the very essence and purpose of life. Posed before many fears of life, we constantly suffer challenges and seek respite. We ponder many a time - why this life and why we are made to live at all. While seeking such answers one is not alone, we all face the same problem and find ourselves stirred within us trying to find out how to face the world and yet lead a meaningful life deriving satisfaction and happiness out of it. 

Life is generally viewed as all about joy and happiness to be experienced. In order to achieve it, the desire engine works through the human body and mind. This desire leads to an urge for action and the resultant achievements translate into a deep sense of joy and satisfaction. This is the way life seems to be designed and bestowed upon us on this planet. However, generally these accomplishments do not bring contentment to us and we desire for still more. This happens mostly due to the flickering nature of our mind and not for genuine reasons. Thus we miss the moments of joy to us. Having lost this paradise of joy we fail to experience true happiness and become victims of endless ‘desire-action-desire’ loop, leading us nowhere. Thus, the desired satisfaction being thwarted, we fall victims to anger coupled with the loss of the power of discrimination. It twists our personalities in such a manner that we find ourselves low in confidence, patience and endurance. This is the exact point where fear peeps in and enters our mind leading us to total destruction.

In the Gita, Lord Krishna tells Arjuna:

Krodhat bhavati sammohah

Sammohat smritivibhramah

Smritibhranshad buddhinasho

Buddhinashat pranashyati (2 / 63)

(From anger comes delusion; from delusion

loss of memory; from loss of memory the

destruction of discrimination; from destruction

of discrimination, one perishes)

The essence of life is in living it to its fullness. This can be understood by the enormous zeal and survival quest present in every living being, be small or mighty. Swami Vivekananda, the apostle of Vedanta, also advocated this point. He said, “Compare the mighty steam engine whistling and rushing on the rail tracks and a small insect walking on the same track a little away. No doubt that the mighty engine can crush it in moments, but the little creature uses all its efforts and intelligence to save his life”. He further questions if it is not a miracle that mostly such efforts succeed. Now just think - while this little creature had courage to face the mighty engine with his intelligent action, the mighty engine will simply crush anything in front of it, if not controlled by a driver having intelligence.

The Indian philosophical system describes the human body as comprising of gross i.e. physical (Sthula), subtle i.e. astral (Sukshma) and causal (Karana) bodies. These bodies are inter-connected and operate through Pranic (life force) energies in any living being, otherwise composed of gross physical matter. Thoughts and actions are stated to be having three gunas (qualitative manifestations) known as Sattva (sublimity), Rajas (passion) and Tamas (ignorance). According to presence or play of these three gunas in varying degrees, the mula prikriti (basic nature) of an individual living being is established. Most of the worldly actions and thoughts are guided and governed by the rajas and tamas, while the Sattva leads one to higher and noble deeds, including those that lead to liberation.

Further, there are seven wheels (Chakras) or energy transmission centres, stated to be located in the spinal pathway, regulating the entire physical & astral body complex under pranic forces. The mind can be taken as a manager making the interaction between the external world and the inner life intelligence possible with the help of the sensory organs, which record and communicate the stimuli received from outside. So, it is a well-defined system with such refinement and automation that most of the time we can only feel amazed and clueless. 

Therefore, it is important to recognise the basic intelligence present within and directing every moment of action. It works through the thoughts emerging in the mind prompting us for action within a fraction of a second. The mind is the instrument between the thoughts emerging out of the inner life intelligence and the body making the physical act possible. This is again evident from the fact that having completed an action, we analyse them and the experience gained at the thought-level only. It is now clear that subjective satisfaction of action and experience so gained lies with the core intelligence – referred to as ‘Atman’ in the Indian system of philosophy. 

Complex it may seem but the dynamics of this system, like any scientific process, are very simple. For example, at the core electron-flow level, the electricity flowing from a dry battery cell or a power generation plant are alike except for voltage and amperage; yet the dry cell and a power plant are distinct in their form, operation and complexities. In the same manner, the life-force energy or Atman (Pure Self) and the universal creative intelligence or Isha (God) are actually alike but seem to be complex systems due to expressed and perceived manifestations. These perceivable manifestations are the foundations of Maya (Illusions), which builds up the mansions of unending cycle of worldly affairs with the help of duality present in nature coupled with our own desires. We had already seen that desires stem out of the basic inner quest to find the everlasting joy and happiness.

The physical plane on earth is mostly governed by action and so is known as Karma-bhumi. Every living being here is bound by various karmas done, being done and to be done including the basic set of compulsive actions like eating breathing, moving, reproducing, and excretion etc. The human beings, in addition to this, can think, analyse, create, explore and so on, having, therefore, unlimited possibilities to act. Of course, a few animals on this earth have some special faculties of skills and actions but these are learnt and imitated from the human beings, which indicates that this earthly plain is to be commanded by the human beings by desire-linked intelligent action. 

Now a question naturally arises: If the earth is an action-plane, why action creates bondage and why it does not always result in joy? To understand this, we need to understand the external world stated to be an illusion (maya) i.e. which is not real but appears to be so. Whenever maya has to influence an act, it puts forth another comparable choice before us, making us indecisive for the moment. These choices are put forth again and again as we eliminate options against them in order to take a decision. In this process, decision is delayed and so is the subsequent action. The lag of time and distraction so created results in change in terms of reference to the desired action since its inception. Thus the entire action path is changed with loss of original direction. This is further modified by ego-driven logic of mind and external stimuli perceived. 

Hence, the stimulus of the original desire is compromised and the action, though accomplished, does not bring the inner joy for which the desire arose. In absence of the joy sought but not experienced, the inner self keeps demanding it, and deluded under maya we continue to act, act and act…but for no avail. This causes dissatisfaction which, many a time, results in fuming anger. The qualities like patience and endurance are lost in these situations and man is lured even more into the desire-action loop creating bondages for him. In this manner a common man misunderstands the inner urge for joy or happiness for material possessions or ego-gratification.

What is the way out, then? In order to live we have to perform action every moment of our temporal existence and expected to perform these in such a way that they bring joy to us and not bondages. The key to is being truthful to ourselves. This approach to world, while facing it for challenges, is very well reflected in a popular Bengali devotional song – “I dare, the Mother Divine care…” , which means taking oneself as merely performer of action, while surrendering the fruits at the feet of the Divine. This principle is known as Karma Yoga in Indian philosophy.

In Shrimad Bhagvad Gita, Lord Krishna speaks about how action should be performed:

Karmanyakarma yah pashyed

akarmani cha karam yah

Sa budhiman manushyeshu

sa yuktah kritsna-karma-krit -- Gita, 4-18

(One who sees inaction in action,

and action in inaction,

is intelligent among men,

he is a Yogi and a true performer of all actions)

It is further declared:

Na kartritvam na karmani

lokasya srjati prabhuh

Na karma-phala-samyogam

svabhavas tu pravartate – Gita, 5-14

(Neither agency nor actions

does the Lord create for the world,

nor union with the fruits of action.

But it is Nature that acts)

However, the embodied beings are bewildered while doing action due to ignorance, which veils the real knowledge. As we had seen earlier, maya or material envelopments around us play a significant role in draping and drawing the curtains of ignorance to hide the real self. Therefore, to remove this veil of ignorance, Lord Krishna in his great sermon of the Gita suggests a mantra for the deluded mankind:

Karmanye va adhikarste,

ma phaleshu kadachana – Gita: 2-47

(Thy right is to work only, but never to its fruits)

We had begun with the present day stress and turmoil which takes away the inner calm and tranquillity in our day-to-day life. Having understood the mechanism of maya and the mind dancing to the tune of the external stimuli perceived, it should be easier for us to direct our energies in a way that restores the inner state of calm filled with joy. For this, we must first try to understand the root of an emerging desire. Then one must test it on the benchmark of being selfless or selfish. Here a larger good of the beings of the universe will indicate the selfless nature of our actions. Again, it is important to see whether at the end of the action so accomplished, it generates the satisfaction and joy which just does not fade away in a short span of time. The fickle mind can be calmed to a great extent either by doing some deep breathing exercises (pranayam) or engaging in some creative pursuits.

Mahatma Gandhi used to say that there should be a right cause or reason behind each action, and if it is not so, then the action should be abandoned. This provides a great insight for all in understanding the Karma-Yoga philosophy, and also becomes an important guidepost for our day-to-day actions. The right attitude and commitment for selfless action, as far as possible, need to be nurtured, inculcated and practised by us to reap the real fruit of action, which bring in its wake everlasting joy and not the temporary material gains. If we succeed in this endeavour, the stress will bust and we may find the treasures of happiness right here, even while performing actions related to worldly affairs.

(C) Ashok Kumar Pandey,Noida (India)1988-2010