Of late, I have been pondering over the events happening around me, some of which pleasant and some not so pleasant but many of them uncannily making me aware of the play of karma in one’s life.
Karma theory is known to be a play of cause and effect. As you sow, so shall you reap. It is as simple as that and may be even simpler than what one understands. However, the phrases destiny and freewill have often confused the understanding of ‘karma'. It is perceived that destiny is something that has been inflicted upon us against our freewill. But there is nothing actually like destiny and freewill. It is all freewill, only 'karma'. What is taken to be the play of destiny today is a result of freewill exercised in the past whether in this birth or in a previous one. We are the creators of our own world.
Understanding it a little more, it is not actually the actions alone that constitute one's 'karma' but a whole combination of thoughts, feelings and actions. Let us take the oft quoted example of one ripping open someone’s belly with the intention to kill and ripping open someone’s belly by a doctor intending to save the other’s life. Action is the same but the intention and thus the imprints gathered by the two people are different and thus would result in different effects for both of them.
This made me ponder over the emphasis laid by spiritualists and religions on ethics and values in our daily lives. Sri Sri Ravishankar, Founder of the Art of Living has talked many times on the role of ethics in businesses and corporates. I have started to get a glimpse of the enormous truth of existence that he has been propounding by laying emphasis on ethics. As a very gross example let us take a transaction of an individual selling a product or providing a service. Let’s observe the intention in the transaction. First case scenario: the seller wishes to sell it at the best price for maximising his profits and second case scenario: the seller sells his product or service to provide to the need and comfort of the customer though against a price.
In the first case the intention being maximisation of profits, the individual may have extracted an undue price from a gullible customer or may have adopted unethical practices or may have sold a substandard product for maximising his own profit. In these cases he would have caused discomfort or distress and a feeling of being cheated, to the customer. Yes the cash flows in but what did the seller earn? Discomfort, distress and a feeling of being cheated. In the second case the seller was careful to see that the customer gets comfort and convenience from his product and at a fair price leaving the customer satisfied with his purchase. What did the seller earn? Comfort, convenience and satisfaction! Now, cash is only a means for attaining comfort, convenience and satisfaction. But driven by a desire for maximising profits while compromising on quality and customer satisfaction, what does the seller attain?
Can we observe every transaction, thought that we go through? Each thought, each feeling, each emotion, each action goes into creating our world. This implies that all the wrongs that we feel were done to us, all the insults that were heaped on us originated from within us!
The difference between the enlightened masters who walk on this planet and the ordinary folks is precisely this, they are aware of this truth of existence and are able to overcome it whereas ordinary mortals not being able to live this truth, toss around in life in the hands of their own karma and creating more and more spirals of web around themselves.
Living in a heightened state of awareness of this truth, can one choose one’s karma? Yes, it is possible if one were to go by what the enlightened one’s indicate. Being in awareness of one’s thoughts, feelings and actions. This is possible only when one is living entirely in the present moment responding to each situation with awareness. But is it really possible to respond to situations in their present context only without being driven by the past experience, anger, hurt or even patterns of behaviour cultivated, consciously or unconsciously and relied upon till now? Even if one were to have the intention of choosing one’s future behaviour, is the future not emanating from one’s past? For example the choices made in the past, the environments created around one self, etc, etc. What about the impressions carried over from the past? What about the imprints one may be carrying in the deep recesses of one’s subconscious that may compel certain types of behaviour or situations even without one willing them now?
This is where the relevance and need is, for a ‘Guru’, a spiritual master. In olden days, in India, people understood the nature of a Guru, an enlightened one at that. That is the reason they would travel for miles at end and for months to have a ‘darshan’ of an enlightened one. They experienced peace and freedom from problems by just being in the presence and within the sight of an enlightened one. The wiser ones among them understood cleansing they were undergoing at the subtler levels of mind and spirit, a cleansing of the unwanted karma! Such visits were akin to intense pilgrimages.
In the present times, in the presence of Sri Sri Ravishankar, millions all over the world have experienced the same inner peace, the silence of mind. At a personal level, I have experienced the silence of greatest of inner turmoil by just one ‘drishti’ (glance) from Him. And the inner transformation I have witnessed within me since I first met him is beyond my own comprehension. Such is the power of ‘darshan’ of an enlightened one.
What is the physiology and chemistry of ‘darshan’ and what happens during this phenomenon of ‘darshan’ is something worth trying to understand. May be another time I will deliberate upon it with my views and experience.
Long ago the rishis (Hindu ascetics) of ancient India proclaimed “Vasudaiva Kutumbakam” i.e ‘the world is one family’. Another verse which was in the form of a prayer reflected the same globalism enshrined in the Vedic thought thousands of years ago, “Loka samastha sukhinau bavanthu” – May the world live in peace. The people did not just pray for the happiness of humans alone. They prayed for every living creature in the world. “Sarve sukina santhu, sarve santhu niramayaha” – May every living being be free from ills and miseries and attain peace. Such was the vision held by the people of the Vedic culture.
Today the world is talking of ‘global village’ and ‘globalization’. Globalization by definition is ‘the process of transformation of local phenomena into global ones, a process by which the people of the world are unified into a single society and function together’. While globalization started as an economic phenomenon driven by business interests, it is today perceived as a unification of economic, technological, social, cultural and political forces. However, although globalisation aims at diluting and dissolving the political boundaries of nations, nationalities, cultures and diversities, the world today is witnessing strife, wars, conflicts at all fronts and on all accounts i.e economic, political, social and cultural !
The Vedic people who proclaimed 4,000 years ago that ‘world is one family’ were not seen to be in such conflict. Although the underlying objective of the two concepts appears to be the same, there obviously is a difference between the process of ‘globalization’ being attempted today and the principle of 'Vasudaiva Kutumbakam' that was ingrained in the culture and way of life of the people on the Indian subcontinent.
Globalization was motivated by economic interests and not out of a concern for ‘universal welfare’ – economic interests of those searching for new markets and better resource mobilization. Its advocacy for free trade was adopted by different countries as it did lead to cash flows in otherwise deficient economies. However, the whole process being motivated primarily by economic interests of a few powerful nations and corporations, the emphasis was on pursuit of financial gains. It did lead to satisfaction of economic needs of many people in less developed countries, though not all, thus nations’ policies and actions have started to get structured around greatest financial gains to benefit their societies. Progress and success has started to be measured in material terms, and other concerns such as environmental issues, or human perspectives of emotional richness or social well being, are not necessarily cared for. Moreover, the survival in the new global business markets is dependent on improved productivity and increased competition and in such highly competitive environments, human actions are getting centered on self interest and greed.
In this pursuit of material progress - production, distribution and consumption of an increasing number of goods and conveniences is the creed and each competes with the other to produce more with less. More skills, better technology, better access to cheaper resources even if through the exploitation of natural resources of the earth or through better, bigger bombs to maim and destroy opponents, all in pursuit of more financial gains! Although many of the wars being waged in the world appear to have religious and ethnic basis, the underlying motives are now being perceived to be economic – competition for dwindling resources of the world. Troops and weapons are being deployed where local people threaten corporate investments and returns!
On the contrary, ‘Vasudaiva Kutumbakam’ was ingrained in the way of life of Vedic people as an integral part of their culture. Their vision encompassed the whole humanity as one’s own part. There was no place for exploitation of natural resources, in fact animals and plants and even rivers and mountains were venerated. Their actions were seeped in a concern for ‘universal welfare’. Their interactions with alternate beliefs, faiths and even civilizations reflected tolerance and pluralism. When sects like Buddhism, Jainism and Sikhism emerged as reformist movements, even though as rebellion to what their propagandists considered wrong in the society, the Hindus did not suppress these reformers but gave them the freedom and space to grow. After the spread of Budhism in India, Sri Adi Shankaracharya brought many back to the Hindu fold not through force, coercion, incentives or threat but by preaching in the form of debates.
Where did this vision of and concern for ‘universal welfare’ come from?
The Vedic people had the knowledge of the eternal truth, the truth of the wholeness of universe. They knew it was a oneness and a perceived separateness from this oneness as an individual identity was a matter of awareness. Thus any action at any point in this oneness would affect the whole. The whole is aware what happens at any point in the universe and a response is triggered to every action. Scientific researches of modern day confirm this Vedic knowledge of oneness of universe. Here is what I read about it some time back. The starkest revelation is through the theory of non-locality in Quantum mechanics.
‘Non locality is if you take two quantum particles that were twins and separate them billions of miles apart, and then do something to one particle here, the other particle billions of light years away will “immediately” come to know about what you did to that one particle here!! This quantum property has been confirmed by experiments. In fact, “all” particles in this universe are twins, in the sense they all can be traced back to a common ancestral origin. In other words, what happens to every particle should become known to every other particle in this universe! So the whole universe is “interconnected”?!’
It was this knowledge thousands of years ago that made the Vedic people proclaim ‘Vasudaiva Kutumbakam’ – ‘the world is one family’. Present day drivers of globalization can take cue from this knowledge.
Later day philosophers and thinkers in India have been propounding this concept again and again. Lately, Sri Sri Ravishankar, a spiritual master has made it a mission to make it a reality in the present day chaos. The Silver Jubilee celebrations of the Art of Living in 2006 witnessed a congregation of 2.5 million people from over 150 countries belonging to different cultures, nationalities and religions. All came to celebrate this truth, this reality of Vasudaiva Kutumbakam – the world is one family !
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