Jaya Row, Creator, Vedanta Vision & Initiator – Managing Trustee, Vedanta Vision, On Fate, Free Will And The Law Of Karma
HUMAN SUFFERING IS ONE OF LIFE’S MOST CONFUSING DILEMMAS. WE OFTEN FEEL WHY DOES ONE PERSON GO THROUGH SO MANY PROBLEMS WHILE ANOTHER SEEMS TO SAIL THROUGH? WHY IS ONE PERSON BORN WITH A SILVER SPOON WHILE ANOTHER GOES THROUGH PROBLEMS WITHOUT SEEMING TO DESERVE THEM. FORTUNATELY, FOR US, OUR FOREFATHERS COLLECTED DATA ON THIS SUBJECT, COLLECTED SEEMINGLY UNCONNECTED FACTS AND DISCOVERED THE LAW OF KARMA.
The law of Karma is pretty much like the Law of Gravity, it applies to everybody whether you know it or not, accept it on not. So, it would be in our well-being to learn what it is, abide by it and then benefit from it. The millennial concept, the modern concept to do what you want and forget about the future, doesn’t quite work that way. It is like throwing a stone in the water and expecting that there will be no ripples.
Karma simply means Action. Action is the pivot around which life revolves; when you act more driven by greed, selfishness and negativity, you are planting seeds of suffering for yourself. The same you – driven by generosity, positivity, and you create a future that is wonderful for yourself.
So, let’s start with what is the source of action. Let’s say in a family over the weekend – the father goes to play golf, the son goes to play football, the daughter decides to hang out with friends and the mother decides to watch a movie on Netflix. Why are different people doing different things? Because they have a desire to do that particular thing? Where does this desire come from, because, at some point of time you grow out if it – golf, football, friends or the movie? Now, the interesting question is why did the thought come to you? Because Vedanta says you have a Vasana for it.
Vasana is a Sanskrit word which literally means fragrance but to understand what it is, it is a deep-rooted yearning interest for a particular thing, an unmanifested desire. So, when you have a Vasana for music, an interest or leaning towards music, you think of music, you develop a desire to listen to music or sing yourself or learn music and it results in action. So, as the Vasana, so will be your thought, desire and action. But not just that, also your circumstances.
A stock broker hangs around with other stock brokers, a doctor is in his own world with other doctors and patients, an architect is with other fellow architects and so on. At this moment you are a victim of your Vasanas, you can’t change them and this is referred to as destiny. So, you find all beings according to their Vasanas. A cow is mild, the lion is ferocious, a deer is agile and an elephant is slow, they can’t change. But when it comes to human beings, they have the power to bring about tremendous change in their lives.
We have heard of a dacoit who become a sapta rushis. There is the story of a beggar in Orissa who has started a school. The rich can become paupers and vice versa. I just read about a brilliant judge, Justice Radhabinod Pal, unknown in India but famous in Japan. He helped a lot of war criminals from escaping the death penalty by his fantastic judgments written in thousands of pages. His life started in East Bengal [Bangladesh] taking a cow to graze. They lived in abject poverty; his mother owned a cow and they would take the cow to graze outside a school and he would stand outside the school and listen to the teacher teaching. One day, an inspector came and asked the students a whole lot of questions, to which none of the students had answers but he. He said, I have the answers to all these questions. And he rattled them off. So, he started his life that way and he became internationally famous. He did his MSc in Mathematics, intern to law and became an outstanding Judge. So, this is the power we have in ourselves and this is called Free Will.
We each have two forces acting upon us; one is the result of past actions which is called Prarabdha karma or past destiny, which cannot change at this moment, it is irrevocable. But, in the present, we have Purushartha or Freewill which is independent and completely under your control and you can use this as a tool to build a fantastic future philosophy. But, because we don’t know this, we don’t differentiate.
For instance, you plant an apple seed, you get an apple. You cannot get mangoes no matter how much you pray or manipulate – you cannot get a mango from an apple seed. The only way to get mango is by planting a mango seed. We can understand this when talking about mangoes and apples. But when it comes to life, we do not apply the same logic. We want happiness, but we plant seeds of sorrow; we want success, we plant seeds of failure and this is the problem.
We are free to choose every action, every moment but once you make that choice and you act, you become a victim of its effect. You are the creator of your destiny, there is no such thing as pre-ordained fate. It is not fixed, it keeps changing. Like a bank account, every time there is a transaction in your bank account your balance changes. Similarly, your Karma changes every time you act.
Now the question that may arise in your mind is that if I am the creator of my future then why is it that negative things happen, because no one in the world would want to become handicapped, would want to suffer or want unhappiness. Then how does it work? Destiny or the result of all past actions is resultant like the law of parallel or law of forces.
If there is an Object ‘O’ and there are two forces acting on it, one horizontally equal force, and other vertically. In which direction will this object move? In an angle of 45 degrees and in that direction, there is no foresight but it is the resultant of the two forces. Similarly, if there are 100 forces acting on that object, the object will move in the direction of the resultant of these forces whether there is a force in that direction or not.
Similarly, with our thoughts, emotions and actions. What you face today is the result of all that is put together. If you don’t want what you are facing, you can’t go to an astrologer, palmist or any external force, all you have to do it to look within, take a look at your thoughts, what kind of thoughts are you entertaining, your notion – are you hateful, compassionate or spiteful and your actions – selfish, malicious or benevolent and unselfish. And the result of what you face in future will be a product of what you are acting now, what your destiny is till now, plus or minus your present actions. This is the power of positive actions and positive thinking. It is in this loop – Vasana, desire, action. At thought [action] level you bring in this free will that dramatically changes your future. So, there are two results of your present thought, emotion and action.
One is the immediate effect, the moment you think of a positive thought, a benevolent thought, that moment you feel good. For example, take two kids in kindergarten. One comes in school, her father has got her a gift from London, she comes there and shares and shows it with everyone. And in giving to another friend, take a look on the face of the child, she is beaming with happiness. Another child also brings something but refuses to share and when anyone asks for it, he says, “No, it’s mine!” take a look at the face of the child, he is invariably having a frown when he says no. So, it is with us, the only difference is we are experts at faking. So, we go around with a smile on our face while inside it is all rage. But that is what it is, that is the immediate effect.
Second is the future effect where it leaves an imprint on your personality and your character and so the message of this law of Karma is: be very careful of the kinds of thoughts you entertain, the kinds of emotions you feel and the actions you perform. The potency of action varies depending on the kind of action you perform. If you are completely unaware of it, like you are walking around and you trample on an insect and you kill it, you don’t become a murderer. You don’t have an intention to kill but you are careless. Like an underage teenager driving without a license and proper control of the car, goes and kills a person there will be repercussions. It may not amount to murder in the court of law but he has to pay for it because when you are given a car, you have to make sure that you have the wherewithal to drive properly and not cause harm to others.
Then there is negative action where you will fully, with full awareness find pleasure in causing harm to another individual and do things to bring him down. That has terrible repercussions where you have to face not only just the penalty and interest on defaulting credit cards’ payment but what we call as divine interest and penalty which is back-breaking. So, watch out for negative thoughts.
Then, positive actions, you are aware that there is so much suffering around in the country, we also have distributed food supplies, serve as many people as we could afford. When you have desire to do good to the society and when you understand that you are privileged, it becomes your duty to reach out to people and help them. It is positive action that has fantastic results both in the present and in future. So, the power of generosity is something that we need to apply and experience for us. We don’t do that. Every privileged person just shuts his windows and personality because he is afraid that somebody will come and ask me for money. That is a terrible thing to feel and you have to let go of that. Instead, you have to cultivate a desire to help.
Like Buddha said, your mind is filled with loving kindness towards all beings. There is a documentary movie I suppose, of a man who decides to befriend an octopus and it is amazing how he goes down to the bottom of the ocean and he reaches out to the octopus’ hand and the octopus returns his courtesy and engulfs his hand with affection. It is incredible how animals seem to have this response to laugh and if you apply this at home, with family members, in your workplace with employees and customers and have that deep intention to benefit the customer, it has a fantastic effect on you.
I was discussing with someone the other day, JRD Tata’s attitude towards Air India. It was not just business, it was his passion, he was committed to it, he loved it and I have heard stories of crew members from that time of JRD Tata. The moment the flight takes off, he is in First Class, he walks to economy, occupies a vacant seat and watches very carefully how they treat the passengers. And writes down meticulous notes of where they are lacking and talks to them later about it. This is why I travelled Air India in the 60s and it was a fantastic airline. Such a pity what happened later. But this is an inspiration for all of us. Even in our businesses, workplaces, we can bring this attitude of love, affection, compassion, passion then you see miracles happen.
Lastly, the most important one, is the understanding of the impermanency of the world. Then, your attitude towards the world changes, you become less affected by what is happening, and you get power by becoming independent. So, this is as far as our life is concerned.
Then the question of Birth and Death. An off-shoot of the Law of Karma is the theory of Re-incarnation and Vedantic masters accept that it is a theory, it cannot be proven but just as in a court of law there can be a conviction based on circumstantial evidence, they collected enough circumstantial evidence to point towards re-incarnation.
Today, you see psychiatrists in Canada, UK, US using what they call as past life regression to cure psychiatric patients of various illusions and they subscribe to this theory of re-incarnation fully. But coming back to the Law of Karma, to understand what happens between Birth and Death, let’s see what happens during our lifetime.
During our lifetime, we move from one circumstance to another, one place to another. This movement is determined by what we call as ‘Pre-dominant desire’. We have all met here today virtually, why? Because we have been derived by a desire through friends or because you want to know something on the Law of Karma, there is some desire that had brought us together. Where will we go next? It depends on the next pre-dominant desire and thus it goes on from Birth to Death. Now at Death, you suddenly find a whole lot of thoughts, meanings, aspirations suddenly disappear into nothing. Then when you look at the earth, it is beautiful, when you see an infant being born, you wonder where it came from and suddenly a whole lot of aspirations seem to appear out of nowhere.
Now scientifically it is illogical to believe something came out of nothing and that something goes into nothing. So, all that it was, they connected, unexplained effects at death with the unexplained causes at birth and then it seems to fit. So, we define Death as the movement of our inner personality from one body to another. Now the next question that arises is why does this movement take place? It is incredible. There has been an instance in Kentucky where a family was travelling in a private plane to Kentucky. The plane crashed and the only survivor was this little girl who in the cold and the snow walked several miles to the closest home and knocked at the door. She was the only survivor.
Now we make ask why does one person die and another survive? So, to put it in a simple manner, [if you want to know in detail, I have written a book called Good Karma which you may refer] you have, let’s say a million desires out of which a handful are pressing for fulfilment. They are powerful and they want to be fulfilled. So, these 200 determine your present birth and one thing you are guaranteed during your lifetime is that these 200 will be fulfilled. Death cannot take place until these are fulfilled. But once the 200 are fulfilled, the next bundle of desires, let’s say 150 are now pressing for fulfilment but the nature and quality of these 150 is very different from the 200. So, there is a mismatch between the second bundle and your body and circumstances. These 150 cannot be fulfilled as you are. So, nature gives us an opportunity to start fresh. This is called the Death of Present body.
You move to another body which is more conducive to another set of circumstances and environment, more conducive for the next bundle of desires. Now during life, we have accessed to the 1 million, so you can add or take away from it, change the quality, upgrade them and also eliminate them and this is the power we have of free will that we need to deploy for our own growth, improvement, transformation into a towering personality, everyone of us has this potential. What matters is your commitment to your development, growth and then it is a matter of time. You transform completely from an ordinary person to an extra-ordinary. Many people in history have achieved that. Shri Ramakrishna Vivekananda’s guru was an ordinary person, illiterate by choice but he rose to highest level of perfection at the tender age of 29. There are several examples of people who have grown in sense of the term. An ordinary Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi became a Mahatma.
The question is, how do you that? You just deploy three methods – one, while acting, shift your attitude from taking, grabbing to giving, serving and adding value to others. That brings a magical difference in life as long as you are driven by the attitude of taking, your growth is stunted. You cannot achieve greatness with small thinking. You have to expand your thinking emotionally and you have to move from viewing people as different from you, separate from you which breeds competition, animosity, hatred and violence.
You know the entire battle of Mahabharata took place because of one man – Dhritarashtra, he saw differences between his own children and his brother’s children. One man brought about so much devastation. In modern times there was one Hitler who caused the death of millions of people because of his hatred. During the same time there was one Mahatma Gandhi who won victory over British without fighting a war. And that is the power of oneness that we need to cultivate.
The third thing, there is a poem called the Nightingale and the Glow Worm. So, the Nightingale had sung all night and was looking for food. Spotting the glow worm, she was about to pounce on the glow worm and consume it. When the glow worm saw nightingale, he quickly went out of reach but he addressed the nightingale and said
Did you admire my lamp,’ quoth he, ‘As much as I your minstrelsy, You would abhor to do me wrong, As much as I to spoil your song, For ‘twas the self-same power divine
Taught you to sing, and me to shine, That you with music, I with light, Might beautify and cheer the night.’ The ability to rise above differences and see oneness is a fantastic quality that helps us grow, never mind what happens to the other person.
The last thought I would like to leave you with is, everything in the world passes. It is temporary, it is impermanent and while we are going through this present crisis, if you retain that thought that yes it will pass but during that time let me do my best to combat it, to overcome it and to help others who are suffering. You will achieve the permanent. So, you then shift, your foundation shifts to the permanent and you watch the passing of the impermanent as life goes by.
ROTARIANS ASK
You said the theory of Karma can’t be proved which means that immediacy matters more than the future. So, how you will be able to prove it, to make people to do good Karma because that journey doesn’t seem to happen?
No, I did not say the theory of Karma, I said the law of karma which even science endorses that every action has an equal and opposite reaction. You can’t escape that; it is a law. What I said was a theory was the Theory of Re-incarnation for the simple reason, we are talking of Re-birth. That cannot be proven because memories obliterate after death and you are born with a clean slate. So, it can’t be proven but it can be concluded.
Yes, so, I can believe in re-incarnation but if you say your action will determine your future, naturally there is a cause and effect. You say good causes are good effect and bad causes are bad effects, that is where I am not able to get you.
It doesn’t happen only in the next life, you don’t have to believe in the theory of re-incarnation to understand and abide by the law of Karma. More than 90% of what is happening in this life time, you can connect the cause and effect.
How much of our Karma actually affects our destiny?
All of it, every thought, every action, affects destiny, it depends upon the power of the thought, emotion or action and how much of the past has an impact. It is a result. If you want to change your destiny quickly, you have to put a consistent effort in a positive direction and it has to be with all your mind and heart and soul, that has more power than the mechanical actions.
What Geeta says about Karma, Karmanye vadhikaraste Ma Phaleshu Kadachana, so, lord Krishna tells Arjun that your duty is to do Karma. Your duty is not to accept the fruits of Karma, the fruits are not because of what you have done. So, whatever you are saying is almost saying that you do good karma and you will get good things, so, in mind there is a bit of disconnect conceptually. Not that I disagree.
Secondly, when these desires no longer remain, does that mean re-incarnation stops?
See, I explained the Law of Karma but while at it when you understand that your present action is going to make a difference to your future then what Krishna says is correct that focus 100% on present action and while performing present action don’t think of the future because the future is unborn, you only have control over the present but the present impacts on the future. So, at the moment don’t think of the future but while planning and strategizing on your life’s activities, you have to take the law of karma into consideration and say okay if this is what I want, this is how I should act.
When all your desires are eliminated, then you reach the state of enlightenment that Buddha and Ramakrishna spoke of. So, you then go beyond the purview of the Law of Karma. Re-incarnation stops because it is the desires that drives re-incarnation. So, when you run out of fuel, re-incarnation stops.
We are going through this pandemic, what is your assessment, has the world learnt anything from this pandemic because we continue to remain territorial, there are so many issues and opportunities that this pandemic has given to reflect on our lives. What is your thought?
It is difficult to think of what is happening collectively because it depends on how individually a person responds to a challenge like this. As the saying goes, a wise man learns from other’s mistakes, a fool by his own, but there are some super-fools who don’t learn even from their own mistakes. So, there is a combination of different kind of people, there are some people who have learnt a lot and changed the course of their life and there are others who are trying to cheat the lockdown, go out and behave irresponsibly. So, it is a problem not only for them but other also. It is a question of learning the lessons in time, behaving responsibly and I think those of us who have this awareness must do our bit to tell others. Because, in our country, there is more ignorance, we have an added responsibility to make others more responsible.
In our daily lives, we come across various situations which, somehow, because of human nature, we are not able to overcome our anger. What is your perspective in a situation where you may be on the right court but somebody else is not, and that results in you reacting rather than responding?
Anger is nothing but desire obstruction. So, the desire may be positive, you may want to do good but when it is obstructed and you are not able to do what you want to do, the thought current that goes from you to the particular object gets deflected as anger towards the problem who is obstructing it. So, you have to look into the source of your anger and if you are generally an angry person, it is because you have too many desires that are frustrated. So, you have to tackle them first by letting your intellect scan your desires, figure out if you need to fulfil your desires, how do you go about fulfilling them. Then when you manage your desires, your agitation and anger come down. Then reduction of desires by picking up a higher desire. This we have been doing all our lives, this is how we keep moving towards adult.
So, move from physical to emotional. If I were to offer you the best chocolate in the world and you say you love chocolates but you don’t eat it and put it in your bag, I say, I thought you like chocolates, you say yes I love them but I am taking them home for my child. And when your child eats the chocolate without offering you a bite, you don’t feel deprived or frustrated, you glow with satisfaction because your emotional desire has been satisfied watching your child eat. Then you move towards intellectual, I have seen students move from here to US Universities, they go through all that because of their intellectual desire to get a Masters or a PhD. And then comes the spiritual. So, when we say rise above desire, it doesn’t mean don’t have object of desire. This is how it is, with this you tackle all your anger and differences.
There are people who are born just inherently with a bad nature, how do they earn good karma?
In this Law of Karma, it doesn’t matter how low your level is or how bad you are, what matters is are you moving in the right direction. It is like it doesn’t matter what your starting point is, you could be a Jewish real-estate [Chris Gardener] who went as a refugee to the US after WW2 but became a billionaire. So, what matters is what you do in the present consistently. So, move in the right direction, you will get there.
