Natural Attributes

14.5 Material nature consists of the three modes: goodness, passion and ignorance.

When the living entity comes in contact with nature, it becomes conditioned by these modes.

14.6 O Sinless One, the mode of goodness, sattva, being purer than the others, is illuminating, and it frees one from all sinful reactions.

Those situated in that mode develop knowledge, but they become conditioned by the concept of happiness.

14.7 Arjuna, know that the mode of passion, rajas, is characterized by intense craving and is the source of desire and attachment.

Rajas binds the living entity by attachment to work.

14.8 Know, O Arjuna, that the mode of ignorance, tamas, the deluder of the living entity, is born of inertia.

Tamas binds the living entity by carelessness, laziness, and excessive sleep.

Material nature consists of three modes or attributes: goodness, passion and ignorance. These are called gunas in Sanskrit. This translation is incomplete because there are no relevant English words for sattva, rajas and tamas. We do not have the right word for guna. We cannot aptly translate these words into English. When the eternal living Entity comes in contact with nature, He becomes conditioned by these modes.

We may say that these are the different ways people behave; as the phrase goes, it is the good, the bad and the ugly.

Krishna explains how we are caught in three different mental setups; we operate through three different types of engraved memories. One is sattva, the other is rajas and the third is tamas. These are translated as goodness, passion and ignorance; however, these are not exact translations.

Let me explain these concepts: Sattva refers to the engrams or engraved memories or samskaras that leads us to bliss. These engraved memories lead us to joy and ecstasy. Rajas refers to the engraved memories that lead us to restlessness, excitement and to work intensely. They make us active and materially productive. The third attribute, tamas, means the engraved memories that lead us to depression, laziness and to dullness. Engraved memories that lead to ecstasy and bliss form sattva, engraved memories that lead to restlessness, anger and emotional imbalance form rajas, and engraved memories that lead to depression, dullness and low moods form tamas.

A small example:

We are like passengers riding in a car. Slowly we become lost in thoughts. After a while, we suddenly recall a person or place that disturbs us. The moment the mind feels disturbed, we come back to awareness. Sometimes, we say, 'I should not think about it; let me think of something else.' Sometimes we speak these words aloud. We may make gestures.

The driver may look back and say, 'What happened? What are you doing?'

When we are lost in thoughts and a memory arises that makes us depressed, dull or disturbed, we suddenly come back to awareness. We ask ourselves, 'What am I thinking?'

Sometimes we say it aloud, 'I should not think about this. Oh God, what am I doing? I should think of something else.' Sanskrit has a beautiful word for engraved memories: samskaras.

Those engraved memories that automatically arise and lead to depression are called tamas.

Sometimes a thought suddenly comes up, 'I will not let him off so easily. I will see that he learns a lesson. I will not let him go.' We may unexpectedly make an angry gesture with our hands while engrossed with this thought.

Engrams that make us active or cause anger or violence and imbalance are called rajas. We are normally caught between rajas and tamas. Very rarely do we get sattvic engrams. Sattvic engrams do not disturb us. They give rise to a memory of deep bliss or joy that we have experienced. For example, if we come here everyday, the moment it is 4:30 pm, an engram like this may come up, 'Oh, yesterday the discourse was wonderful. The meditation was beautiful. I should go today as well.'

However, if it is 4.30 pm, instead of that sattvic engram, we typically get the engram to eat a snack or drink a cup of coffee!

If we are pulled inwards, if we are made to do something good that leads to bliss, ecstasy and peace of mind, it is due to engraved memories of sattva, sattvic memories or sattvic engrams. If we go to the Himalayas for a few days, we may experience joy and peace. Then later when we see pictures of a mountain, the memory of the Himalayan experience suddenly comes up and we think, 'Oh I should spend a couple of months in the Himalayas. It was so peaceful.' Engrams that lead us to peace, bliss and ecstasy are sattvic engrams.

These three different types of engraved memories or samskaras rule our entire life. Knowledge of these engraved memories is the basic knowledge that must be possessed by anyone who wants to live successfully. The Vedic science of health and wellness, Ayurveda, is structured around the concept of gunas and their effect on our body-mind system.

It is like an owner's manual for the person who has a mind. Without an owner's manual, when we use a product, either we miss the whole thing, or we miss the knowledge of many of the product's applications and features.

There are so many uses and features of a computer. Even the humble calculator has hundreds of applications that we are unaware of. We may use the calculator for basic features like addition and subtraction; however, we may not take advantage of its other applications. In the same way, if we don't have and don't know the owner's manual of the mind, we do not use it the way we ought to or to its full potential.

Understanding the three different engraved memories or samskaras is the operating manual of the mind*.* Krishna calls it, gunatrayavibhaga yoga. When we don't comprehend this manual, we are not able to catch the whole understanding of life. We miss so many opportunities. Because we have never learned or understood about the gunas, we live only a very small fraction of what's possible in life. We miss the beauty and potential of life when we don't have the owner's manual.

Why should we know about these samskaras? What is the use? How will it help us? We should know them because they are the owner's manuals of the mind. At the outset, samskaras are not dead memories. Here once again we don't have the correct translation of samskaras in English.

We can never understand or fully appreciate Shakespeare's work in another language. If we read the translations of Shakespeare, at the most we will understand what Shakespeare was trying to express. However, we will never understand how he expressed it or the depths that he reached. If we want to enjoy Shakespeare, we must read it in the original language and not today's spoken English. In the same way, if we want to understand these great truths, we must know a little Sanskrit.

When I ask people to learn a bit of Sanskrit they think I'm trying to spread the language. I say, 'No, for spirituality, a little knowledge of Sanskrit helps you understand many technical terms.'

Let me give the exact meaning or the idea expressed by the word samskara.

Samskara is not any dead engraved memory. It is an engraved memory that is alive and active. It has the power to pull us down and make us travel the same path again and again. Usually the word memory is understood as a dead record; however, samskara is not a dead record. It is not dead memory. It is not like the memory of a computer where pictures and word documents are stored. No. Samskaras have the power to pull us down repeatedly and to make us walk the same path over and over. We end up going in dead-end circles.

Samskaras automatically attract us, call us and make us travel the same path. Then, when we do walk down the same path, the engraving becomes even deeper and those memories get further entrenched. Modern science understands this fact. Experiments have shown that repeated emotional experiences create more receptors for that emotion being developed in the brain. Physically, physiologically, the more anger outbursts you have, the more anger receptors your brain develops. This is a horrifying thought but it's true. The great rishis, the inner scientists have known this for thousands of years.

If certain emotions are not expressed, the corresponding brain parts or receptors degenerate and die. So, the more we manage to stay out of negative emotions, the less they bother us. On the contrary, the more we indulge, the more our brain demands the same indulgence. This is the cause of addictions. Our entire life is ruled by samskaras.

Samskaras are living memories, not dead memories. The more we travel with these memories, the more we live with these memories; the more they become a part of our being. They take up residence in deeper levels of our consciousness. They get embedded. They are engraved into our brain structure.

Krishna explains step-by-step how we become caught in these three levels of memories and how, again and again, we are pulled and pushed by these memories. It is almost like having three wives. If we have one woman in our life, enlightenment is a luxury. If we have two women, enlightenment is an option. If we have three women in our life, enlightenment is compulsory! With three wives, or husbands, one cannot live without enlightenment.

Someone asked me, 'Why did Krishna have so many girlfriends?' I answered, 'This is solid proof that He is enlightened! The fact that He survived despite having so many girlfriends is evidence of enlightenment. No doubt, that is also solid proof that He is God. Only God can manage so many women!'

Here, He gives us an understanding of how to live with these engraved memories. Another important point is that these memories are living energies and they are not dead. Because these are living energies, they can be used for bad deeds or good deeds.

When a person has energies to do bad deeds, we can tap into those energies and make him do good deeds. From my experiences of conducting meditation programs in prisons, no one puts in as much effort and goes into such deep meditation as a prisoner. We conduct meditation programs in prisons. They are so involved and go into meditation more deeply in comparison to people outside. When prisoners take up meditation, they really take it up. They are intense. They don't do anything half-heartedly. When they are transformed, their whole life is transformed!

If we look at the lives of Hindu rishis, Valmiki in South Bharat, the great saint Arunagirinadhar and many others were sinners. However, a dramatic change happened and a cognitive shift took place in their being. The cognition usually happens in the way that our mind receives data, processes it and delivers the result. Once the cognitive shift takes place, we receive data, process it and go inside instead of outside. As long as we react externally, we are working towards depression. However, once we go in, we move into bliss.

For example, the death of someone close to us, our near and dear, can lead us to the spiritual path or to frustration. We can think, 'Anyway, I am also going to die, so l should do what I want to.' Or we can decide, 'I too will die some day. Let me learn what I can and grow.'

A small story:

A person was about to be hanged. The officer on duty asked him if he had any last wishes. The prisoner said, 'No.' The officer said, 'You can pray to God. You can ask forgiveness and ask for His blessing. We can bring in a priest.'

The prisoner said, 'I want to remember God, but not in the way you suggest. Had I known earlier I would be executed for these crimes, I would have committed a few more sins.'

The prisoner continued, 'If I had known that I was going to be hanged, I would have committed more sins. So if I pray, I will ask God why He didn't let me know earlier that I was going to be hanged. I don't need a priest for that.'

When some people understand that death is ultimate, they think, 'Death is the ultimate so let me work towards the Divine, achieve God, or realize atman.' Others react differently, 'Anyway we are going to die. Let us do whatever we want and live the way we want to.' One group takes the path of meditation and the other takes the path of the outer world. The path we choose is up to us.

Engrams are living energies. Through engrams we can choose to suffer and torture ourselves again and again. Or we can make our life a blissful experience. If we know the science of how these engraved memories happen in our being and how they can transform our being, we can take the help of these engraved memories to achieve eternal Consciousness, eternal bliss in our being.

Krishna explains how engraved memories disturb our mind and through this understanding, we can transform our being.

Before explaining these verses, let me present a small diagram through which we can understand how engrams affect our decisions and how to come out of the influence of engrams. I have given a basic understanding of this diagram elsewhere, but let me repeat it so that we can connect with samskaras.

Please understand how we receive information or data from the outer world, how we process it and how we make decisions. First, we see something through the eyes. I have taken the example of the eyes but we can replace with any other sense: ears, nose, taste or touch. Among these five jnanendriya (senses of perception), any one of them can be used here.

There are five jnanendriya and five karmendriya (senses of action) that are the means of communication between the external world and us. Jnanendriya are the senses of perception, the five senses of smell, taste, sight, touch and hearing. The karmendriya are five actions of elimination, procreation, locomotion, grasping and speaking. Each indriya, karmendriya and jnanendriya, is related to one of the energy centers (chakras) in our mind-body system. For instance, locomotion is related to the manipuraka chakra, and the energy of fire.

We can take any of the five jnanendriya to replace the eyes in this example. Through the eyes we see a scene. Let us take the example of this situation, the scene of this

Part 2: Bhagavad Gita, Commentary by THE SUPREME PONTIFF OF HINDUISM BHAGAWAN SRI NITHYANANDA PARAMASHIVAM - Chapter 14 - Drop your Samskaras

discourse. You see me talking to you. First your eye captures this whole scene like a picture and this picture goes to chakshu (energy behind eyes). Understand, we don't see with the eye, we see through the eye. There is an energy that is inside or behind the eye that sees. There is an energy inside or behind the ears that hears. Ears by themselves cannot hear. That is why when we read a book, we may not hear the alarm or doorbell ring. If we are reading, we may not know if our spouse walks into the room. Of course if it is late at night, all wives know when their husbands sneak into the house, that is different!

A small story:

A man goes to the police station to meet a thief who had burglarized his home the previous night and taken all the cash. The officer on duty refuses to allow him to meet the thief saying, 'You cannot talk to him now. You can meet him in court tomorrow." The man pleads, 'I don't want to disturb him. All I want to know is how he entered my home without waking up my wife? I have been trying to do this for years and have not been able to do it! How did he manage?'

So there is energy inside the eyes that sees. We call this energy chakshu. The whole scene is converted into a file like a digital signal processor in a computer so that our mind can process the data.

The chakshu is almost like the digital signal processor or the DSP in electronic systems. If we are to work on sound or light or photograph, it must be first converted into a digital file. In a computer, whether it is an audio or visual file, it must be converted into a digital file. In the same way in our system, whatever we see or hear is converted into a bio-signal file like a digital file. This conversion happens in this chakshu area.

Then the file starts moving up, step-by-step. The file goes to the part of the mind called chitta (memory). If we understand this, our whole life can be transformed. We will know where and how we react. We will realize how we make big decisions based upon our assumptions and consequently suffer.

This is what happened in the story where the teacher imagined that alcohol was the leaking liquid from her gift and tasted it without thinking. We can understand how these mistakes happen by analyzing this diagram.

The file goes to chitta, the place where past memories are collected. Of course, all these places are connected to memories; however, this area is where the work of excluding happens. When the file reaches this place, the excluding process starts - Na iti, Na iti - this is not, this is not. Neti Neti (this is not, this is not) takes place in this area. Upon seeing this file, our chitta starts eliminating what the object is not.

Take the example of this scene: First you see me, the whole scene is photographed. It goes to chakshu and becomes a bio-signal file. The file is then taken to chitta. Chitta says, 'This is not a tree. This is not an animal. This is not a plant. This is not this. This is not that.' The excluding process happens in chitta.

It is like searching for the word 'cow' in a dictionary. You first eliminate all other letters to reach 'c'. Then you search for 'o' and eliminate all other letters. Then you reach 'w' by eliminating all other letters. In this manner, you reach the word 'cow'. This is how chitta works.

Next, the file goes to manas, another part of the mind. The manas tries to positively identify, 'This is a human being. He is wearing a saffron robe. He is standing on a stage.' The identification process*, 'iti, iti'* (this is it, this is it) identification process happens in manas. In chitta, 'netineti' or the 'not this, not this', elimination happens.

Once this positive identification happens, the file goes to a third part of the mind called buddhi or the intelligence. Buddhi is where the trouble starts. Here the analysis starts, 'How am I related to this file? How am I connected to this scene? How is it relevant to me? How should I respond to this scene?'

If past memories about me have been good or pleasant according to your buddhi, you respond in a positive way. You immediately refer to those memories and review, 'It was so good at yesterday's discourse.' Your buddhi refers to the past memory and makes a decision based upon past experiences. If past experiences with me have been positive, your buddhi tells you to stay and listen. If past experiences have been unpleasant and you felt bored, your buddhi tells you that this is not a place for you and that you should leave. These are logical decisions based on conscious memories retained by your mind.

Up to this point, transmission of what is perceived by the senses and what is registered by the mind is relatively straightforward. It is a conscious process. I explained earlier about conscious and unconscious minds. Psychologists talk about a subconscious mind as well. This does not exist. This is a term used to further confuse you.

Mind specialists know that ninety percent of all that we sense goes into an unknown, unconscious zone and we are unaware of what we sense. It is a leap into an abyss. It is a quantum leap into our dark unconscious mind. There is no logic to this leap. This is shocking, but true. As a corollary, ninety percent of what we process mentally happens in an unaware state of the unconscious. The conscious mind is just the tip of an iceberg. Ninety percent is below the surface. We do not see it. We do not sense it and we do not use it.

One problem with this is that it results in a colossal waste. The good news is that in it we have a great potential. Even if we awaken another ten percent of this unconscious mind, the power of our mind can be doubled. Just imagine what can happen. Everyone will be an Einstein. We can also learn to put that extra mind capacity to good use.

If the processing of sensory data is stopped at this conscious level, at buddhi, we make decisions on the conscious level by using our intellect. This is not bad; however, it is limiting because the conscious mind is still only ten percent of the total mind capacity. This is what we call intellect-based decision-making. These decisions are based on logic and rationale. We are proud of this achievement. The French philosopher Descartes said, 'I think therefore I am.' He didn't realize that he limited his potential to only ten percent. What a sad state and tragic fate!

However, what is in store for most of us is far worse. Because of the limited capacity of our conscious mind, nature wires us to use our unconscious mind to decide many things. Unfortunately this unconscious mind is a conditioned mind. It is full of engraved memories, beliefs and value systems drilled into us from childhood. All that parents and elders have taught us plus all that we have been force-fed by religion and society from a deeply impressionable age are stored in this vault that is never open to us. It opens on its own when it chooses to, especially in moments of stress and trauma. Just as viruses and bacteria attack when our immune system is down, the virus of engrams and samskaras influence us when our emotional systems are weakened.

Samskaras do not collect only during this lifetime. The mental attitudes are carried over from previous births. Neural scientists tell us about the part of our brain called the reptilian brain that stores memories of our evolution from marine and amphibian creatures. Religions may not accept this, yet science does.

From the conscious mind, the information is passed to the unconscious region of the mind, the ego.

I call this unconscious region of the mind ego not because it is arrogant, but because it provides you the

identity of who you are. The word 'ego' is derived from a Greek word that means 'a mask'. Your identity is a mask you wear. It is not you.

Your identity stems from your unconscious. You project who you wish to be, never who you are. You do not even know who you are. Who you are is deeply buried in your unconscious. All the major decisions that shape your life are consigned to this unconscious zone. This is the repository of all those emotionally filled memories and beliefs about yourself, which constitute what you are and therefore, create your identity. This is what I call the ego.

The conscious mind does not make important decisions. It makes a few decisions that can be reached by its limited intellect. Anything important moves to the unconscious ego. It is well-known that our unconscious handles all life-threatening situations, the so-called flightor-fight decisions. Our conscious mind is too slow to handle them.

Let us go back to the incident of you watching me here. The problem arises if your conscious mind does not make a direct decision. If you have had past experiences with other persons wearing saffron robes, you will have engrams about that experience. You will not bother to see who this person is. You decide based on that memory, 'No, with that Master I suffered like this; with some other Master, I suffered like that.' It will be a generalized memory. You make a decision based on your past collected samskaras.

That is where we create trouble. When decisions are made with a straight understanding, there is no major problem. However, most of the time we collect and react based on engrams that are unrelated to each other.

For example, you see someone wearing a white dress. You may have been hurt in the past by someone wearing a white dress. The moment you see a white dress, the memory comes back even if you don't want it to. If we are abused or disrespected in a house, the memory comes up automatically the next time we visit that house, even if the person who did it is not there. We experience the same feeling, feel depressed and go into a low mood.

We connect and associate things with places, with triggers, with memories and put them into memory files. We are not able to work spontaneously. We must rely on some technique, some method to reduce our processing work. Naturally, we opt for some kind of arrangement in our memory. Consequently, we miss out on real life.

Only in the first few days of marriage do we respond spontaneously to our spouse. Then within the first few months of living with our spouse, we form a clear idea about him or her. After that, we don't live with our spouse. We live with our imagination of the spouse. We live with our understanding of him or her. After that, whatever our spouse does is wrong. We come to a predetermined conclusion that the spouse is always wrong. If our spouse does something right, we say that it happened by mistake.

After a few months, we come to a conclusion about the other person. We create an engram related to them

based on our judgment. After that, we judge whatever he or she does through the filter of the engram, or engraved memory. Sometimes we create engraved memories in our system based on experiences that others have or from media influences.

A small story:

A funeral procession slowly makes its way down the road. A man is walking two bulldogs as he moves along ahead of the body of the dead woman. There's a long queue of people following slowly behind him.

An onlooker observes the number of people in this procession and thinks, 'She must have been a famous woman.' He approaches the man with the bulldogs and asks, 'Who is the dead lady?'

The man replies, 'She was my mother in law.'

The onlooker asks if the two dogs were the dead woman's pets. The man replies, 'No. They attacked and killed her.'

'Killed her?' the onlooker asks. 'Yes,' says the man. The onlooker asks, 'Can I borrow the dogs for two days?'

The man points to the people following him and says, 'Join the queue.'

We have collected so many memories that we never relate to people as they are. We only relate with the preconceived memory we have of the person.

People ask me, 'Master, is our life pre-destined or open to free will?' The more engrams we have, the more our life is pre-destined. This is because we will go along the same route. The fewer engrams we have, the more freedom we enjoy.

The number of samskaras determines whether we have free will or if our life is pre-destined. For example, the file travels to the ego, and the ego gives the decision, and we execute it. If there are more engrams, the file travels to every table like in a bureaucratic office. Each engram stamps, puts its signature and writes its opinion.

Take the example of attending at this discourse and seeing me. One engram says, 'I had a Master in my life. He was a blessing. He helped me a lot. I think I should sit here.' So this engram signs, 'Yes, I will sit here.' The next engram says, 'I read in newspapers that these Masters do this or do that.' There is enough written in the press, especially in South Bharat, where being abusive to Masters is fashionable. So, the second engram signs off saying, 'doubt'. Then the file goes to the next table, and the third engram says, 'I attended his discourse yesterday. What he says makes sense, I think I should sit.' This engram signs, 'yes'.

The file reaches the ego. Ego comes to a conclusion based on all the 'yes' responses and all the 'no' responses. Yes or no is not a problem; however, we have wasted so much time and energy in this small decision. For example, when we sit in our office, not doing anything, just sitting and worrying, we become stressed. Within fifteen minutes, we have pain in our shoulders.

Worrying about simple decision-making leads to shoulder pain. The more engrams, the more restless and rajasic we will be.

People with many engrams never relax. People with stress cannot sit quietly. So much physical movement and physical restlessness is due to many decisions taking place inside their unconscious. This space between the buddhi and ego is the unconscious mind. Because we do not know what happens here, we don't know how many blocks are here. It is like an Hindu Government office. There may be three hundred tables occupied by people who must sign off as a bureaucrat to approve a decision. The file must move through three hundred tables to get approved. When it will move, who will sign what, and what the final result will be, neither we know nor God knows.

The conscious zone is like an honest office. I don't know what example to give of such an office! I don't think there are any relevant examples. This is a straightforward process and politics are not involved in the conscious area. Politics starts in the unconscious area.

According to the data collected at the conscious level, we know smoking is injurious to health. According to simple, straightforward data that we have assimilated, we know smoking is injurious to health; however, when the time comes, suddenly many decide to smoke.

How does the file take such a quantum leap? How is the decision totally changed? When the file travels to the unconscious area, engrams say, 'No, no! The last time I smoked, I felt really good, I felt relieved from all the stress.'

If we want to eliminate stress, wear a tight shoe instead of smoking. When we wear a tight shoe, we forget other worries. Smoking and wearing a tight shoe are the same. By smoking, we try to forget. By creating bigger problems, we try to forget the smaller problems. The same applies to wearing tight shoes. If we wear tight shoes, we automatically forget smaller worries.

Here, in the unconscious area, all the past memories reside: 'I smoked. I felt good. I felt relieved. All the stress disappeared.' We suddenly make a decision that we did not want to make because of these unconscious memories.