Finding Our True Nature in Life
We all create a magnetic field of energy around us based on our attitude and goal of life. It is important that we discover the nature of this magnetic field, which is essentially our own true nature. The way to inner peace, the way to happiness, is through our own nature. When we accept our true nature, respect it, and then flow with it, our life is in balance. When we are aware and work with our true nature, we avoid creating unnecessary resistance. Our lives move forward more naturally and harmoniously.
We all travel through these natural states of the mind or gunas, as they are called in Yogic Philosophy. These natural states depend on the vibrational frequency or energy and the level of awareness of the individual seeker.
In Eastern thought, the gunas are defined as the three qualities of sattwa-purity, harmony; rajas-emotion, action; and tamas-inertia, darkness. In scientific research, scientists split the atom and find electrons, neutrons and protons. These are the basic blocks of the creative process, the fundamental elements, but the wonder of wonders is they appear to be representative of the three gunas: sattwa, rajas, and tamas. Stability and peace (sattwa), urge for action (rajas) and inertia or laziness (tamas).
We are all a mixture of these three energy states. When any one of these qualities is greater than the other, we experience disharmony and are out of balance. We think of a lazy person as a good for nothing. A hyperactive person is a menace, and a too good person is also a problem! Our challenge in life is to bring about a proportionate blending of the three so that our true nature in life is in balance and harmony.
The Key is to Be Awake and Aware
How do we do it? The key is awareness. To be alive is to be awake and aware. With awareness comes the balance and harmony of life. The key is to be aware of where we are in what part of the process in these various arenas of life. We, however, should never judge where we are or where we think another is. According to our individual nature, we tread one or the other path toward final unity. Everyone is unique and has his or her own path. But in order to understand ourselves more it is advantageous that we become more aware of which pattern dominates in our lives, as this self-knowledge can be most important in one’s day to day life, health, and relationships.
People from different walks of life each have their own problems and tendencies from whichever state they are manifesting at any given time: the sattwic, rajasic and tamasic. An example of how this affects our relationships is that it is human nature to get into the ego-rut where our mind, in an unconscious state, quite naturally feels at ease. Everyone wants to be important in this world. At the bottom of every individual’s mind, there is a beautiful child who wants full attention and credit. So, it is not easy to work together as a team or have family harmony when different members are manifesting different states. Therefore, understanding what state we are in or someone else is in at a particular time can make us more tolerant and loving towards each other and ourselves.
One of our greatest challenges as humans is when we are predominantly in the rajasic state, where we are thinking too much; thinking about what we could learn next, want next, have next, and do next. We think if we obtain these desires, we will then be happy! Thinking too much and addictive doing are creating the mess that we are in today. Driven by the rajasic tendencies of “doing,” man is now at the brink of forgetting the reality that we are not “human doings,” but more precisely “human beings.”
When we observe nature, we see that nature gives us only that which we already have and desire! Look around and see, those who are rich and have a lot, they are seeing opportunities opening every other day to add to their wealth. On the other hand, in the slums and streets of all our major cities and villages, the poor are just managing with the bare minimum. In most of the interior villages of the developing countries, we hardly see any changes for the better in the rural infrastructure.
Again, it is just each individual’s energy that is the bottom line! When one has, one will have more, when one does not have, then one has nothing. A rajasic person works hard and acquires, and then starts attracting more and more. A tamasic person lacks the zest, the vitality, and so does not attract the wealth that the universe wants to offer. The sattwic person, though they may resemble a tamasic person, has gone through both the tamasic and rajasic stages, and now is in a lofty position of balancing rajas and tamas in life. Sattwic people know when to work and when to rest. The rajasic person will bring the office and business home and work through the early hours of dawn–even work in his sleep! He keeps running, but knows not the destination. A heart attack robs his life. He attracts wealth and status, but not rest and peace.
How To Be Aware of Our True Nature
One of the best practices to learn one’s own nature is to sit on your bed before you fall asleep, do a body scan by becoming conscious about every part of the body and detoxify your body. Then watch your breath for a while, to bring the dimension of rhythm to the breaths. The magic of breath is when we become conscious and aware of our incoming and outgoing breaths, then its energy changes into deep healing chi or prana.
Once the body and mind are relaxed, and the breaths are balanced, watch your thoughts and see what is your dominant trait of the thoughts. You will, over days, find that there are certain thoughts that arise again and again, which point toward a particular tendency of your character, seen from the perspective of sattwa, rajas, and tamas. You can then know the simple fact of your own true nature, or natural tendencies. Once you know that, you walk that path toward your self-realization.
There is yet another aspect of these gunas. The wise say that each of these gunas are like chains that bind us, no matter what stage we are in. Tamas could be like an iron chain, rajas like a silver chain, and sattwa, a golden chain. Let us not forget that a chain made of gold still binds us. Hence, the eastern mystics and sages talk of the fourth stage, called the Turiye, which transcends all the three gunas. This stage is the ultimate stage, where all chains are broken and the soul is freed from the perception of good and bad, duality and multiplicity of existence. This is the ultimate holistic perception of life. The parts become the whole. At this stage, man becomes god, inseparable from the whole universe.
Our ultimate goal is to go through the tamasic state and the rajasic, but not get stuck there. As we move on, the sattwic state is waiting to give us a new peak in life, a silence, which is filled with peace, calm, balance, and harmony of life. When we strive to recognize and balance our rajasic and tamasic tendencies, and therefore know when to work and when to rest, then we enter the sattwic state of true being. The idea is to be free from all the unnaturalness as we move toward the pure natural state of balance and harmony, peace and beatitude.
True spirituality is indeed the journey back to the state of our own true nature. The soulful state. The state of pure bliss.
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About the Author
Shuddhaanandaa Brahmachari (Kolkata, India): Globally acclaimed motivational teacher (mindfulness meditation, stress reduction) author, peacemaker (Man of Peace Award 2012), Visionary social advocate; founded Lokenath Divine Life Mission, 1985. Serves thousands of poverty-stricken individuals in India. (Lifetime Achievement Award, House of Lords, UK, 2015)
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