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Truth, goodness, justice, and love avail little if the faculty of discrimination is discarded; this would be just like an unarmed soldier proceeding to the battlefield. 
- Swamiji

The last few weeks have been intense; as it seems with life, there is always an ebbing and flowing, and this ebbing and flowing has been all about karma yoga, the yoga of action or work. The truth is karma yoga is much more than the yoga of action or work; one can work all day and perform actions all day mindlessly, go to bed the same person, and wake up the same person, but real karma yoga is about ego change, remember the soul never needs to change. Karma yoga is about doing our actions skillfully and joyfully, which puts a twist on everything because to think is actually to act. We must remember how we think when performing our duties, leading us to act skillfully and joyfully or ineptly and miserably; the choice is yours; no one can control your mind. That is on YOU! Consider this: there has never been a war started that did not first begin with a thought, and there has never been a sexual act performed that did not first begin with an idea; these are just two examples of how our thoughts dictate our outward actions, and taint the way we perform our actions. We may be performing an action that, by the social media world, looks to be an act that is compassionate and caring, but inside our hearts and minds, there is a raging war of hate. For example, suppose I volunteer at a soup kitchen serving the homeless every Saturday (and I'm sure to post it on all social media outlets). Yet, while I am serving, I think these people are disgusting; they stink, they are lazy, and they could get a job and have a home. To the world, I look like a caring, compassionate person, but inside, I'm seething with hate and disgust; this is a perilous game we play because there is no harmony in our thoughts, speech, and actions. One of the many ways we walk on the razor's edge. On some level, that person feels our sentiments, and at the same time, we are increasing our hate and anger by being in the soup kitchen. It would be better not to serve at the soup kitchen than to create more anger and disgust in your heart. We must be skillful with our actions and learn to do them selflessly; then, we are treading the path of karma yoga. We must understand ourselves better to perform our actions with love and selflessness, and yoga gives us the tools to do just that; remember, we must become fully human before becoming divine. Yoga allows us to understand our thoughts, which means we can understand our actions and learn how to behave more skillfully.

In reality, most of our actions are dominated by our thoughts, so to understand our actions, we must understand our thoughts, and yoga gives us the means to do that. What controls and creates our thoughts? Our emotions. We have six main emotional streams they are desire (kama), anger (krodha), pride (mada), attachment, jealousy (matsarya), greed (lobha), and the sense of I-am-ness or delusion (moha). These six streams of emotions come from our four primitive urges: food, sex, sleep, and self-preservation. Since many of our thoughts are controlled by our emotions, reason follows feeling; let's examine the word thought more. Have you ever heard of Chitta Vrittis? Chitta is one of the four functions of the mind; it is the storehouse of impressions in this life and our previous lives. Vritti means whirlpool, so chitta vritti could mean the whirlpools of impressions in this life and our previous lives. Consider that, for a moment, it is a holy shit thought. How many millions of incorrect impressions do we have stored? That can feel daunting, but consider this. Our minds are so clever that the mind loops similar impressions with similar impressions, so we only need to break through whirlpools of impressions or thinking patterns; this feels much more manageable than trying to understand each impression.

The six streams of emotion are:

Kama (desire)

With the six streams of emotion and the four fountains in mind, I have much to consider concerning my karma. By karma, I mean my actions and maneuvering in the ebbing and flowing of life. I try to live my life in a way that does not make me a victim and does not allow me to fall into a victim mentality; this means I must take responsibility for all that is happening in my life because it is happening for me, not to me. The last few months have seen an increase on my already full plate. I have found myself with an increase in the number of temp jobs on my plate. I could list them, but there is no point as the temp jobs that have been giving me the most to look at are dealing with the TYS website and Social media platforms. Over the last few months, I have been learning about SEO (search engine optimization), editing, and redesigning the TYS website. If you have spent time around me, you quickly realize I would rather spend my allotment of time doing other things besides social media and website development, but here I am, and let me say I am forever grateful that the days of writing code for a website are over which has made my newest temp job so much easier but not without its own set of demons for me to look at, there is no distinction between "my life" and the teachings of yoga. I am here to learn about myself and work with my ego, not to subdue it into submission but to understand it so I can make the changes that make me more human and step into my divinity at some point on this journey.

I do not want to squander this existence and return to the same monotonous existence repeatedly; every day, I receive beautiful opportunities to practice what I preach (this makes sense if you have taken a yoga class with me). Remember, our thoughts are tightly woven with our emotions and our four primitive urges, all ways to examine our ego and our vrittis. As far as the four primitive urges go, food, sex, sleep, and self-preservation, the first three have been great. We eat very well in these parts; I sleep like a baby, and sex with Riley is excellent (we are householders!) It is the last self-preservation that has been giving me the go-around; I'm not worried that updating a website or posting on Instagram will kill me, but the self-preservation of protecting my ego has been the challenging component. I must protect the ego or the I-amness, and when this ego rears its ugly little head, you better believe the six emotions are not far behind. We must protect what we think is ours; this could be our false identification with being ill-equipped to handle something or pride in thinking we are more valuable than we are. I wonder whether I am equipped to handle the world of technology, meaning what if I am not smart enough? What if I can't do it? What if it doesn't look right? What if I make mistakes? After living in the what-ifs for a few days, I could feel myself becoming agitated (krodha), that sense of protecting my not knowing something from others (what if they see it as a weakness), and my strong desire to do it right and succeed at it. After one of my morning practices, I realized precisely what I was doing. I had slipped from gratitude into frustration and was not doing my duties joyfully or for the right reasons; how could I call this selfless service? One of my strongest desires is to serve Swamiji and the tradition, and I was not doing that at all; how could I? I was caught up in my disturbed mind of "what-ifs" and " can-nots."

I began to focus on what is fantastic in my life, and I have a lot of fantastic in my life; that began to reset my mind so that I could look at what I was doing differently. Firstly, I am working on a website for my teacher; how wonderful it allows me to examine what is on the website, remove what no longer needs to be there, rewrite and add more of what is required, and add things that are not on there so that it can be of greater service to others (Sanskrit dictionary, asana gallery). What a golden opportunity to consider what I don't know and be okay with it. Fuck that is a pretty sweet deal. Shouldn't I be excited instead of worrying about what I don't know? I have a functioning brain that will allow me to learn precisely what I am supposed to understand and know in this lifetime; now, this takes the pressure off. Secondly, I don't have to write code; that makes it much easier! Thirdly, I have a life where I can dedicate myself to becoming a better person; I'm not struggling in so many ways that others are woe is me if I don't take advantage of the opportunities I've been given in this lifetime and examining those things that trigger my I-amness is a big one. What if I don't know something? What if I can't do something? What if it is imperfect (if I have tried my best)? What if I fail? None of it matters if I have done my best so that I can surrender the fruits of the actions. If I always protect my ego, I will never be able to grow and change and become a better human. For now, I'm done feeding the mindset that I am not good enough or smart enough. I have precisely what is required to succeed; that might change tomorrow, and I might have to start back at stating everything I have to be grateful for, but right now, I am grateful and feel like I am enough!

In loving-service,

Ranjani