Krishna’s 3 must-dos for modern citizens!
By Vivek Sharma
Krishna stresses the need for harmonic actions and says they are not to be given up. What are harmonic actions? The ones which are in line with the cosmic continuity. What is cosmic continuity? The sun gives out light and energy. The earth gives it the water in vapoury atomic form and uses its light and energy to further life-cycles. The moon gathers its light and plays a complementary role in nourishing whatever there is on the earth. This cooperative action, or give and take of energy in a progressive way is called harmonic action.
Point To Ponder
This is the principle on which every activity—personal, social and global —needs to be carried out, according to Krishna. Leave everything else but don’t give up three major actionable forms of this principle. (a) Yagya (b) Dan (c ) Tap.
Yagya is basically converting raw energy into finer one. The finer one is more potent and growth oriented. This is what exactly you must/do in the kitchen while cooking. The raw energy is in the form of raw vegetables. They are cooked in such a way that their energies convert into finer and more potent forms. They should complement, supplement and replenish our body-mind system instead of turning it into a storehouse of toxins. The modern kitchen and the cooks have forgotten the art of progressive conversion of energy —wherein a small bite is worth a million bites of energy.The same way our body converts a form of raw energy into finer and more potent one. This too is called yagya. Yogis of the yore knew this art and were physically, mentally and emotionally the power house of infinite energy. Like the sun they radiated their energies all around and shared with the earth, the plants and the animals, even the inanimate objects.
Interlinking Harmony
This ego-less sharing is called dan. Sharing what you have for a larger benefit finally helps in making a healthy society. Tap is basically a self-effort for personal excellence. Everybody is naturally inclined to attain some excellence in some work, idea or thing he believes in. Tap is necessary to keep the yagya going on within and without. Tap is the process wherein you further refine and focus your energies to achieve your goal of excellence. Tap can be visualised as the fire aflame. To keep it aflame, you put raw material into it. The fire converts anything that you pour into it into itself and remains aflame. It gives out light, heat and energy inside and outside too. In fact, tap is the first activity of yagya. The sun is called tapswin too in Sanskrit, because it is engaged in the tap at the individual level which promotes the yagya and dan by converting the energy and sharing it with others around.
This is the reason why Krishna says in Discourse 18, Shloka 5, यज्ञदानतपः कर्म न त्याज्यं कार्यमेव तत्। The Energy conversion Yagya), Dan (welfare sharing) and tap (effort for personal excellence) are not to be given up, they should be carried out as a principle of life.
What To Give Up?
Only disharmonic actions. What are they? Anything which is against the principle detailed above. Tap for self-excellence without yagya is as bad as a blackhole imploding! Any selfish effort is just degenerative, constrictive and against the law of progressive energy conversion. Instead of finer energy, you then will just accumulate grosser and toxic waste within and without. That is exactly what we are doing today. Look at the Yamuna, some selfish industrialists have ruined it and turned the fine flowing water energy into a toxic chemical. Look what we have done with the air. We have polluted it so much so that we have almost destroyed oxygen and now have not collected toxic waste hanging in the air all around. If this continued further, everything will implode and we will have no life. This combustion will be much mightier and more powerful than a nuclear explosion. So watch out! Remember and practise the three actions as Krishna says.