August 10, 2025 • 49 mins
Join Kamala Rose and Nischala Joy Devi as they dive deep into the profound teachings of Karma Yoga from the Bhagavad Gita. In this enlightening podcast, these experienced yoga practitioners unravel the mysteries of karma, offering practical insights into:
- The true nature of karma beyond Western interpretations
- How spiritual practices can transform personal and collective energy
- The role of meditation in understanding our deeper motivations
- Overcoming fear and expanding consciousness
- The interconnectedness of individual actions and universal experience
Drawing from decades of study and personal practice, Rose and Devi provide a compassionate, feminine perspective on spiritual growth. Learn how small, mindful actions can create ripple effects of positive change, and discover how you can use yoga and meditation to evolve your understanding of karma.
Whether you're a seasoned practitioner or new to spiritual exploration, this podcast offers transformative wisdom for navigating life's challenges with grace and intention.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Kamala Rose (00:00):
Namaste, friends.
Thank you for joining us for awoman's Gita Podcast. I'm
Nischala Joy Devi (00:05):
Kamala rose and I'm Nisha la joy. Davey.
Kamala Rose (00:10):
Thanks to our listeners and subscribers for
hanging with us for our dialogsin the Gita today, we're
starting our second season of awoman's Gita podcast, beginning
by delving into chapter three,karma yoga. If you've been
(00:31):
listening to our deep dive intochapter two, we've covered a lot
of ground. Getting here, you'vecovered a lot of the foundations
of the Bhagavad Gita and the thephilosophical orientation right
chapter two is often a placewhere, quite frankly, a lot of
(00:52):
people get off on their readingof the Gita. They just can't
quite understand how thedifferent threads weave together
in a meaningful way. And this iswhere nishala and I are hoping
to help our listeners from ourlong time study of the Gita
together. We probably havestudied this for over 50 years
(01:15):
together, and today we'd like tooffer some insights into Karma
Yoga chapter three, where we'recoming from from chapter two and
chapter one, and how we can makethe Bhagavad Gita meaningful to
us in this modern age as Westernwomen who are encountering a
(01:36):
kind of manly man, sort of text,how we can make it our own and
take the gems of yogic wisdominto our daily lives.
Nischala Joy Devi (01:49):
I think one of the things that I keep
hearing from people is amisinterpretation of karma. This
is something that is not reallypresent in the western society
like it is in the easternteachings. And because of that,
(02:11):
we're so used to, I think, inour society, the duality of
crime and punishment, or actionand punishment, or whatever that
is that we're used to thenegative instead of looking at
the positive. And then what wedo is we then take that and put
(02:35):
it onto karma, which is a verydifferent concept. And I think
the idea of karma is is really aneutral energy that is
propelling us and also pushingus both at the same time, from
the past karma, or the pastincarnations, into the forward
(02:55):
incarnation. I think one of theproblems is we see life as as
the It begins at birth and itends at death, physical death of
the body, when we don't realizethat's just a parenthesis,
there's something that comesbefore it, and there's something
that goes after it. And if wecan understand that, that it's a
(03:17):
continuum, we understand karma alittle bit better, because it's
not just something that we donow. So for instance, I think
the simplistic way of looking atit is my brother punched me in
the shoulder, and then he wentand fell down the steps and hurt
his shoulder, so that we wouldsay, Okay, that was his karma.
(03:40):
To bring it to a very mundanelevel, but when we look at it
from a higher level, we see thisis what is teaching us, the
lessons that we that our soulneeds, not necessarily the body
and the mind, but really whatour soul needs to continue,
raising up, moving upward onthis journey of incarnation, and
(04:05):
that's the main thing. It is sooften we talk about, and also in
the Yoga Sutras, when it talksabout the pain that is yet to
come, that is avoidable, when wetalk about karma, this is also
by doing the practices, andwe'll get into the main practice
of karma, of of incarnation andkarma in a moment. But we have
(04:33):
to understand it's a continuum.
It's not a stop and go.
Kamala Rose (04:39):
And this is really a deep dialog in eastern
thinking. I think what youbrought up that when we're
looking in the binary terms ofcrime and punishment, we are
action and punishment. We're Ithink, as Western readers of the
Gita, we. Are, many timesbringing a sort of Christian or
(05:03):
Western worldview into ourunderstanding of a very, very
deeply Eastern idea of karma.
And when we, when we speak aboutkarma, we're, we're engaging in
this dialog over about nature,about the nature of reality,
karma, being that property ofnature that we might summarize
(05:29):
as as time or of the activity ofthe countless billions of
beings, right, who have who aresentient and have free will to
exert their thought on theworld. Right? That, you know we
generally think of as humanbeings, although you know this
(05:53):
kind of worldview is is inquestion these days. The more we
the more we grow and we learnabout other people and other
ways of seeing the world. Ithink we're able to take up our
own worldview, the way we framethe world philosophically, and
re evaluate it, and I think thisis one of the gitas greatest
(06:14):
strengths and contributions toour modern world, and why I
think it's important that we'reable to make it more accessible,
is we have this. We have thisvery foundational Eastern
concept of nature as acollective force, as the world
(06:36):
as a collective history made upof individuals, but also having
a larger right, like theexample, you used a neutral
energy that right if you dosomething that harms someone
else, then eventually you willreceive something equal or of
(07:00):
equal measure or weight back,right, and an intelligence of
nature that it is ultimatelymysterious to us, right? It's,
you know, it's the problem ofkarma that brought about the
teachings of yoga. So this isreally at the core of why we
(07:24):
practice, is understanding thatkarma is a mystery to us, and we
have to learn how to balance itand deal with it, to, let's say,
to win life in order to beourselves, to be authentic in
the world.
Nischala Joy Devi (07:45):
Not only is karma mystical, but Yoga itself
is mystical. I think most peoplemiss the mysticism of it because
they focus on the physicality ofit. They don't let go of that.
So when we look at karma, it'sit's, I both love to talk about
(08:06):
it, and it's also a quagmirewhen you get into it, because
when you were speaking about theworld, we have to understand
that if we could see with notthe two eyes, but with the third
eye, we see we were really allconnected. All our arc feels are
connected. And the person thatyou just passed, and they
(08:29):
dropped their wallet, and youpicked it up and handed it back
to them, that was a karma thatyou had with them, whether you
realized it or not, and you thenfulfilled that at that moment,
simple things that happen everysingle day, and then there's
things that that complicate it.
For instance, I'm a singlewoman. I have my karma. If I
(08:50):
then get partnered withsomebody, it's now my karma,
their karma, and our karmatogether. So now I've just
increased what my karma is, andhow do I then lessen it so we
don't know exactly who we were,even sometimes we can't remember
(09:13):
who we were as teenagers. Wemight not have been very nice
people. We might have donethings that weren't nice,
because you don't have that fullconsciousness yet of what's
right or wrong. So suppose I didsomething it wasn't very good,
and now I'm reaping the karma ofthat 25 years later. What do I
(09:33):
do? Well, this is where thepractices come in, we always had
an expression. My teacher alwayssaid he'd say, when talking
about karma, he'd say, they wentfor the head, but they got the
hat instead. And I alwaysimagined an arrow, you know,
(09:54):
like those putting an apple onyour head, and they shoot the.
Arrow to that, and what itmeans, and what it was always
meant to me, is that I can, Imay not be able, to get rid of
the karma completely that isholding me back, that is causing
me to be sick, or whatever itis, that money wise, it's not
(10:16):
allowing the money to flow,whatever that may be, the key
and the magic in this is that itcan be lessened by deep
spiritual practice. So they dogo for the hat. They do get the
hat instead of the head. And Ithink this is something that
(10:37):
even if you're not thinkingabout your next lifetime in
karma, whatever, just thinkabout right now. Can anything
you have be lessened? Perhaps,physical pain, emotional pain,
financial distress, whatever itmay be. Can it be lessened by
doing more deep practices? Ithink it's worth a try. If it
(11:00):
doesn't work, the worst canhappen is you sat quietly for an
hour a day, right? So I thinkthat's something that's
important.
Kamala Rose (11:10):
Meditation offers us a way to to look deeper at
why we act, and I think this iswhat we're getting at here in
chapter three, and again, basedon that important foundation,
theoretical foundation inchapter two, right? We're we're
(11:31):
hoping to understand why we dothe things we do, and this is
really that purpose of ofdharana and Dhyana, as we've
discussed, as meditation, it'svery clear that we, you know,
through concentration, concertedconcentration and creating an
open space in our minds andhearts, we can really understand
(11:55):
why we do things and right. Myexperience is this is not at all
linear, right? It. Insightsarise when the time is right to
understand why you make thechoices that you make, and as
you, as you said, not so much.
Who am I going to become inanother lifetime? Or who have I
(12:17):
been? But what did I doyesterday to create the world
that I'm in right now, and ifthere are areas that I'm unhappy
with or are of a constantirritation and concern and never
able to move into a morecomfortable or easy going
(12:39):
relationship with a situation,then how can I solve it? And,
you know, having the couragethat we've been talking about,
the courage to do the deep work,to ask the tough questions of,
what is it that in me that iscontributing to this? Maybe,
what do I want on a deeper levelthat I'm not aware of, and the
(13:02):
tool of meditation really, forthis purpose to understand, to
understand karma in a verydeeply personal way, I think,
but Also in that it's verydeeply personal in that it's
mine. It's very intimate to mypsychology and the pathology
(13:25):
that emerges from that, but alsoto understand that I am really
no different in motivation thanall other people. You know,
everyone wants a little bitmore. Everybody wants to be a
little bit happier. Everybodywants better for the people they
(13:48):
love. And they want to berecognized in their work. They
want to feel that they'vecontributed right, some sort of
professional or right. So these
Nischala Joy Devi (14:02):
deeper thing, yeah, life means something,
yeah, it's
Kamala Rose (14:06):
important. It's important. It's and these are,
you know, these are deepermotivations that we don't want
to take the attitude, I think,111, way that I often find Karma
Yoga interpreted as, like, wejust need to smash those. We
need to eradicate. We need tosubdue, right? We need to
(14:27):
eliminate, or, you know, in inthe violent language of the
Gita, we need to kill thesemotives. And I, I ask you
honestly, who has had successwith that? No one, no one. You
and I entered monasteries to todo this work, to to we saw the
(14:47):
problem of karma and said, Good,let's stop making it. Let's
let's go to a place where we caneradicate individuality, which
is the that, that seed ofavidya. Of that wrong
understanding. Let's get to theget to the core of it,
Nischala Joy Devi (15:05):
and what you just said really scares people.
Yeah, I think that's that, thatthat idea with of the truth that
you just told scares peoplebecause it makes them
responsible for their ownaction. You can't just say, and
I hear this also a lot inmedicine, oh, it's genetic.
(15:29):
There's nothing I can do aboutit. There's always something you
can do about it.
Kamala Rose (15:35):
Yeah, always there.
There really is. And I think oneof those strengths of the Gita
is it's not trying to take usout of the world. It says these
base desires, these the will towant to contribute to the world
and to be recognized that you'regood at it, right, the desire to
see your children and yourfamily happy. You want to you to
(15:56):
be a little bit happier, have alittle bit more comfort around
you these basic human things.
You know, there we we're notgoing to make headway in
eliminating it, right? We're notgoing to end that. In fact, the
world is the world is created bythese deep desires to contribute
(16:23):
to a greater whole, to helpother people and make improve
their lives, right, to improveour own lives, to grow and
expand intellectually in ourinner lives, right? These are
desires I don't think we shouldthink about eliminating, but as
you so often say, to refinethat, we have to take it up some
(16:45):
levels and transfer those basedesires for just a personal well
being into a larger sense ofwell being that includes
everyone
Nischala Joy Devi (17:02):
I agree so much that the understanding has
to be there. People really needto not just live it, but
understand it. And I guess oneof the things that came up for
me while you were talking Kamalais that, for the viewers, you
(17:25):
may or may not know, I think wementioned it a few times, but
Kamala and I are both part ofthis extraordinary organization
called Yoga. Gives back that itdoes exactly what we're talking
it gives yoga teachers who havegained so much benefit from
(17:47):
yoga, it gives them theopportunity to give some of that
energy back, and thereforechanges their karma. It. It
really lessens anything that weall inadvertently do that we
don't realize, and helps usbrighten and move forward. And I
(18:10):
think the extraordinary thingabout this is that these
children that we are supportingand women that they have had
according to a Western look andprobably most Eastern, not very
good karma in their life,they've been abused. They've
been in abject poverty, povertythat most of us can't even
(18:35):
imagine. And suddenly, fromhalfway across the world and
around the world, money iscoming to them to improve their
lives. Well, this is, this tome, is, is, is a vision of karma
that is so extraordinary, andthey're now becoming doctors and
(18:58):
nurses and it and things thatthey could have never dreamed
of. So when you look at this,you can say they have really
good karma, because they've beenlifted out of this abuse,
poverty, etc. But don't forgetabout the other side, the good
karma that comes from doingsomething like this for someone
(19:22):
you will never meet. You don'tknow who they are, but somehow
the entire world has beenuplifted, maybe minuscule
amount, by your action, by theway that you did this, and that
little girl or that little boyis now growing up to be a leader
in their community and changesthe whole world. That's what a
(19:46):
little bit can do. So I justthink this is such an
extraordinary, empowering idea,which most people feel is
disempowering. And to me, under.
Understanding that we can dosomething. We may not be able to
get rid of everything, but wecan do something for ourselves
(20:06):
and for the world that upliftsand sustains it also at that
same time. So if any of you areinterested, when yoga gives back
we can, you can look it up inthe internet and ygb, and you
may want to join too. You wantto want to join too. If you know
(20:28):
how good it feels, you'll wantto join
Kamala Rose (20:33):
Absolutely. We'll make sure that that's in our
show notes. And so easy just tohost a class. And there's just a
lot of
Nischala Joy Devi (20:47):
maybe we should add that in with the
information. This will help yourkarma,
Kamala Rose (20:54):
right? Because once we become exposed to the idea of
karma, and we start to thinkabout this, we naturally become
interested in how we, not onlyon a personal level, can
practice in a way that thatfeels ethical, which is the
foundation of when we're talkingabout karma, What, when we're
(21:16):
talking about punitive ormeritorious karmas, where, once
we learn about it, we'reinterested in how to turn a turn
the wheel in a good way. How canwe help be a part of the
solution, and now part of thiskind of corruption that we see
in the world? I think thisreally gets to the metaphor of
(21:40):
the Gita, and some of the waysthat we as modern Western women
or international women, allwomen who are taking the Gita
into their hearts at thiscrucial time in history, you
know, we should understand thisas an existential battle of
ethics, Right, that those whoare really trying hard to do the
(22:03):
right thing and be a part of thesolutions that ensure ensure a
the kind of life that makesavailable the conditions for
self knowledge and all of thesebeautiful ideas that the
Bhagavad Gita points to, we knowfor a fact are just simply not
(22:27):
available to billions of womenacross the world because of the
conditions of their birth right.
And I think why? When in ourinitial dialogs on this that we,
you know, we really look at thewe look at the world in in all
of its complexities, and see theimportant role of yoga
(22:48):
practitioners who are waking upin the western world armed with
the empowerment of the women'smovement, right, in a sense of
Self that says I should be ableto see myself in these
scriptures. I should be able toimagine myself as this warrior
on a battlefield, right? My ownpersonal images might not be
(23:11):
involve, you know, gallons ofblood and rivers of headless
soldiers and everything, likesome of the, you know, some of
the Gita, let tends to go inthat very manly man sort of
direction. And I think this iswhere we can, you know, looking
especially here at karma, it'sa, it's a feminine force, right?
(23:36):
It's, it's, it's nature. It'scausality, right? It's cyclic,
right? It, it is cyclic. It, youknow, it arises within us
questions about what's the rightkind of effort to apply to what
situations. And I think asWestern women, we're really
(24:00):
coming from a really differentplace, of course, than a
soldier. And, you know, we'removed by the conditions of the
world, and are looking to helpin ways that are effective. Are
really effective.
Nischala Joy Devi (24:17):
I think that's the whole point here,
that we and I think sometimespeople have a misconception.
They think that spiritualpractice is selfish, and maybe
in the beginning, it is becausewe're really having to carve
time out of a very busy day thatwe never had to before. I mean,
(24:42):
as for me, I have to alwaysfigure an extra hour between my
getting up and doing something,getting to the office, going
out, etc, because of mypractices. And that's built in.
That doesn't change. And you.
Unknown (25:00):
Yeah, I think, I think maybe it helps to see the chain
Nischala Joy Devi (25:05):
of how this affects people. So for instance,
if you're meditating and you'refeeling a sense of calmness, the
first person you meet, you willdistribute that kindness to them
that's almost like contagious,and then they may be say they're
(25:25):
a waitress in a restaurant. Sothey then take that and they
then distribute it to all theirclients that day, and then the
clients go home and they're in agood mood because they had a
nice conversation with thewaitress or wait person, and
they go out and they so this,how I see it is karma expands
(25:50):
exponentially every time it'spassed to that next person. And
what you were just talkingabout, kama is also a way to
pass it, but it's not a good wayto pass it. It's the way of the
disgruntled. I don't know if youever it's always funny to me. I
(26:12):
love to read the little Yelpthings, what if I'm going to a
hotel or wherever, and thethings that people say have
nothing to do really with thehotel. If they really looked in
themselves, they saw, they see,it was them that was having the
problem, not that the hotel wasgiving the problem. And I think
(26:32):
if we could all start to seethat in ourselves, what did I do
to cause that without puttingguilt on ourselves, we don't
need guilt. We have enough. Butjust from a Yana yoga
standpoint, just observing howcould this have been made
different? She said this, I saidthat, is there any way it could
(26:54):
have been made differently, andthat also impacts the karma, so
it's not something that we justhold individually. I always
think of it like trees in aforest, they look separate, but
if you go down a little bit, alltheir roots are intertwined, and
(27:16):
that's what keeps them strong,that's what keeps them from
blowing over is thatinterconnectedness and by
separating ourselves, because wefeel that that's the best way to
do it, we're actually hurtingour karma. So knowing when you
(27:38):
can do something and when youcan't do something, I think
that's that's the wisdom thatcomes from years of meditation
and understanding, and thatpeople change. That's the other
thing. People change. They maybe not so good. Now, we talked
about this, about teenage maybeyou weren't so sweet, then I
(28:02):
know I certainly wasn't. Butthings change. People change. I
think what changed me the mostwas starting to work with very
sick people. Something happensto you when you do that and you
start to be grateful that youcan get out of bed by yourself,
etc. And I think that goes on.
So it's all karma. It's allkarma.
Kamala Rose (28:25):
And what a powerful teacher. Yeah, and your life as
a powerful teacher, and youreally bring up the, the this
core in, in the theory, right?
The theory of this beautifuldialog on reality and the Gita,
that property nature, what karmais built out of, really exists
(28:49):
for the liberation of theindividual soul, right on a very
deep level, once we discontinuebeing confused about the
permanence of these situations,right? We're constantly fooled
that, you know, I am my reactionto this situation, and we're so
(29:13):
sure it will last forever,whatever it is, good, bad or
ugly, once we're able tounderstand, okay, it's just
temporary and I'm having areaction to it, good, bad or
ugly, we can take a step insideand have a little space to
(29:34):
Evaluate that I I see myself asas part of this drama when
really This drama is far beyondme, right? Is connected with all
of the other players in this andwhen we're able to have that
point of view, then nature andkarma become something else. We
(29:56):
can see it differently once. Wecan see it as it really is Be it
now becomes that agent of ourliberation and our great friend
in awakening, and we are able tosee our life situations as
places to learn, rather than youknow, places to be perfect and
(30:19):
in control. And, you know, Ithink this is the deep, deep
lesson of the Gita, is thatyou're just not in control of
karma. You You have to own it,and you are in it, and you see
yourself. You see your karma asyou very personally,
subjectively. But we have tolearn that you are not in
(30:42):
control of this. And you knowyou mentioned that that
transformative experience of endof life care and how much that
changed your worldview, how yousaw yourself and your action in
the world. And, you know, I'vehad, I've had some of that
(31:04):
myself, caring for for people onthe edge of life and but I think
one of my most transformativeexperiences, and how I see this,
is in working with my garden andbecoming a permaculture
gardener. And I couldn't helpbut think, when you brought up
(31:25):
the example of the trees andthat, you know, trees are like a
family, yeah, right tree, treesliterally are a family. They're
they're thought of inneighborhoods, or they're
thought of in guilds inpermaculture. And, you know, one
of the ways I've reallycontextualized these chapters in
(31:46):
the Bhagavad Gita in this thislast year, and I feel like my
understanding of the Gita isalways applied in my garden, or
in the garden that I tend, thegarden that I care for. You
know, the first part in lookingat your work in a garden is just
(32:07):
to grab a chair and sit downthere and observe. And for me,
this is like chapter two of theBhagavad Gita. We're getting
into an in depth study, or let'ssay, an introductory in depth
study of how the mechanics ofthe mind work. You know how we
(32:27):
exist in karma, but we also haveindividual choice, right, these
big issues that the Gitawrestles with, right, when, when
you, when you stake your chairin the garden. You commit
yourself to watching the sunpattern, seeing where the light
is coming through, becomingfamiliar with the insect life,
(32:48):
right? You You literally take abird's eye view, and you come up
to look at the sources of waterclose by, and you look beyond
your fences and to the to thelarger environment, to the
neighborhood of trees that thetrees that you're planting are
going to live with. And it'sonly on that understanding now
(33:12):
that we begin to take skillfulaction and create a
permaculture, or a permanentagriculture situation where
everybody's helping each other,right? So that the ideas that we
plant in companions and wecreate guilds of cooperative
vines and trees and shrubs andherbs and fruits and vegetables
(33:38):
that will attract the birds andto stay longer, to attract the
bees, to stay longer, and we weopen our minds to the to the
whole of the ecosystem, to asgreat as we can think, as much
of a bird's eye view As we canconceive and take action based
(33:59):
on that, yeah. And for me, thisis a great metaphor for karma
yoga as a very cyclic, intuitiveway of being in the world that
is not just considering thepersonal point of view, although
it's not not considering thepersonal point of view, but has
(34:21):
the largesse, or has theMagnanimous, the magnanimous
mind and heart to consider thenon human players, Right? The
other human players, the animaland vegetable players in every
environment, and this helps usto look beyond ourselves and see
(34:46):
it. My efforts are important,but they're not all that's going
on. And I think this isessential in karma yoga.
Nischala Joy Devi (34:55):
I think that scares people to think they're
not as essential. And. And,yeah, it's a beautiful,
beautiful metaphor. And I thinkabout my garden when you say
that, and how things pop up andyou don't even know that they
were there. They just visited,and there they are. And people
(35:15):
call them volunteers or weeds, Ijust call them flowers, and they
just, they're just there. And sowhat you're describing by
sitting there and observing isreally a part of yoga that we
don't most people don't embrace,or don't realize they're
embracing, and that's Yana yoga,because I think in Yani, yoga is
(35:37):
probably the easiest place torecognize our attachments and
all this that we're talkingabout, even when you talk to
someone and have a disagreement,the disagreement is because you
think your way is right, and aslong as we hold on to that, our
(35:57):
karma does not diminish. Ourkarma expands. And when I was
talking about getting intomedicine, it wasn't really end
of life that I was involved withyet. Of course, there's always
end of life involved, but thesepeople came in with with very
severe life threateningdiseases. And what I saw, the
(36:23):
main thing I keep seeing acrossall medicine, is the fear, and I
spent long time getting into thefear. What? What is this fear?
Is it a fear of pain? Yeah,there's definitely a fear of
pain, and there's mostly thisfear of lack of survival. Well,
(36:46):
I live, and we all know, unlikethe garden metaphor, where we
know that the flowers are goingto go at the end of the season,
we know that the corn will bepicked and the corn stalks will
be mowed down. We know thevineyards will change. We don't
(37:06):
really, really believe that asan individual person, although
we see dying all around us, thatwe are actually going to die.
But we hold this tremendousfear, and this fear impacts our
karma constantly, whether weknow it or not, we are always
(37:29):
making decisions based on that,and sometimes we're trying to
prove that we don't have thefear of death. So we drive cars
fast. We drive jump out ofperfectly good airplanes. We do
all kinds of things to prove toourselves that, no, I'm
invulnerable. I'm going to liveforever. It's the little things
(37:55):
that we have to look at forkarma. It's the little everyday
things. Did you see yourneighbor's trash can in the
street, and did you go and pickit up and bring it back? Little
things like that is what changesour life and the world, and it
helps us not focus on this fearof death, but instead, and
(38:20):
people said to me, Well, Ilearned all this, and then I
die. What's the point? Well,that's where the continuum comes
in, the understanding of goingforward, like the garden. My
favorite kind of plant is theperennials, right? I don't have
to do anything next year. Theyjust surprise me and come up
again. That's what I like.
That's my karma, to be able tosit there and and say, Oh, I'm
(38:44):
ready for those roses, I'm readyfor those petunias, I'm ready
for that and to see them rereincarnate each year. It's like
us. We're like bulbs. We're notseeds. We're bulbs, and we keep
going. So all this has to be inMaya, understanding understood.
(39:06):
So it takes, or at least lessensthis fear, the fear of the
unknown, the fear of death, thefear of whatever else it is, so
we can move forward and servewithout that fear. You know, I
brings up to mind the story ofSt Francis and st Claire. And he
(39:32):
was very much afraid of lepersand didn't want to go near them,
whereas st Claire was theopposite. She just went and
brought bread every day and fedthe lepers. And he said, How can
you do that? Aren't you afraidthat you're going to catch it?
It didn't even occur to herbecause of the love in her heart
(39:55):
and because of her purity andher. Continual service. He then
decided to try that too, andwhen he did it, it changed him
also. So this fear that'skeeping us back is also creating
more karma.
Kamala Rose (40:18):
Well, that's a great example to see that these
very, very deep, we'd call thata vasana, a deep, deep pattern,
fear of death, same, similar tothe that desire to succeed, the
desire to be liked, right? Theseare deep. These are deep
(40:38):
patterns. They're calledvasanas, and we all have them,
right? There's no one who is notafraid of death, and there's no
one who does not hope in theircore of themselves to, you know,
to make, to create and to betterthemselves and those that they
love, right? Even even the cowof us, right? We can have common
(40:59):
humanity with everyone, right?
The Good, the Bad, right? Theseare, these are common
motivations to all people. And Ithink there's a real strength
and just knowing that asspiritual as I am, as much as I
have the answers, and I lovethat the sutra that speaks to
that fear of death, right, theinherent even in the wise, yes,
(41:24):
inherent even in the wise,right, that that deep crate
craving or hoarding that we haveof the body and of all the
things that go along with thebody, the mind, the emotions,
The feelings, right, theBuddhist speak in terms of
cherishing our our opinions andour identities to such a great
(41:46):
degree that, you know, it's it'svery difficult to overcome that
sense of individuality, but forunderstand that that's Really
what these teachings are about,and the Gita really starts on
the battlefield and brings tothe forefront the fear of death
(42:06):
as a primary subject that isbeing addressed in this dialog.
And I think in our in ourexperience as meditators and our
work as teachers. I think weboth try to help people
understand that we can, we cansee, we can understand, we can
(42:29):
acknowledge and we can acceptthese parts of ourselves. We're
not going to kill it or stifleit or drown it. But we can, we
can know that there's a part ofme that you know that that has
fear in this area, and if youknow, if you've been through
(42:53):
anything on a health level thathas scared you deeply, I have a
couple times, and you really,you really confront a lot, and
you understand how it motivatesyour actions, how the karmas
that you take from that pointare coming out of that. And I
think it's a good place to be,to be in a place of acceptance
(43:14):
of that, not trying to eliminateit, but maybe just holding space
for the existence of these deepdesires and fears that exist in
all human beings. And I love theattitude that of the Dalai Lama
who says, Every morning, Ipractice, I meditate, and then I
(43:34):
start to think of prepare myselffor my death and these are words
I've taken very personally, andI will admit to no mastery of
nothing but, but I when I saythere has to be an acceptance of
(43:55):
one's humanity, I think this is,this is part of it, or it or it
has been for me to to understandthat the ideals of immortality,
maybe, or of heaven, and thesethings that we receive in our
religious messages that areaimed to quell this fear, right?
It's not that you're going todie. You're going to go to a
(44:18):
beautiful place where all yourdogs will greet you, yeah, yeah,
right, all your friends and yourparents, the angels, and the
angels will sing,
Nischala Joy Devi (44:30):
what is the Muslim? So many Vestal virgins
and yeah, they're promising allthese things.
Kamala Rose (44:37):
I just want my dogs to be there so, but we can
understand why, why this is sucha big hold in religion, the
afterlife and what happens, likea way of understanding this,
what comes next. And, you know,whatever we make of these, I
believe it to be veryindividual, right? We need
(44:58):
different things at differenttimes. Sometimes, right? And
sometimes the idea of the pearlygates and dharma dogs is really
lovely, right? And other timeswe need to just be a little more
honest with ourselves about, youknow, what, what? What am I?
What am I doing today based outof fear? And is that healthy? Is
(45:22):
it making the results that I'mlooking for, or is this
interfering with my presentmoment and the decisions that
I'm making right now,
Nischala Joy Devi (45:36):
when the decisions are made, even after
they're made, and maybe theyweren't the right ones for that
moment. Think about it, becauseeven the going back and
retracing and admitting that itwasn't the right thing at this
time can lessen karma. So Ithink that it's more what we're
(46:04):
looking for. We're looking athere is the idea that this karma
that has been created from whatwe may not even know is now
coming to fruition. How do wedeal with that? And there's
numerous ways to deal with it.
There's not just one way to dealwith it. There's many different
ways to deal with it, and inthat dealing with it, we can
(46:27):
either create more, transform itinto something positive, or many
other ways to do things or thatit can manifest. But I think the
main thing we have to look at isour reaction. And it's very
simple, how do you feelafterwards? How does it make you
(46:49):
feel? And then, if you meditate,when you first sit down to
meditate, what thoughts come up?
What are the first thoughts thatcome up. And also, what are the
first thoughts that come up asyou're falling asleep and in the
morning, that's what you reallyneed to work on. That's where
(47:11):
our point is. No one has to tellyou it's there right in your
mind to see and acknowledge andrecognize. So spend the next
couple days, next couple ofweeks, just looking, observe
your mind. Try not to judge it,just observe it. And how are you
creating more karma ortransforming the karma you
(47:33):
already have?
Kamala Rose (47:36):
It's powerful.
Morning meditation, eveningmeditation, the best times to
sit. So I hope all of ourlisteners will join us first
thing in the morning with yourmantras and your meditations and
your self inquiry. This isreally what I think the Gita is
trying to teach us, is give usthe tools, the means, the
worldview, to understand why weare the way we are and be a
(48:01):
force for good in the world. Sothank you so much for joining us
today for a woman's Gitapodcast. We'll look forward to
being with you next time.
Nischala Joy Devi (48:16):
Namaste.
Thank you so much. You.
Namaste, friends.
Thank you for joining us for awoman's Gita Podcast. I'm
Nischala Joy Devi (00:05):
Kamala rose and I'm Nisha la joy. Davey.
Kamala Rose (00:10):
Thanks to our listeners and subscribers for
hanging with us for our dialogsin the Gita today, we're
starting our second season of awoman's Gita podcast, beginning
by delving into chapter three,karma yoga. If you've been
(00:31):
listening to our deep dive intochapter two, we've covered a lot
of ground. Getting here, you'vecovered a lot of the foundations
of the Bhagavad Gita and the thephilosophical orientation right
chapter two is often a placewhere, quite frankly, a lot of
(00:52):
people get off on their readingof the Gita. They just can't
quite understand how thedifferent threads weave together
in a meaningful way. And this iswhere nishala and I are hoping
to help our listeners from ourlong time study of the Gita
together. We probably havestudied this for over 50 years
(01:15):
together, and today we'd like tooffer some insights into Karma
Yoga chapter three, where we'recoming from from chapter two and
chapter one, and how we can makethe Bhagavad Gita meaningful to
us in this modern age as Westernwomen who are encountering a
(01:36):
kind of manly man, sort of text,how we can make it our own and
take the gems of yogic wisdominto our daily lives.
Nischala Joy Devi (01:49):
I think one of the things that I keep
hearing from people is amisinterpretation of karma. This
is something that is not reallypresent in the western society
like it is in the easternteachings. And because of that,
(02:11):
we're so used to, I think, inour society, the duality of
crime and punishment, or actionand punishment, or whatever that
is that we're used to thenegative instead of looking at
the positive. And then what wedo is we then take that and put
(02:35):
it onto karma, which is a verydifferent concept. And I think
the idea of karma is is really aneutral energy that is
propelling us and also pushingus both at the same time, from
the past karma, or the pastincarnations, into the forward
(02:55):
incarnation. I think one of theproblems is we see life as as
the It begins at birth and itends at death, physical death of
the body, when we don't realizethat's just a parenthesis,
there's something that comesbefore it, and there's something
that goes after it. And if wecan understand that, that it's a
(03:17):
continuum, we understand karma alittle bit better, because it's
not just something that we donow. So for instance, I think
the simplistic way of looking atit is my brother punched me in
the shoulder, and then he wentand fell down the steps and hurt
his shoulder, so that we wouldsay, Okay, that was his karma.
(03:40):
To bring it to a very mundanelevel, but when we look at it
from a higher level, we see thisis what is teaching us, the
lessons that we that our soulneeds, not necessarily the body
and the mind, but really whatour soul needs to continue,
raising up, moving upward onthis journey of incarnation, and
(04:05):
that's the main thing. It is sooften we talk about, and also in
the Yoga Sutras, when it talksabout the pain that is yet to
come, that is avoidable, when wetalk about karma, this is also
by doing the practices, andwe'll get into the main practice
of karma, of of incarnation andkarma in a moment. But we have
(04:33):
to understand it's a continuum.
It's not a stop and go.
Kamala Rose (04:39):
And this is really a deep dialog in eastern
thinking. I think what youbrought up that when we're
looking in the binary terms ofcrime and punishment, we are
action and punishment. We're Ithink, as Western readers of the
Gita, we. Are, many timesbringing a sort of Christian or
(05:03):
Western worldview into ourunderstanding of a very, very
deeply Eastern idea of karma.
And when we, when we speak aboutkarma, we're, we're engaging in
this dialog over about nature,about the nature of reality,
karma, being that property ofnature that we might summarize
(05:29):
as as time or of the activity ofthe countless billions of
beings, right, who have who aresentient and have free will to
exert their thought on theworld. Right? That, you know we
generally think of as humanbeings, although you know this
(05:53):
kind of worldview is is inquestion these days. The more we
the more we grow and we learnabout other people and other
ways of seeing the world. Ithink we're able to take up our
own worldview, the way we framethe world philosophically, and
re evaluate it, and I think thisis one of the gitas greatest
(06:14):
strengths and contributions toour modern world, and why I
think it's important that we'reable to make it more accessible,
is we have this. We have thisvery foundational Eastern
concept of nature as acollective force, as the world
(06:36):
as a collective history made upof individuals, but also having
a larger right, like theexample, you used a neutral
energy that right if you dosomething that harms someone
else, then eventually you willreceive something equal or of
(07:00):
equal measure or weight back,right, and an intelligence of
nature that it is ultimatelymysterious to us, right? It's,
you know, it's the problem ofkarma that brought about the
teachings of yoga. So this isreally at the core of why we
(07:24):
practice, is understanding thatkarma is a mystery to us, and we
have to learn how to balance itand deal with it, to, let's say,
to win life in order to beourselves, to be authentic in
the world.
Nischala Joy Devi (07:45):
Not only is karma mystical, but Yoga itself
is mystical. I think most peoplemiss the mysticism of it because
they focus on the physicality ofit. They don't let go of that.
So when we look at karma, it'sit's, I both love to talk about
(08:06):
it, and it's also a quagmirewhen you get into it, because
when you were speaking about theworld, we have to understand
that if we could see with notthe two eyes, but with the third
eye, we see we were really allconnected. All our arc feels are
connected. And the person thatyou just passed, and they
(08:29):
dropped their wallet, and youpicked it up and handed it back
to them, that was a karma thatyou had with them, whether you
realized it or not, and you thenfulfilled that at that moment,
simple things that happen everysingle day, and then there's
things that that complicate it.
For instance, I'm a singlewoman. I have my karma. If I
(08:50):
then get partnered withsomebody, it's now my karma,
their karma, and our karmatogether. So now I've just
increased what my karma is, andhow do I then lessen it so we
don't know exactly who we were,even sometimes we can't remember
(09:13):
who we were as teenagers. Wemight not have been very nice
people. We might have donethings that weren't nice,
because you don't have that fullconsciousness yet of what's
right or wrong. So suppose I didsomething it wasn't very good,
and now I'm reaping the karma ofthat 25 years later. What do I
(09:33):
do? Well, this is where thepractices come in, we always had
an expression. My teacher alwayssaid he'd say, when talking
about karma, he'd say, they wentfor the head, but they got the
hat instead. And I alwaysimagined an arrow, you know,
(09:54):
like those putting an apple onyour head, and they shoot the.
Arrow to that, and what itmeans, and what it was always
meant to me, is that I can, Imay not be able, to get rid of
the karma completely that isholding me back, that is causing
me to be sick, or whatever itis, that money wise, it's not
(10:16):
allowing the money to flow,whatever that may be, the key
and the magic in this is that itcan be lessened by deep
spiritual practice. So they dogo for the hat. They do get the
hat instead of the head. And Ithink this is something that
(10:37):
even if you're not thinkingabout your next lifetime in
karma, whatever, just thinkabout right now. Can anything
you have be lessened? Perhaps,physical pain, emotional pain,
financial distress, whatever itmay be. Can it be lessened by
doing more deep practices? Ithink it's worth a try. If it
(11:00):
doesn't work, the worst canhappen is you sat quietly for an
hour a day, right? So I thinkthat's something that's
important.
Kamala Rose (11:10):
Meditation offers us a way to to look deeper at
why we act, and I think this iswhat we're getting at here in
chapter three, and again, basedon that important foundation,
theoretical foundation inchapter two, right? We're we're
(11:31):
hoping to understand why we dothe things we do, and this is
really that purpose of ofdharana and Dhyana, as we've
discussed, as meditation, it'svery clear that we, you know,
through concentration, concertedconcentration and creating an
open space in our minds andhearts, we can really understand
(11:55):
why we do things and right. Myexperience is this is not at all
linear, right? It. Insightsarise when the time is right to
understand why you make thechoices that you make, and as
you, as you said, not so much.
Who am I going to become inanother lifetime? Or who have I
(12:17):
been? But what did I doyesterday to create the world
that I'm in right now, and ifthere are areas that I'm unhappy
with or are of a constantirritation and concern and never
able to move into a morecomfortable or easy going
(12:39):
relationship with a situation,then how can I solve it? And,
you know, having the couragethat we've been talking about,
the courage to do the deep work,to ask the tough questions of,
what is it that in me that iscontributing to this? Maybe,
what do I want on a deeper levelthat I'm not aware of, and the
(13:02):
tool of meditation really, forthis purpose to understand, to
understand karma in a verydeeply personal way, I think,
but Also in that it's verydeeply personal in that it's
mine. It's very intimate to mypsychology and the pathology
(13:25):
that emerges from that, but alsoto understand that I am really
no different in motivation thanall other people. You know,
everyone wants a little bitmore. Everybody wants to be a
little bit happier. Everybodywants better for the people they
(13:48):
love. And they want to berecognized in their work. They
want to feel that they'vecontributed right, some sort of
professional or right. So these
Nischala Joy Devi (14:02):
deeper thing, yeah, life means something,
yeah, it's
Kamala Rose (14:06):
important. It's important. It's and these are,
you know, these are deepermotivations that we don't want
to take the attitude, I think,111, way that I often find Karma
Yoga interpreted as, like, wejust need to smash those. We
need to eradicate. We need tosubdue, right? We need to
(14:27):
eliminate, or, you know, in inthe violent language of the
Gita, we need to kill thesemotives. And I, I ask you
honestly, who has had successwith that? No one, no one. You
and I entered monasteries to todo this work, to to we saw the
(14:47):
problem of karma and said, Good,let's stop making it. Let's
let's go to a place where we caneradicate individuality, which
is the that, that seed ofavidya. Of that wrong
understanding. Let's get to theget to the core of it,
Nischala Joy Devi (15:05):
and what you just said really scares people.
Yeah, I think that's that, thatthat idea with of the truth that
you just told scares peoplebecause it makes them
responsible for their ownaction. You can't just say, and
I hear this also a lot inmedicine, oh, it's genetic.
(15:29):
There's nothing I can do aboutit. There's always something you
can do about it.
Kamala Rose (15:35):
Yeah, always there.
There really is. And I think oneof those strengths of the Gita
is it's not trying to take usout of the world. It says these
base desires, these the will towant to contribute to the world
and to be recognized that you'regood at it, right, the desire to
see your children and yourfamily happy. You want to you to
(15:56):
be a little bit happier, have alittle bit more comfort around
you these basic human things.
You know, there we we're notgoing to make headway in
eliminating it, right? We're notgoing to end that. In fact, the
world is the world is created bythese deep desires to contribute
(16:23):
to a greater whole, to helpother people and make improve
their lives, right, to improveour own lives, to grow and
expand intellectually in ourinner lives, right? These are
desires I don't think we shouldthink about eliminating, but as
you so often say, to refinethat, we have to take it up some
(16:45):
levels and transfer those basedesires for just a personal well
being into a larger sense ofwell being that includes
everyone
Nischala Joy Devi (17:02):
I agree so much that the understanding has
to be there. People really needto not just live it, but
understand it. And I guess oneof the things that came up for
me while you were talking Kamalais that, for the viewers, you
(17:25):
may or may not know, I think wementioned it a few times, but
Kamala and I are both part ofthis extraordinary organization
called Yoga. Gives back that itdoes exactly what we're talking
it gives yoga teachers who havegained so much benefit from
(17:47):
yoga, it gives them theopportunity to give some of that
energy back, and thereforechanges their karma. It. It
really lessens anything that weall inadvertently do that we
don't realize, and helps usbrighten and move forward. And I
(18:10):
think the extraordinary thingabout this is that these
children that we are supportingand women that they have had
according to a Western look andprobably most Eastern, not very
good karma in their life,they've been abused. They've
been in abject poverty, povertythat most of us can't even
(18:35):
imagine. And suddenly, fromhalfway across the world and
around the world, money iscoming to them to improve their
lives. Well, this is, this tome, is, is, is a vision of karma
that is so extraordinary, andthey're now becoming doctors and
(18:58):
nurses and it and things thatthey could have never dreamed
of. So when you look at this,you can say they have really
good karma, because they've beenlifted out of this abuse,
poverty, etc. But don't forgetabout the other side, the good
karma that comes from doingsomething like this for someone
(19:22):
you will never meet. You don'tknow who they are, but somehow
the entire world has beenuplifted, maybe minuscule
amount, by your action, by theway that you did this, and that
little girl or that little boyis now growing up to be a leader
in their community and changesthe whole world. That's what a
(19:46):
little bit can do. So I justthink this is such an
extraordinary, empowering idea,which most people feel is
disempowering. And to me, under.
Understanding that we can dosomething. We may not be able to
get rid of everything, but wecan do something for ourselves
(20:06):
and for the world that upliftsand sustains it also at that
same time. So if any of you areinterested, when yoga gives back
we can, you can look it up inthe internet and ygb, and you
may want to join too. You wantto want to join too. If you know
(20:28):
how good it feels, you'll wantto join
Kamala Rose (20:33):
Absolutely. We'll make sure that that's in our
show notes. And so easy just tohost a class. And there's just a
lot of
Nischala Joy Devi (20:47):
maybe we should add that in with the
information. This will help yourkarma,
Kamala Rose (20:54):
right? Because once we become exposed to the idea of
karma, and we start to thinkabout this, we naturally become
interested in how we, not onlyon a personal level, can
practice in a way that thatfeels ethical, which is the
foundation of when we're talkingabout karma, What, when we're
(21:16):
talking about punitive ormeritorious karmas, where, once
we learn about it, we'reinterested in how to turn a turn
the wheel in a good way. How canwe help be a part of the
solution, and now part of thiskind of corruption that we see
in the world? I think thisreally gets to the metaphor of
(21:40):
the Gita, and some of the waysthat we as modern Western women
or international women, allwomen who are taking the Gita
into their hearts at thiscrucial time in history, you
know, we should understand thisas an existential battle of
ethics, Right, that those whoare really trying hard to do the
(22:03):
right thing and be a part of thesolutions that ensure ensure a
the kind of life that makesavailable the conditions for
self knowledge and all of thesebeautiful ideas that the
Bhagavad Gita points to, we knowfor a fact are just simply not
(22:27):
available to billions of womenacross the world because of the
conditions of their birth right.
And I think why? When in ourinitial dialogs on this that we,
you know, we really look at thewe look at the world in in all
of its complexities, and see theimportant role of yoga
(22:48):
practitioners who are waking upin the western world armed with
the empowerment of the women'smovement, right, in a sense of
Self that says I should be ableto see myself in these
scriptures. I should be able toimagine myself as this warrior
on a battlefield, right? My ownpersonal images might not be
(23:11):
involve, you know, gallons ofblood and rivers of headless
soldiers and everything, likesome of the, you know, some of
the Gita, let tends to go inthat very manly man sort of
direction. And I think this iswhere we can, you know, looking
especially here at karma, it'sa, it's a feminine force, right?
(23:36):
It's, it's, it's nature. It'scausality, right? It's cyclic,
right? It, it is cyclic. It, youknow, it arises within us
questions about what's the rightkind of effort to apply to what
situations. And I think asWestern women, we're really
(24:00):
coming from a really differentplace, of course, than a
soldier. And, you know, we'removed by the conditions of the
world, and are looking to helpin ways that are effective. Are
really effective.
Nischala Joy Devi (24:17):
I think that's the whole point here,
that we and I think sometimespeople have a misconception.
They think that spiritualpractice is selfish, and maybe
in the beginning, it is becausewe're really having to carve
time out of a very busy day thatwe never had to before. I mean,
(24:42):
as for me, I have to alwaysfigure an extra hour between my
getting up and doing something,getting to the office, going
out, etc, because of mypractices. And that's built in.
That doesn't change. And you.
Unknown (25:00):
Yeah, I think, I think maybe it helps to see the chain
Nischala Joy Devi (25:05):
of how this affects people. So for instance,
if you're meditating and you'refeeling a sense of calmness, the
first person you meet, you willdistribute that kindness to them
that's almost like contagious,and then they may be say they're
(25:25):
a waitress in a restaurant. Sothey then take that and they
then distribute it to all theirclients that day, and then the
clients go home and they're in agood mood because they had a
nice conversation with thewaitress or wait person, and
they go out and they so this,how I see it is karma expands
(25:50):
exponentially every time it'spassed to that next person. And
what you were just talkingabout, kama is also a way to
pass it, but it's not a good wayto pass it. It's the way of the
disgruntled. I don't know if youever it's always funny to me. I
(26:12):
love to read the little Yelpthings, what if I'm going to a
hotel or wherever, and thethings that people say have
nothing to do really with thehotel. If they really looked in
themselves, they saw, they see,it was them that was having the
problem, not that the hotel wasgiving the problem. And I think
(26:32):
if we could all start to seethat in ourselves, what did I do
to cause that without puttingguilt on ourselves, we don't
need guilt. We have enough. Butjust from a Yana yoga
standpoint, just observing howcould this have been made
different? She said this, I saidthat, is there any way it could
(26:54):
have been made differently, andthat also impacts the karma, so
it's not something that we justhold individually. I always
think of it like trees in aforest, they look separate, but
if you go down a little bit, alltheir roots are intertwined, and
(27:16):
that's what keeps them strong,that's what keeps them from
blowing over is thatinterconnectedness and by
separating ourselves, because wefeel that that's the best way to
do it, we're actually hurtingour karma. So knowing when you
(27:38):
can do something and when youcan't do something, I think
that's that's the wisdom thatcomes from years of meditation
and understanding, and thatpeople change. That's the other
thing. People change. They maybe not so good. Now, we talked
about this, about teenage maybeyou weren't so sweet, then I
(28:02):
know I certainly wasn't. Butthings change. People change. I
think what changed me the mostwas starting to work with very
sick people. Something happensto you when you do that and you
start to be grateful that youcan get out of bed by yourself,
etc. And I think that goes on.
So it's all karma. It's allkarma.
Kamala Rose (28:25):
And what a powerful teacher. Yeah, and your life as
a powerful teacher, and youreally bring up the, the this
core in, in the theory, right?
The theory of this beautifuldialog on reality and the Gita,
that property nature, what karmais built out of, really exists
(28:49):
for the liberation of theindividual soul, right on a very
deep level, once we discontinuebeing confused about the
permanence of these situations,right? We're constantly fooled
that, you know, I am my reactionto this situation, and we're so
(29:13):
sure it will last forever,whatever it is, good, bad or
ugly, once we're able tounderstand, okay, it's just
temporary and I'm having areaction to it, good, bad or
ugly, we can take a step insideand have a little space to
(29:34):
Evaluate that I I see myself asas part of this drama when
really This drama is far beyondme, right? Is connected with all
of the other players in this andwhen we're able to have that
point of view, then nature andkarma become something else. We
(29:56):
can see it differently once. Wecan see it as it really is Be it
now becomes that agent of ourliberation and our great friend
in awakening, and we are able tosee our life situations as
places to learn, rather than youknow, places to be perfect and
(30:19):
in control. And, you know, Ithink this is the deep, deep
lesson of the Gita, is thatyou're just not in control of
karma. You You have to own it,and you are in it, and you see
yourself. You see your karma asyou very personally,
subjectively. But we have tolearn that you are not in
(30:42):
control of this. And you knowyou mentioned that that
transformative experience of endof life care and how much that
changed your worldview, how yousaw yourself and your action in
the world. And, you know, I'vehad, I've had some of that
(31:04):
myself, caring for for people onthe edge of life and but I think
one of my most transformativeexperiences, and how I see this,
is in working with my garden andbecoming a permaculture
gardener. And I couldn't helpbut think, when you brought up
(31:25):
the example of the trees andthat, you know, trees are like a
family, yeah, right tree, treesliterally are a family. They're
they're thought of inneighborhoods, or they're
thought of in guilds inpermaculture. And, you know, one
of the ways I've reallycontextualized these chapters in
(31:46):
the Bhagavad Gita in this thislast year, and I feel like my
understanding of the Gita isalways applied in my garden, or
in the garden that I tend, thegarden that I care for. You
know, the first part in lookingat your work in a garden is just
(32:07):
to grab a chair and sit downthere and observe. And for me,
this is like chapter two of theBhagavad Gita. We're getting
into an in depth study, or let'ssay, an introductory in depth
study of how the mechanics ofthe mind work. You know how we
(32:27):
exist in karma, but we also haveindividual choice, right, these
big issues that the Gitawrestles with, right, when, when
you, when you stake your chairin the garden. You commit
yourself to watching the sunpattern, seeing where the light
is coming through, becomingfamiliar with the insect life,
(32:48):
right? You You literally take abird's eye view, and you come up
to look at the sources of waterclose by, and you look beyond
your fences and to the to thelarger environment, to the
neighborhood of trees that thetrees that you're planting are
going to live with. And it'sonly on that understanding now
(33:12):
that we begin to take skillfulaction and create a
permaculture, or a permanentagriculture situation where
everybody's helping each other,right? So that the ideas that we
plant in companions and wecreate guilds of cooperative
vines and trees and shrubs andherbs and fruits and vegetables
(33:38):
that will attract the birds andto stay longer, to attract the
bees, to stay longer, and we weopen our minds to the to the
whole of the ecosystem, to asgreat as we can think, as much
of a bird's eye view As we canconceive and take action based
(33:59):
on that, yeah. And for me, thisis a great metaphor for karma
yoga as a very cyclic, intuitiveway of being in the world that
is not just considering thepersonal point of view, although
it's not not considering thepersonal point of view, but has
(34:21):
the largesse, or has theMagnanimous, the magnanimous
mind and heart to consider thenon human players, Right? The
other human players, the animaland vegetable players in every
environment, and this helps usto look beyond ourselves and see
(34:46):
it. My efforts are important,but they're not all that's going
on. And I think this isessential in karma yoga.
Nischala Joy Devi (34:55):
I think that scares people to think they're
not as essential. And. And,yeah, it's a beautiful,
beautiful metaphor. And I thinkabout my garden when you say
that, and how things pop up andyou don't even know that they
were there. They just visited,and there they are. And people
(35:15):
call them volunteers or weeds, Ijust call them flowers, and they
just, they're just there. And sowhat you're describing by
sitting there and observing isreally a part of yoga that we
don't most people don't embrace,or don't realize they're
embracing, and that's Yana yoga,because I think in Yani, yoga is
(35:37):
probably the easiest place torecognize our attachments and
all this that we're talkingabout, even when you talk to
someone and have a disagreement,the disagreement is because you
think your way is right, and aslong as we hold on to that, our
(35:57):
karma does not diminish. Ourkarma expands. And when I was
talking about getting intomedicine, it wasn't really end
of life that I was involved withyet. Of course, there's always
end of life involved, but thesepeople came in with with very
severe life threateningdiseases. And what I saw, the
(36:23):
main thing I keep seeing acrossall medicine, is the fear, and I
spent long time getting into thefear. What? What is this fear?
Is it a fear of pain? Yeah,there's definitely a fear of
pain, and there's mostly thisfear of lack of survival. Well,
(36:46):
I live, and we all know, unlikethe garden metaphor, where we
know that the flowers are goingto go at the end of the season,
we know that the corn will bepicked and the corn stalks will
be mowed down. We know thevineyards will change. We don't
(37:06):
really, really believe that asan individual person, although
we see dying all around us, thatwe are actually going to die.
But we hold this tremendousfear, and this fear impacts our
karma constantly, whether weknow it or not, we are always
(37:29):
making decisions based on that,and sometimes we're trying to
prove that we don't have thefear of death. So we drive cars
fast. We drive jump out ofperfectly good airplanes. We do
all kinds of things to prove toourselves that, no, I'm
invulnerable. I'm going to liveforever. It's the little things
(37:55):
that we have to look at forkarma. It's the little everyday
things. Did you see yourneighbor's trash can in the
street, and did you go and pickit up and bring it back? Little
things like that is what changesour life and the world, and it
helps us not focus on this fearof death, but instead, and
(38:20):
people said to me, Well, Ilearned all this, and then I
die. What's the point? Well,that's where the continuum comes
in, the understanding of goingforward, like the garden. My
favorite kind of plant is theperennials, right? I don't have
to do anything next year. Theyjust surprise me and come up
again. That's what I like.
That's my karma, to be able tosit there and and say, Oh, I'm
(38:44):
ready for those roses, I'm readyfor those petunias, I'm ready
for that and to see them rereincarnate each year. It's like
us. We're like bulbs. We're notseeds. We're bulbs, and we keep
going. So all this has to be inMaya, understanding understood.
(39:06):
So it takes, or at least lessensthis fear, the fear of the
unknown, the fear of death, thefear of whatever else it is, so
we can move forward and servewithout that fear. You know, I
brings up to mind the story ofSt Francis and st Claire. And he
(39:32):
was very much afraid of lepersand didn't want to go near them,
whereas st Claire was theopposite. She just went and
brought bread every day and fedthe lepers. And he said, How can
you do that? Aren't you afraidthat you're going to catch it?
It didn't even occur to herbecause of the love in her heart
(39:55):
and because of her purity andher. Continual service. He then
decided to try that too, andwhen he did it, it changed him
also. So this fear that'skeeping us back is also creating
more karma.
Kamala Rose (40:18):
Well, that's a great example to see that these
very, very deep, we'd call thata vasana, a deep, deep pattern,
fear of death, same, similar tothe that desire to succeed, the
desire to be liked, right? Theseare deep. These are deep
(40:38):
patterns. They're calledvasanas, and we all have them,
right? There's no one who is notafraid of death, and there's no
one who does not hope in theircore of themselves to, you know,
to make, to create and to betterthemselves and those that they
love, right? Even even the cowof us, right? We can have common
(40:59):
humanity with everyone, right?
The Good, the Bad, right? Theseare, these are common
motivations to all people. And Ithink there's a real strength
and just knowing that asspiritual as I am, as much as I
have the answers, and I lovethat the sutra that speaks to
that fear of death, right, theinherent even in the wise, yes,
(41:24):
inherent even in the wise,right, that that deep crate
craving or hoarding that we haveof the body and of all the
things that go along with thebody, the mind, the emotions,
The feelings, right, theBuddhist speak in terms of
cherishing our our opinions andour identities to such a great
(41:46):
degree that, you know, it's it'svery difficult to overcome that
sense of individuality, but forunderstand that that's Really
what these teachings are about,and the Gita really starts on
the battlefield and brings tothe forefront the fear of death
(42:06):
as a primary subject that isbeing addressed in this dialog.
And I think in our in ourexperience as meditators and our
work as teachers. I think weboth try to help people
understand that we can, we cansee, we can understand, we can
(42:29):
acknowledge and we can acceptthese parts of ourselves. We're
not going to kill it or stifleit or drown it. But we can, we
can know that there's a part ofme that you know that that has
fear in this area, and if youknow, if you've been through
(42:53):
anything on a health level thathas scared you deeply, I have a
couple times, and you really,you really confront a lot, and
you understand how it motivatesyour actions, how the karmas
that you take from that pointare coming out of that. And I
think it's a good place to be,to be in a place of acceptance
(43:14):
of that, not trying to eliminateit, but maybe just holding space
for the existence of these deepdesires and fears that exist in
all human beings. And I love theattitude that of the Dalai Lama
who says, Every morning, Ipractice, I meditate, and then I
(43:34):
start to think of prepare myselffor my death and these are words
I've taken very personally, andI will admit to no mastery of
nothing but, but I when I saythere has to be an acceptance of
(43:55):
one's humanity, I think this is,this is part of it, or it or it
has been for me to to understandthat the ideals of immortality,
maybe, or of heaven, and thesethings that we receive in our
religious messages that areaimed to quell this fear, right?
It's not that you're going todie. You're going to go to a
(44:18):
beautiful place where all yourdogs will greet you, yeah, yeah,
right, all your friends and yourparents, the angels, and the
angels will sing,
Nischala Joy Devi (44:30):
what is the Muslim? So many Vestal virgins
and yeah, they're promising allthese things.
Kamala Rose (44:37):
I just want my dogs to be there so, but we can
understand why, why this is sucha big hold in religion, the
afterlife and what happens, likea way of understanding this,
what comes next. And, you know,whatever we make of these, I
believe it to be veryindividual, right? We need
(44:58):
different things at differenttimes. Sometimes, right? And
sometimes the idea of the pearlygates and dharma dogs is really
lovely, right? And other timeswe need to just be a little more
honest with ourselves about, youknow, what, what? What am I?
What am I doing today based outof fear? And is that healthy? Is
(45:22):
it making the results that I'mlooking for, or is this
interfering with my presentmoment and the decisions that
I'm making right now,
Nischala Joy Devi (45:36):
when the decisions are made, even after
they're made, and maybe theyweren't the right ones for that
moment. Think about it, becauseeven the going back and
retracing and admitting that itwasn't the right thing at this
time can lessen karma. So Ithink that it's more what we're
(46:04):
looking for. We're looking athere is the idea that this karma
that has been created from whatwe may not even know is now
coming to fruition. How do wedeal with that? And there's
numerous ways to deal with it.
There's not just one way to dealwith it. There's many different
ways to deal with it, and inthat dealing with it, we can
(46:27):
either create more, transform itinto something positive, or many
other ways to do things or thatit can manifest. But I think the
main thing we have to look at isour reaction. And it's very
simple, how do you feelafterwards? How does it make you
(46:49):
feel? And then, if you meditate,when you first sit down to
meditate, what thoughts come up?
What are the first thoughts thatcome up. And also, what are the
first thoughts that come up asyou're falling asleep and in the
morning, that's what you reallyneed to work on. That's where
(47:11):
our point is. No one has to tellyou it's there right in your
mind to see and acknowledge andrecognize. So spend the next
couple days, next couple ofweeks, just looking, observe
your mind. Try not to judge it,just observe it. And how are you
creating more karma ortransforming the karma you
(47:33):
already have?
Kamala Rose (47:36):
It's powerful.
Morning meditation, eveningmeditation, the best times to
sit. So I hope all of ourlisteners will join us first
thing in the morning with yourmantras and your meditations and
your self inquiry. This isreally what I think the Gita is
trying to teach us, is give usthe tools, the means, the
worldview, to understand why weare the way we are and be a
(48:01):
force for good in the world. Sothank you so much for joining us
today for a woman's Gitapodcast. We'll look forward to
being with you next time.
Nischala Joy Devi (48:16):
Namaste.
Thank you so much. You.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
My Favorite Murder with Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark
My Favorite Murder is a true crime comedy podcast hosted by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Hardstark. Each week, Karen and Georgia share compelling true crimes and hometown stories from friends and listeners. Since MFM launched in January of 2016, Karen and Georgia have shared their lifelong interest in true crime and have covered stories of infamous serial killers like the Night Stalker, mysterious cold cases, captivating cults, incredible survivor stories and important events from history like the Tulsa race massacre of 1921. My Favorite Murder is part of the Exactly Right podcast network that provides a platform for bold, creative voices to bring to life provocative, entertaining and relatable stories for audiences everywhere. The Exactly Right roster of podcasts covers a variety of topics including historic true crime, comedic interviews and news, science, pop culture and more. Podcasts on the network include Buried Bones with Kate Winkler Dawson and Paul Holes, That's Messed Up: An SVU Podcast, This Podcast Will Kill You, Bananas and more.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.