Twinn Swan

Causation, causation, causation. What caused me to take a certain route at the expense of all others? If I had made a different choice, I would be living a very different life.

The word karma has a strong relationship to the very idea of causation. The law of karma is the law of causation: the inevitable cause and sequence of events that arise from performing or not performing a particular action. Wherever there is a cause, there is indeed, an effect.

We Hindus call it the law of karma as we know that a particular action (or inaction) will naturally activate the tendency to embark upon a series and sequence of events that can only occur after a particular action (or inaction) is taken.

One event is followed by another and another and so on. Sometimes, these occurrences happen simultaneously. These events are not only foreseeable, they are probable.

The only way to escape the bondage of the law of cause and effect is to go beyond the restrictions of the law by transcending the causation itself.

Each human life is but that of a current and a wave that arises and vanishes in the great ocean of existence. We are all a part of the tide and we all tend to behave as the tide does. But what a man truly wants–whether he realises it or not–is to get out of this whirlpool that endlessly repeats itself.

Karma yoga is the secret of work. It is there to teach us how to work and how to organise the way in which we work. A great deal of energy may be sent in vain if we do not learn to apply karma yoga to our lives. When we understand the concept of Karma Yoga we see that this world of ours–this wave that we are a part of–only lasts five minutes. It is something that we have to pass through. Freedom cannot be found in the wave but in what exists beyond it.

When we identify ourselves with the work that we do, we instantly become miserable. If we do not allow ourselves to become identified with our work, we overcome the misery that our work is causing us. “I” and “mine” is the cause of all misery. We do not need to attach our identity to our work. We can do it with non-attachment and humility.

We can then just do it and then release it into the infinite ocean, knowing that we had an opportunity to be a part of the wave.