Yoga is essentially a dynamic expression in the interpretation of the western mind. We are vitally concerned in any ideology which will promise more efficient living, more abundant health and more material improvements. And this no doubt attracts many students to follow Karma Yoga, the Yoga of Action.

Disciplining our lives and achieving self-mastery through Yogic techniques enables us to develop our own self culture lives and accomplish our inherent aspirations. Everyone has abilities that can be used for one’s own self culture and purposes or for the benefit of others.  We are all granted opportunities to develop our own talents and to in some way help others. Many are lazy and find both avenues neglected but will find a degree of disappointment or frustration is felt with any procrastination.

Everyone must nurture a degree of unselfish longing to contribute to society. Until this is fulfilled in some way, life will tend to seem wasted in spite of all the transitory experiences and pleasures.

Yogic practice develops self confidence as we come to understand the presiding natural law of Karma, or cause and effect that rules all action and determines repercussions. We know that constructive effort is rewarded and goodness will result in positives in life. Karma however is not a bargaining table. Its great calculations are left to higher agencies than our human system of debits and credits. The ancient Egyptians understood that both the heart and mind are weighed in the balance to determine the quality of our actions and depicted this in their frescoes. It is important in understanding Karma Yoga to realize that right action follows right thought and right feeling.

There comes a time that each of us must make decisions about how we choose to spend our years ahead and what we would wish to do. In the planning that helps us focus upon priorities we have to make choices such as whether we will live entirely selfishly or to include a degree of effort towards contributing to the community.  We are all aware of the many avenues where help is needed by those less fortunate and it is this awareness that helps to motivate us to act. It can become very uncomfortable if we choose to do nothing.

Westerners are active and purposeful. Studying and applying the principles both of physical and mental activity and balancing energies with quiet meditative moments help to make us candidates for leading a vital, healthy and rewarding life that satisfies our personality as well as our soul. The Karma Yogi understands and enjoys activity and work. Work is enhanced by the injection of enthusiasm. This, the Bhatia’s energy, is known and expressed by Kahil Gibran in his simple words “Work is love made visible.”

Westerners can accomplish much by their dynamic approach to life when the passive power developed through meditation inspires their enterprises to reach beyond material purposes alone to goals that satisfy the deep needs of others and to advance human progress.

We are taught and most of us profess to believe in the natural law of Divine Justice and the wisdom in acting with “do unto others…” in mind as a guiding or modifying influence. It is a benign law to assist us in making right choices in life.

We may readily also believe that each of us has the wonderful privilege of free will that allows us to make our own decisions and to choose our path through life.  But we may forget that we determine our future fortune or otherwise by our choices made today.

The Karmic Law is one that has been recognized throughout the centuries and taught in all schools of philosophy and religion. It is considered to be the fundamental teaching every spiritual teacher is to impart.

Although varying slightly in phrasing or words it is interesting that this simple teaching is found to be common in all belief systems.

It is the spirit of our own interpretation as well as its application that will influence us in our lives.

There are no favourites in life and we all live under this natural law known to the scientist as that of cause and effect and must recognize that it is we who by our actions today, determine our long term life tomorrows.

Karmic Law is reliable as Universal accountant and computer extraordinaire, with limitless memory.

Our task is to learn to trust in it and live by it as does the Karma Yogi.

Yoga is essentially a dynamic expression in the interpretation of the western mind. We are vitally concerned in any ideology which will promise more efficient living, more abundant health and more material improvements. And this no doubt attracts many students to follow Karma Yoga, the Yoga of Action.

Disciplining you life and achieving self-mastery through Yogic techniques will enable you to develop your life to become a fruitful accomplishment of all your inherent aspirations.

Everyone has abilities which would enable them to use for the benefit of others. Most people cover up their talents by a slothful attitude, or smother there secret longings for expression, under disappointment, frustration and procrastination etc. Practice of Yoga develops confidence in oneself and focuses what it is that you can give to the world – what it is that you and you alone can contribute.  Then truly, your life is not wasted if there is a purpose to your life other than your own personal experiencing of good and bad, knowledge and ignorance, pain and pleasure.

Yoga in action includes achievement of health through following the health rules of natural nutrition, yogic exercise of the whole body, asanas, breathing and relaxation.

Develop your own self culture and self confidence by self-searching and to discover your inner abilities. Gentle persuasion and patience brings success in all things, including physical mastery.

Cultivate your mind and concentration so that you may become an authority on your chosen studies.

Practise meditation and clarify your psychological nature so there is no friction between the conscious and the subconscious mind.

Follow the traditional rules of ethics and be faithful to the moral codes that are in accordance with your own highest ideals.

Particularly follow the principle of ahimsa and refrain from hurting or harming living beings or being violent or destructive in any sense.

Remember in all your actions, the wisdom teachings that try to impress upon us that what we do in action and the spirit in which we do anything, returns to us in kind at some time as natural justice through the Law of Karma.

From a western point of view, in attempting to understand and embrace the qualities and traditions of worth from other cultures, there are certain limitations. If we are to be sincere in our motivation and respectful in our application of any traditions of other cultures we must also be accurate in our understanding of their meaning.

Western students of Yoga are at present happily embracing much of the philosophies and ideologies attributed to Hindu and Buddhist faiths. Many are enriched by their extended knowledge and understanding that will help them in striving for excellence in their lives, their actions and their behaviour.

The general decline in western attention to these core values and even a resistance to them, allows others who wish for better, to be excused for their eager appetite to improve our own behavior that alongside others, is seen to be boorish and crude. Habits can be very different. For instance …In western countries is the warm handshake by which we demonstrate our trust and measure the sincerity of the other. The eastern person, in adapting to this custom of the west finds the physical contact breaks his own code that calls for him to place his hands together, to show sincerity, and by a subtle head gesture to demonstrate his respect. Continuing with this example, there are some westerners who are comfortable in following the traditional Yoga greeting, as some businessmen in contact with the west will adjust to the handshake. We are only called upon to be sincere in our social habits.

In the meantime, our interest to understand the terms that are new to us and inevitably focus as we pursue our study of Yoga, we will seek to comprehend the importance of the term Dharma. Scholars will understand that there are differences of interpretation attributed to Hindu and Buddhist systems but generally it is the first that is associated with classical yoga teachings.

The word is simply ‘Dharma’ but it takes many words to explain the complexity that lies within it. Firstly we consider righteousness, moral integrity, self discipline, dutiful responsibility to others, and following natural law. Within it, Dharma also represents a lifestyle with its keynote being a life of goodness, constructive work, compassion and brotherhood. It is also representative of a prescribed pattern that is like a blueprint within us, an outline or ultimate divine plan and purpose traced out for us to complete through our own efforts in this life in fulfilling our own highest capacity and potential and in working to become that person… our spiritual self-image. Dharma implies that we accept our fate and destiny. As we become conscious of this ‘blueprint’, then inspired by it, we willingly construct our lives accordingly.