Understanding how the three modes of material nature affect us in our functioning

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Let’s look at the modes a little bit further. So there are three modes of material nature. Krishna says that all living beings are bound by the three modes.
This is 14.5. And then 14.13, 11, 12, 13 he talks about how do three modes function? How do they affect us in our function? So he uses the word prakasha and pravrtti. Prakasha is illumination. It’s capability to see things clearly.
And pravrtti is action. So in the mode of ignorance, Krishna says He says aprakasha. Neither illumination nor pravrtti, neither action.
There is intoxication, there is delusion. In the mode of ignorance, we just become, some people just get paralyzed. Sometimes some people live like almost in a state of daze.
It’s like that. Some people make things happen. Some people watch things happen.
And some people wonder what happened. So those in the mode of ignorance, they wonder what happened. What’s going on? So just in a daze, there is neither action nor contemplation.
And nowadays people may just spend a lot of time watching video games, playing video games, watching movies. And sometimes the digitally created world can for many people become an alternative to the real world. In America, an increasing social problem is that many young people, they grow into adolescence, they go into youth and still they don’t feel any need to take any responsibility.
Just live on in their parents’ houses and there is social security, the government will pay for you. They just stay in their homes, play video games, watch movies, surf on the net. And they are basically living life second hand.
Just watching someone do it and think that I am doing it to enjoy. When we watch movies. It’s basically the Bhagavatam talks about how they are eating, sleeping, mating, defending.
They are the basic bodily drives. And all human beings, all living beings crave for it and human beings also crave for it. But when we are caught in watching movies, it is, say in movies there is a romantic scene, the hero and heroine are embracing and people start whistling over there.
So now what are they doing? It is not even mating, it is second hand mating. Somebody else is doing it and I think, oh if I was there it would be so enjoyable. That’s why most of the time when people watch movies, they take something like popcorn and they keep popping it in.
Why? Because everything is imaginary, something has to be real. So, entertainment as a part of life is fine. But when entertainment becomes a substitute for life, then it becomes a major problem.
So, in the mode of ignorance, that becomes facilitated. The technology by which movies are made, the creativity with which a movie is made, that may not be in ignorance. There may be intelligence used over there.
But the product which is consumed by people, that is often increasing the mode of ignorance. So, in the mode of ignorance, one doesn’t want, even to eat, sleep, mate, defend, it requires some energy, some effort, some work. But in the mode of ignorance, one doesn’t want to do even that.
So, when one doesn’t want to do even that, then the result is, one goes into an illusory world and tries to just get some kind of enjoyment in that illusory world. This is the mode of ignorance. And in the mode of passion, Krishna says, लोभः प्रवृतिरारंभः कर्मणामशि महस्तुर्हा रजस्ये तानि जायंते भूरृते भरतर्षभा He says, अप्रवृति, there is a strong desire, greed, there is passionate action over there.
And that kind of action is there, that means, people just running around, do this, do this, do this. We normally speak to express our thoughts. Some people speak to discover their thoughts.
They speak, I should have spoken that, I am sorry. So, in some cases, there is, in the mode of passion, there is first action and then contemplation. Should have done it, should have not done it.
Why did I do it? Maybe I should not have done it. So, in the mode of passion, there is a strong inclination to try to fix it. But whether I am fixing it or I am worsening it, I don’t think about it at that time.
This is the mode of passion. And in the mode of goodness, Krishna says, He says, He says, when all the doors of the senses, doors of the body, which are the senses, they are illumined with knowledge. That is the mode of goodness.
Now, what does this mean? The doors of the body are illumined with knowledge. Is it that person in the mode of goodness, light comes out of their ears, light comes out of their nose, light comes out of their mouth? Not exactly. Here, prakasha is not used in literal sense of light.
Prakasha is used in the sense of knowledge. That there is knowledge about how to process what comes in and what goes out of the senses. Let’s say there is a door over here, the door is locked, the door is open and we will observe who is coming and who is going out.
But if there is a distant door and around the door there is complete darkness, then some lawbreaker, some thief may come in, we may not even notice. Or we may have a child whom we take care of, the child slips out, not even notice. So the door is dark, then who is coming in, who is going out, we may not realize.
So similarly, in the lower modes, the doors of the body, that is the senses, there is no brightness over there. That means, we don’t understand, what should I see, what should I not see? What should I eat, what should I not eat? What should I hear, what should I not hear? So basically, how to channel, how to process the inputs that are coming in from the world, that illumination comes in the mode of goodness. And when there is the mode of goodness, then, okay, if somebody is coming in, we have the door bolted, and then we have a security camera.
Okay, this person is familiar. This person doesn’t look familiar. We ask, who is it? They identify, then we let them in.
But if they look a little kind of threatening person, we don’t allow them in. So basically, there is first contemplation and then action. The contemplation comes because there is illumination, there is the light that is there, light of knowledge by which we can process.
So, we, when we are talking about understanding our inner world, we need to come to the mode of goodness. At least. Then we can process the inner world more effectively.