of my wife and the fact that I did not cry. Do not think that I did not,
and do not still, feel it as much as any man. The yogi is human. In fact,
through the compassion he gains, he is the most human of humans.
Nevertheless, in the transcendent but razor-alert peace of meditation,
he views life from the summit of Mount Nature.
The qualities of nature (guna) have until now been treated as the
most arcane of esoteric knowledge, unsuitable for the general public. I
do not believe in that attitude. I suffered from it when my own guru
said I was unfit for pranayama. Yet the subject is difficult, and so for
the sake of the general reader, I will offer one last analogy. In all phe
nomena the three guna are present, but always in variable proportions.
As the proportions change, so do natural phenomena emerge (which
we call birth), grow and decay (which we call existence or life), and dis
appear again (which we call death). The odd but striking parallel that
I offer you is not supported by scientific knowledge on my part. It is
Einstein's famous equation E = MCZ, in which E is energy (rajas), M
is mass (tamas), and Cis the speed of light (sattva). Energy, mass, and
light are endlessly bound together in the universe. An analogy of this
might be that light itself (sattva) displays in physics dual attributes. It
is neither a wave nor a particle, yet, depending on the method of ob
servation used, it can be perceived as either a discrete photon (tamas)
with a specific location or as a wave (rajas). Even at our more prosaic
level, we can learn to observe the changing interplay of these three
properties.
There is a practical point to this. Once the principles of nature
have been withdrawn into their root, their potential remains dor
mant, which is why a person in the state of samadhi is but cannot
do. The outward form of nature has folded up like a bird's wings.
If the practitioner does not pursue his practice with sufficient zeal,
but rests on his laurels, even at this point, the principles of nature
will be reactivated to ill effect. Many are the God-men who have
fallen.
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