Yoga and Total Health — February 2018

YOGA AND TOTAL HEALTH • February 2018YOGA AND TOTAL HEALTH • February 2018^2323

strong opinions about anything. I have
been working on this for some time
and I can see some progress. Another
help is often remembering the words
“there is nothing happening in the
world that God would not know of ”.
So if God does not see any reason to
intervene, it would be ridiculous if I
wanted to do so. (Although there is
this doubt: Does not God - not God
in the highest way but at some plane
below where He has some kind of
form - also work through human
instruments of all kinds and levels in
order to intervene?). Of course, there
is also the helpful thought of Karma.
Everything happening has to happen
as a consequence of former actions
and does so according to an infallible
law. Only individuals themselves can
clear their Karmic debts, which might
require that they suffer. So maybe our
present time is even a potentially good
time, contrary to appearances, because
it offers so many opportunities for
clearing accounts by paying off old
debts through suffering. As painful
as this is for so many, it would be
one factor in cleansing the mental
or metaphysical atmosphere. Then
other influxes could happen. All the
influences on people all over the globe
would then be for the better instead
of being for the worse, as they are
now so widely propogated (through
silly and otherwise bad TV-programs,
one-sidedly materialistic education,
advertising and marketing strategies,
sexual over-stimulation, chemically
polluted food etc.). Dr. Jayadeva once
said in reference to one Yoga Sutra that
present and future are an entity, the
future already being contained in the
presence. So the present suffering was
the future of former wrong, may it have
been done knowingly or unknowingly.
But, consequently, the present

suffering - suffering being a cleansing

agent - would contain in itself a good

future. Of course, these thoughts

of mine can only make sense if one

believes in Karma, i.e. chains of

seemingly endless reincarnations,

which will come to an end upon

“liberation” or Kaivalya. If one believes

in only one lifetime, my above words

must appear very wrong and unjust,

since it is very often the good people

who suffer and the demoniacal types

of persons who flourish.

To come back to what is said in the

column, there is also another side to

the coin. Thinking that “everything is all

right” (likewise thinking that everyone

deserves what he gets because it is his

Karma) can also be used in wrong ways.

It can make one lazy, complacent, and

cold-hearted; it can justify preferring

blindness to opening one’s eyes to

disturbing facts, it can also promote

opportunism and wrong conduct. So

the column tells us that what is very

much needed is to think more about

what is most important in one’s life and

set one’s objective accordingly. And

then, of course, work as well as one can

towards reaching that objective. But

thinking correctly, committing oneself

to an objective, resisting distractions

and temptations, and doing work if

one would rather enjoy pleasures - all

this is not at all easy. One needs help

again and again and right guidance.

Yoga, if taught rightly and practiced

seriously, can provide much of this

required help. However, according to

my experience, if the physical yoga

practices are only done mechanically,

this help is limited to just feeling better

than before. (Of course, if one has felt

very bad before, this is already very

welcome, but not enough yet for a

better orientation in life.) And if the

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