Many have bought Vietnamese Dong or Zimbabwean Dollars and some among them have already begun the process of gifting others while others are planning projects that will benefit the world.
Therefore it may be a good time to begin discussing the spiritual path that the masters of enlightenment have over the ages talked about that’s appropriate to those who serve through works of charity and empowerment of others.
Hindus call it karma yoga or the yoga of action. They also call it seva or selfless service.
I’d like to consult the wisdom of Earth and extraterrestrial sages on the attitude and actions consistent with the divine qualities when one approaches subjects like money, charity, and selfless service.
Karma yoga, as I understand it, results in a taming of the ego because what one exercises and causes to expand, rather than the ego and its desires (summarized in the phrase “I want”), is the compassionate heart.
The galactics often speak of two kinds of society: service-to-self and service-to-others. Karma yogis dedicate themselves to the service of others.
Sri Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita or Song of God is often pointed to as the foremost expositor of all the yogas. Here he is on karma yoga.
He tells us that main contribution of karma yoga to enlightenment (which is the purpose of life) is that “if you can understand and follow [the method of the karma yoga], you will be able to break the chains of desire which bind you to your actions.” (1)
So we’ll stop hankering after worldly possessions and pleasures, which binds us to this world and to the wheel of birth and death.
He adds:
“In this yoga, even the abortive attempt is not wasted. Nor can it produce a contrary result. Even a little practice of this yoga will save you from the terrible wheel of rebirth and death.” (2)
In karma yoga, “the will is directed singly toward one ideal.” (3) Always we see ourselves serving God and see the person we’re serving as God. How better to release unitive consciousness than to see and serve everyone as God?
And Krishna adds that “when a man lacks this discrimination, his will wanders in all directions, after innumerable aims.” (4) When we don’t see others as God and serve them, then our mind wanders after trips to Disneyland, a sports car, a love affair – all the desires that spring up in the desiring mind.
In the Bhagavad Gita, Arjuna practices karma yoga by selflessly serving Krishna, who, like Jesus, was an incarnation of God
In the Bhagavad Gita, Arjuna practices karma yoga by selflessly serving Krishna, who, like Jesus, was an incarnation of God.
Krishna tells us that “work is holy when the heart of the worker Is fixed on the Highest.” (5) When we can work with our mind on God, or the Divine Mother, or the master we serve, then work of whatever kind we do – leading a nation, sweeping the streets – is sanctified.
Therefore, “whatever your action, food or worship, whatever the gift that you give to another; whatever your vow to the work of the spirit: … lay these also as offerings before me” and we’ll have sanctified our work. (6)
In fact, Sri Krishna says, it’s hard to lay action aside and renounce the fruits of action without following the disciplined path of karma yoga that he lays out.
Many people push aside the yoga of action in favor of the yoga of meditation. But Sri Krishna advises:
“Let him who would climb In meditation to heights of the highest Union with Brahman [God] take for his path the yoga of action [karma yoga]: Then when he nears that height of oneness His acts will fall from him, his path will be tranquil. “(7)
“It is hard to renounce action without following the yoga of action. This yoga purifies the man of meditation, hringing him soon to Brahman. (8)
The yoga of knowledge is called in Hinduism jnana yoga. Sri Krishna tells us that those who follow the yoga of knowledge and those who follow the yoga of action both reach God.
“The wise see knowledge and action as one: They see truly. Take either path and tread it to the end: The end is the same. There the followers of action meet the seekers after knowledge In equal freedom.” (9)
The secret of karma yoga rightly performed is that the action carried out is done without thought of reward, without thought for the fruits of the action. It’s done in service to God.
What typifies the action of the individual who performs karma yoga fruitfully is that he or she has given up attachment to sensory pleasures and material possessions. Synonyms for this attitude are “detachment” and “renunciation.” Paramahansa Ramakrishna says that “renunciation means to have dispassion for the things of the world.” (10)
And Sr Shankara tells us that:
“Renunciation is the giving-up of all the pleasures of the eyes, the ears, and the other senses, the giving-up of all objects of transitory enjoyment, the giving-up of the desire for a physical body as well as for the highest kind of spirit-body of a god.” (11)
We’re aware that Archangel Michael, for instance, wants us to enjoy ourselves in this lifetime, in part I think because we’re Starseeds who’ve already ascended probably more than once already and he wishes us to anchor ourselves in Gaia and not to wish to leave prematurely. But if we lived many centuries ago, the road to Ascension would have been hard and our progress would have been aided by renouncing worldly possessions and pleasure.
Turning form the world to God would, in those days, have been the basic spiritual movement.
One way of talking about the primary obstacle to enlightenment is to talk about ego and desire, a short form for which is the phrase “I want.” Sri Krishna says: “Those who have renounced ego and desire will reap no fruit at all, either in this world or in the next.” (12)
Reaping no fruit means incurring no karmic debt, which eventually leads to freedom from the wheel of birth and death. In our terms, liberation comes with being firmly anchored in the Fifth Dimension, which follows Ascension.
We know of course that whatever karma we don’t clear before Ascension will be forgiven us, as SaLuSa of Sirius tells us here: “When you ascend, karma will have been cleared by you or ‘written off’ through the Law of Grace.” (13)
Thus Ascension is moksha or liberation. The one who ascends need no longer be born into the physical world of the Third Dimension. And we know form our own sources among the Company of Heaven, after Ascension, we need no longer die to change our form. We can simply choose a different bodily form for ourselves if and when we desire to.
As SaLuSa explains:
“Of course when you rise up into the higher levels, you have a simple transition from one life to another without going through death. You do it through your own choosing, as you decide when it is your time to move on. You can literally step out of your old body into a new one as you desire.” (14)
This is moksha or liberation from death and rebirth. Engaging in karma yoga or the yoga of action is one way of preparing ourselves for Ascension or liberation.
Footnotes
(1) Sri Krishna in Swami Prabhavananda and Christopher Isherwood, trans., Bhagavad-Gita. The Song of God. New York and Scarborough: New American Library, 1972; c1944, 39. [Hereafter BG.]
(2) Loc. cit.
(3) Loc. cit.
(4) Loc. cit.
(5) Ibid., 47.
(6) Ibid. 84.
(7) Ibid,. 63.
(8) Ibid., 57.
(9) Loc. cit.
(10) Paramahansa Ramakrishna in Swami Nikhilananda, trans., The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna. New York: Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center, 1978; c1942 179.
(11) Shankara in Swami Prabhavananda and Christopher lsherwood, Shankara’s Crest-Jewel of Discrimination. Hollywood: Vedanta Press, 1975; c1947, 35.
(12) Sri Krishna in BG, 121.
(13) SaLuSa, Aug. 3, 2011, at https://www.treeofthegoldenlight.com/First_Contact/Channeled_Messages_by_Mike_Quinsey.htm.
(14) SaLuSa, Dec. 2, 2011.