Krishna outlines five factors taken from Vedic Sankhya philosophy that are needed for accomplishing action:
1. The field of action (where you perform the action)
2. The body
3. The senses
4. Bodily functions
5. The body’s ruling deities
No matter what a person does, says, or thinks, rightly or wrongly, whether helpful or unhelpful, these five factors are involved.
To say that the Soul is the doer would be to express an incorrect or delusional view, because the Soul is eternal, unmoving, and wholly uninvolved in action.
Only those who act without ego or agenda (‘I am not the doer’) and without concern for receiving favorable or unfavorable results, and who acts without being bound by the action in either way will achieve Self-Realization.
There are some issues with this type of talk however. First, since all people have some combination of gunas, and the goal of life is to go beyond the gunas, one needs to be careful to not judge others according to their perceived predominant guna.
This sets up a ‘holier-than-thou attitude in one’s mind that destroys the goodness of one’s good acts.
No human being has a life that is 100% pure. Having human characteristics means, even for the greatest saints, they too must be on guard to not get caught in subtle ego traps.
Secondly, merely having the intellectual awareness that one’s thoughts are rajasic or tamasic is not enough to transition to sattwic thinking. In fact, being locked into less than sattwic thoughts and actions, even though temporary, is an example of bondage.
A person can see themselves trapped, but not be able to release themselves from these thoughts. It is a subtle form of addiction and is related to the addiction to materialism, greed, pride, and power.
Thus, just discussing or reading such lofty ideas as set out by Lord Krishna, is not enough to transform one’s life or to liberate the subtlest levels of the reader’s mind. It is a good start, however, but then the real work, the lifelong work begins.
So when reading such philosophy, it is best to remember that the words are there to guide you. But when the storm comes and the mind becomes locked by anger, greed, pride, lethargy, or other smaller-minded patterns, one can only pray with the greatest of sin- cerity and desperation for God to release them from this bondage.
As Krishna has said, God is the doer in life. So even when we are attempting to become free from rajasic and tamasic mental tendencies, it is actually the grace of God that allows for such release. When times become more despondent, it causes a person to more fully and sincerely (often out of sheer desperation) put all their energies and intentions into calling God for their release and asking for salvation from the current storm. Such storms keep the devotee humble in this ongoing life-process.
Therefore, being the ideal sattwic person is something to continually strive for, while looking inward instead of outward. (As mentioned, the goal is to move beyond sattwa to Eternal Soul; but in the context of mental attributes, sattwa is the most desirable attribute prior to eternal transcendence.) [Verse 13–17]
