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IN THIS EPISODE
In July we learned that action doesn't bind us - attachment to the outcome does. But the tradition doesn't stop there: it builds an entire path out of it. This month we begin the four paths of yoga - karma, jñāna, bhakti, rāja - opening with KARMA YOGA: a life of offering up our actions, where the cooking, the teaching, the sweeping becomes the practice itself.
WHAT YOU'LL LEARN
✦ The Vyādha Gītā: why the renunciate was out-yogied by a housewife and a butcher - "it's not the work that binds or frees us, it's only the one performing it"
✦ What karma yoga is: any mundane action used to connect us to the universal
✦ The Gītā's three movements: niṣkāma karma (action without craving the result), yajña bhāva (action as offering), īśvara arpaṇa (dedicating every act and its fruit to the divine)
✦ Why the cave fantasy fails: removing the crows doesn't remove the anger - your life is the best environment for practice
✦ Aaron on the monk with the cigarette, the Coke backlash, and why purity culture is the commodification of yoga, not yoga
✦ Paige's medicine for action by doṣa: commitment and consistency for vāta, anonymous seva for pitta, fresh new action for kapha
✦ Eating as karma yoga: plating up whatever you eat and offering it to the digestive fire
✦ Idaṁ na mama - "this is not mine" - offering up the fruits of your practice
TEXTUAL REFERENCES
✦ Vyādha Gītā, Mahābhārata: the monk, the housewife, and the butcher of Mithilā
✦ Bhagavad Gītā 3.9: action performed as sacrifice does not bind - all other action binds us to this world
✦ Bhagavad Gītā 3.20: "it was by action alone that Janaka and the others reached perfection" - even a king reached liberation this way
✦ Bhagavad Gītā 5.10: one who acts placing all actions in Brahman, abandoning attachment, is untouched by fault as a lotus leaf is untouched by water
TRY THIS IN YOUR PRACTICE
✦ Pick one daily action - dishes, walking, mowing - and do it with no distraction: no phone, no podcast, just presence
✦ Go to work this week to make your workplace better for everyone in it - the same job, performed as offering
✦ Plate up whatever you eat (yes, even the chocolate), sit down, and offer it to your digestive fire
✦ End your practice with hands together: idaṁ na mama - whatever I've gained, it is not mine; I offer it up
✦ Leave us a comment: what's the one daily action you're turning into practice this week?
SHARE & CONNECT
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We run a yoga studio in Berwick, Victoria, offering classes, workshops, and Yoga Teacher Training programs. Wherever you are on your journey, we’d love to connect with you.
HARI OM
