The law of karma is an eternal law and it is the truth. People do not see it because they have no time. But if one analyses oneself, it must be accepted that one is a product of something. One is not just born – the body is the result of a union between two forces. Nobody is immaculate, and therefore each person is a product. Even as the body is a product, the mind must also be a product. It can’t be said that the body is the product of two forces and the mind is independent. The way one thinks, feels and imagines, the way one acts in the family and the way one moves is the product of some cause.
Therefore, each person’s life on this planet is one link in a great chain. This is the truth, but at the same time, nature has given man a little spark of independent will. In yoga, this spark is called purushartha, the power of the spirit. Everyone is born with this power, but it is in seed form and usually one is not able to use it. Destiny and purushartha are two different things.
This is what I have seen in my life. I did not desire whatever I got; I could not even have believed that all this would happen.
I spent twelve years in my guru’s ashram in Rishikesh and worked hard there. After that, I became a bhikshu, a beggar. I would spread a blanket and put a bowl in front of me at fairs. I would buy my meals with whatever money people gave and sleep in a dharamshala. I wandered like that for many years. I could never have imagined that I would spread yoga to every corner of the world! Yoga is not my subject either; I never studied it. I studied Vedanta and Sanskrit. I have often asked myself, “How did all this happen?” I did not think or act; I did not have the capability or even the courage.
When I studied the lives of many people and thought about it, I came to the conclusion that one will receive whatever one has to receive from destiny, and the work that one does is the need of ahamkara, ego.