Guiding Light: Prarabdha Karma Kshayam

The karma of the past, happening, future occurring are classified as sanchita, prarabdha, and aagami. The rough explanation can be the sanchita is the big stock that has to be cleared before the jeeva ‘frees itself’, prarabdha is the scoopful that is given for the current life to undergo and clear off. Aagami is the future occurrence that is based on the current accumulation of fresh karma as well.

Though each of the above karmas are important and matter, the seeker feels the heaviness of the prarabdha alone. The reason is simple, one is embedded in the current life and conscious of the current suffering alone. The corporate equivalent analogy can be one may be highly leveraged but the current servicing requirements matter the most. As corporates look for ‘working capital financing’, humans look for the ‘spiritual capital financing’ to tide over the current miseries.

It is true that the prarabdha has to be undergone but the good point to note is the depth and breadth of suffering in terms of intensity and duration may be flexible depending on various mitigation means available. The mitigation for the prarabdha happens through mantra (cosmic key sounds), wearing the ‘ratna’ (gems), and also through ‘dana’ (charitable acts). But which one to follow and how the mitigation happens are the questions often seekers come across.

The cancellation of the karma doesn’t happen in the strict sense, meaning two units of negative act are never cancelled by two units of positive act. The above prarabdha triggers the mind for more skewed actions, but mitigation often moderates the thinking and prevents one from getting into negative spiral more deeply.

Additionally, on the physical plane only ‘roga’ (dis-ease) makes one suffer as the body is involved. Most of the deeper suffering is at higher levels. Drawing from the kosha theory of our traditional wisdom, roga bothers the ‘annamaya kosha’, the psychological suffering happens at the ‘pranamaya’ / ’manomaya’/ ‘vigyanamaya’ kosha levels. The prarabdha karma gets reduced to ashes or ‘kshayam’ happens when the wisdom dawns. You are no longer embedded into the spiral game of ‘Paramapada Sopana’ (Snakes & Ladders) and you have reached the highest. This is the promise of Gitacharya Krishna that Jnana burns the Karma. We are free forever.

(Prof S Ainavolu is a Mumbai-based teacher of tradition and management. He is with VPSM. Views are personal. https://www.ainavolu.in/blog)

Published on: Wednesday, November 08, 2023, 06:00 AM IST