Justin Stone on Being-Consciousness-Bliss

Being-Consciousness-Bliss

What is life composed of? According to the Indian philosophers, life is composed of Sat-Chit-Ananda, “Being-Consciousness-Bliss.” What are you really? There are many ways you can answer that question. Paul Reps would say, “You are light.” Somebody else would say, “You are sound cognized as light.” In India they are saying, “You are Being-Consciousness-Bliss,” which is very hopeful, isn’t it! It gives a wonderful feeling.

The Indians are essentially devotional. This is why I believe there is almost no Buddhism in India anymore in India where, ironically, the Buddha is considered the greatest of its sons. India is devotional, and devotion does not play a part at all in Buddhism – what would you be devoted to? Karma, however, is accepted by everybody in India. Action brings reaction, cause brings effect, and therefore, you can make your future anything you want. Just plan it the way you want, act that way and set the causes in motion. If you plant a rose seed, you’re not going to get a banana tree. Plant sounds pretty simple, doesn’t it? Just plant that which you want to grow. In Karma Yoga, you do the deed so you get the reward in the future. But the Indian feels that at the end of your life, your last thought is what will bring about your reincarnation or transmigration. Your next life depends on your last thought in this life. So you can say, “Well, I’m going to make my last thought a pretty good one.” But of course, your last thought is going to be based on what you stood for in your lifetime.

Karma & Chi

India is entirely immersed in this thought of karma, which is not exactly as we see it. Your karma is based on the habit energies you have built, these vashanas mentioned earlier. What is it that helps build these vashanas, what is the means for building these vashanas? It is the Chi.

Those who have taken T’ai Chi Chih know what I’m talking about. The intrinsic energy, the vital force, is, if you want to put it into popularized terms, the means by which the absolute comes into the everyday world, comes into being. There has to be a force by which this comes into being and it is the Chi that does it. We are a product of the Chi. But it is the Chi, the force, which causes these vrittis, these mental disturbances, which become habit energies.

The tie between the Chi and the habit energies is a very close one and this is the basis for karma. Most of the holy people in India feel that what you see, whether it’s the world or people, is karma, frozen karma. You are seeing karma. As I’ve said, I’ve been with many teachers who can read karma from your face. Sai Baba said to those who came to him, “Now there’s no sense in asking for my sympathy and pleading. I know what you’ve done in the past and I know what you’re going to be doing in the future.”

From Gateway to Eastern Philosophy & Religion by Justin Stone, p. 22 & 23, ©2006

Available from Good Karma Publishing