What is the Mind? – II

Actually, everyone’s mind possesses those three moods or qualities. There are times when the mind is calm, peaceful, joyful and attentive. You experience clarity, confidence, contentment, alertness and brilliance. Knowledge easily seeps in. There is a sense of well-being and you feel generous toward the whole universe. Such a mind is called sattvic.At other times, the mind is full of desires, passion, ambition, agitation and restlessness. Your five senses are vibrantly alive and you are roused into action, driven by either lust or ego. ‘Lust’ here, in its broadest sense, means ‘an obsessive desire for something’, and again does not necessarily refer to sensuality… although at its grossest, the term certainly covers sexual attraction, which ultimately is an apt metaphor for just how powerful our desires can be. Similarly, ‘ego’ here is not necessarily a synonym for ‘pride’, ‘conceit’ or ‘boastfulness’, although it is true that in its extreme, that is how ego manifests. In the final analysis, the mere concept of individuality—as opposed to the oneness that underlies everything in the universe—is the ‘ego’. And let’s face it, most of us undertake our actions from this platform of ‘I’, ‘me’ and ‘mine’. We work to accumulate unto our little ‘self’, either wealth, glory and prestige or simply comfort and feel-good factors. Under such conditions, one’s mind is said to be rajasic..There are still other times when you feel slow, dull, lazy, unwilling to extend yourself or to even think. You take a ‘chalta hai’ (it will do) attitude. You compromise more readily than usual. You settle for less than you would in your brighter moments. In fact, you seek out the lowest common denominator. The devil may care, but why should you? Intellectually and emotionally, you are on a slippery slope, and you are going downhill…. Toward sleep, indifference, a kind of inertness or death. This is the tamasic mind.