Lost in tamas, lost in rajas, lost in sattva
Like the Indian philosophy says there are three main states of consciousness and development. People who are quite dull, raw, lazy, earthy belong to tamas, darkness. Most people are in the state of rajas, activity, always on the search for satisfaction. Rajas is the state of action. It is very dynamic. Rajas belongs to the fire element. Only a few people are in the state of sattva. They are refined and light like air. It is indeed the airy, wise and high intelligent state. Spiritual people belong to sattva.
I have chosen the title consciously as it is very hard to leave on state for another one. When you are lost in tamas it is very hard to become active, to become flexible and to act intelligent. When you are lost in rajas, then you need action, activity to satisfy your needs. You can´t get back to tamas and it is not easy to enter sattva. When you are lost in sattva, your nature is so refined and full of ease that it is hard to get back into pure action to satisfy needs which do not longer exist for you. In sattva you are liberated from the wheels of the material world. You are saturated, complete and perfect. You are like a balloon which has problems to stay in the material world. Due to these circumstances people have their problems, especially the spiritual people who do not really belong to the material realms.
The human development starts with tamas, dwells a very long time in rajas and refines to sattva in the end.
I wrote this article because it is hard for spiritual people to follow the rajas ideas in the material world – making money, doing business to buy things which you not really need or long for. Consumption is only for rajas but not something desirable for spiritual people who are in a sattva state. Sattva people are happy with a minimum for living and they love nature and do not really need more. They also do not love all the artificial stuff as it is not their world.
Something to think about.
Quite hard it is for someone who has lived in a monastery and incarnates into a normal life where he has to follow the ideals of rajas. This means to come back to a state which you have left already. It can feel like punishment and can cause traumatic experiences.
In any case we are asked to master life in the position where we were set. Especially the possibilities and missions of spiritual people can be quite challenging and of a form where you wouldn´t count with. With will power you can return from sattva to rajas to fulfill your tasks. It is like an undercover operation.
being in sattva, does it also mean a very low survival skills in the material world which could pose a difficulty because living can be challenging for sattva people?
Yes, this is true. The material world requires the state of rajas to survive well respectively to enjoy a good life. Those in the state of sattva are often living as yogis or monks, being dependent on other people. In conclusion, as long as sattva people have no direct support for living, they need to show rajas to survive well.
Thank you, Moony. It was a good question.