An open heart is not only a more enjoyable way to live, it’s the only way to burn your karma, to become free. Shiva Sutra 3.25 teaches that “karma cannot be overcome unless it is enjoyed”— but does that mean if you’re not having fun you’re not burning karma? Yes and no. In the beginning, learning to enjoy our karma is a practice of simply staying present, not rejecting or attaching to the situation in front of you. And this kind of work is actually what eventually burns your karma, and when that loads starts to lighten, you actually begin to find more joy in the everyday tasks of your daily life. As Sri Shambhavananda teaches, “you know you are progressing in your practice when you are getting happier for no [external] reason.” We can open the door to this kind of joy with a slight smile, but the real opening we are seeking is inside our heart. This is a unique work that only you can do— all the Sutras and lineage teachers can merely point the way, but actually walking your awareness inside, actually breathing into your heart in a natural and sustainable way, is the journey. And it begins with this simple teaching— “karma cannot be overcome unless it is enjoyed”. The rest is up to us.

Start now— what does it feel like to enjoy the moment you are in? Repeat the Om sound internally, like a humming, and hold onto the vibration of the present. Keep internally repeating your om sound as you begin to move into your next activity, and see if that slight shift doesn’t bring a little more joy to whatever you do next.

“Through the intensity of meditating on turya…The Yogi becomes like Lord Śiva. Why is it said that the yogi becomes like Lord Śiva? Why not say that he becomes one with Śiva? It cannot be said they become one with Śiva because they have a body, a physical frame. As long as the physical frame is existing, the yogi is just like Śiva, they are not one with Śiva. Their having a physical frame will divert them toward inferior states…When he casts off this physical frame composed of the five elements, then he becomes one with Śiva.”

This physical frame is more than just our body, it is the circumstances of our entire life— the arena, or physical frame, of our life. This arena or frame of our life is no coincidence, it is our karma. Specifically our Prarabdha Karma. Praradbhda Karma is like an arrow shot up in to the sky, it has to land somewhere sometime, but where and when it lands us unknown to us.

As Babaji teaches, “If you find yourself in a particular arena of life, in this or that situation, that is where your karma has taken you, and you have to work it out. If you just run away from it all the time and don’t deal with it, then you have to come back again. So you might as well confront your issues now. Then you can avoid wasting about twenty years to get focused enough to begin to meditate again.) 42, SP.

Our work in yoga is the practice of burning up our Karma. This can be done directly, by applying our practice while we encounter our karma, or indirectly, through a steady daily meditation practice on our cushion, and mantra practice in our daily life.

In this Sutra, and in our lineage, we are given a very specific pathway through our karma— “Prārabdha karma cannot be overcome unless it is enjoyed. For an embodied being, prārabdha karma is unavoidable. He may be just like Śiva or he may be an ordinary person; prarabdha karma must be overcome by being enjoyed. It cannot be cast aside or abandoned.”

What does ‘enjoyed’ mean? This is a powerful question— don’t answer it from your head, answer from your practice. How can you enjoy this moment of your karma? And how does that help you overcome or dissolve the karma of this moment. The simplicity of this approach is profound, and offers you the opportunity to actually feel our work in a real way right now, and whenever you are open to applying your practice.

Paul Reps once taught, “Until it fun better left undone”— is this a real approach to our lives and our karma? The Sutra continues to unpack this ‘enjoyment of our karma’ in the following way: “So, for the remainder of their life, the yogi must continue to exist with this physical frame. They must welcome whatever comes to them, whether it be good or bad. Whatever they get to eat, they must eat. It is not worthwhile to cast their body aside. For such a yogī, this body is to be maintained until the time of death.”

I would like to take a moment to reflect on the significance of leaving our body in this Sutra, as I recently had an opportunity to support yogi in their transition.

In the beginning of the Sutra we are taught that the arena’s or ‘body’ of our life provides endless distractions which divert our awareness to inferior states. We work at dissolving these distractions through our spiritual practice, but it is mentioned at multiple times in this Sutra that only when we leave our body can we truly be free. In the weeks leading up to our sangha member RK’s passing, I felt this to be true. It is similar to the way one feels when they are really sick— you are so supremely present just staying above your sickness, you don’t care if the phone rings, or if you’re late on an email, those things just don’t matter, they don’t have a hook in you. This is what it felt like to be in the room with RK— there were very few hooks, very few of anything in that space except a bed, a blanket, and practice.

As I sat in that room a little each day, I got a new understanding of the images we see of Nityananda in his ashram. Nityananda was as detached to life as we are when approaching death. Almost every picture of him is sparse and simple— His only possession was a blanket, and there he sits or lays in a pretty empty room.

But the emptiness of that room represented the fullness of his being. Just like with RK, the emptiness of the room represented the dissolving of his karma. As this Sutra teaches, for most of us this room can only be emptied by leaving our body— but we can work to empty this room, this body, this arena of our life a little each day. This doesn’t mean throwing everything away in the literal room you are in, it means surrendering, one by one, the thoughts that arise when we meditate, as those are the items that truly fill the space of our being, preventing us from experiencing our true nature. Remember, it is said that we must ‘enjoy’ our karma in order to overcome it, this is the real work of our practice. You have to find your joy inside, and hold that joy, as the tests arise outside of you. By holding your inner joy, you allow the outer distractions to dissolve.