Life is thickly linked with actions. Life is lived through actions. Life is valued through actions. Life’s survival depends on actions. Life cognizant is actions – actions opposite in nature, actions affirmative and negative, actions constructive and destructive. Therefore, to let Life succumb to its ultimate death is to let all actions end. When actions end completely, Life of the limited self spontaneously experiences itself as Existence of the Unlimited Self. Existence being realized, evolution and involution of consciousness is complete, illusion vanishes and the law of reincarnation no longer binds.
Simply to desist from committing actions will never put an end to actions. It would merely mean putting into action yet another action – that of inactivity. To escape from actions is not the remedy for the uprooting of actions. Rather, this would give scope to the limited self to get more involved in the very act of escaping, thus creating more actions. Actions, both good and bad, are like knots in the tangled thread of Life. The more persistent the efforts to undo the knots of action, the firmer become the knots and the greater the entanglement.
Only actions can nullify actions, in the same way that poison can counteract the effects of poison. A deeply embedded thorn may be extricated by the use of another thorn or any sharp object resembling it, such as a needle, used with skill and precaution. Similarly, actions are totally uprooted by other actions – when they are committed by some activating agent other than the “self.”
Karma yoga, dnyan yoga, raj yoga and bhakti yoga serve the purpose of being prominent signposts on the path of Truth, directing the seeker toward the goal of Eternal Existence. But the hold of Life, fed by actions, is so tight on the aspirant that even with the help of these inspiring signposts he fails to be guided in the right direction. As long as the “self” is bound by actions, the aspirant, or even the pilgrim on the path toward Truth, is sure to go astray through self-deception.
Throughout all ages, sadhus and seekers, sages and saints, munis and monks, tapasvis and sanyasis, yogis, Sufis and Talibs have struggled during their lifetimes, undergoing untold hardships in their efforts to extricate themselves from the maze of actions and to realize the Eternal Existence by overcoming Life. They fail in their attempts because the more they struggle with their “self,” the firmer the self becomes gripped by Life, through actions intensified by austerities and penances, by seclusions and pilgrimages, by meditation and concentration, by assertive utterances and silent contemplation, by intense activity and inactivity, by silence and verbosity, by japas and tapas (penances) and by all types of yogas and cheelas (discipleships).
-www.lordmeher.org , p3424
Jan, 1954; Mahabaleshwar