First written on June 12, 2007 Revised and Updated on April 03, 2009 The Doctrine of Karma as per Bhagavad Gita God is not someone away and beyond this universe. He is not only the creator, he is also a dweller in his creation. He exists in all and as the All. It is his creation that lives and moves within him and draws the truth from him. There is nothing else other than the one and only God. The Supreme Lord says, "Knowing me is the essence and the truth". Hence he is known as 'Param Satyam' or the 'Absolute Truth'. Once a person knows the supreme nature of the one and only God, his qualities, his potencies, his opulence's and that he is the absolute truth, he becomes a true devotee. The person starts loving God. That is called 'Bhakti' in Sanskrit. Devotion means Love for God. That is why we say 'God is Love'. True devotion to God cannot be forced on anyone. There are many who visit places of worship and pray without devotion. Service to God or Humanity without devotion is of no use. We come to the question that 'How does God reward such true devotees' ? God grants them wisdom and the power of discrimination. The supreme lord destroys the darkness of ignorance by lighting the lamp of wisdom.  In the entire discourse of Bhagvat Gita to Warrior Arjuna, the Lord keeps repeating that a man must overcome the lust for money, power, position and sense gratification. Everything materialistic is temporal. Everything spiritual is permanent. To that Arjuna asks 'How do we survive in this materialistic world where all these things are very important'. To that the Lord replies that every human being has the right to work to earn his living but should not have any expectation of the fruits of his labor.  Some people get rewarded more than adequately for their work, some people get what they deserve and some people get less than what they deserve. This is based on the Doctrine of Karma. The supreme lord says to Arjuna that 'You have only the right to work but not the right to expect the rewards'. Your rewards and when to award them are decided by me based on your deeds.'  The above will be of significance to a large number of people. There are number of people who are intelligent, talented and skilled but do not shine in this world. At the same time, there are a number of ordinary people who shine and prosper. Since many people do not believe in luck, how do we explain this phenomenon ? Modern scientific studies have proven that intelligence without discrimination is a disadvantage as compared to having no intelligence at all. This can be illustrated by the following experiment. Take 2 glass bottles and place a fly in one bottle and a bee in the other. Place the bottle sideways with the bottom of the bottle facing a light source. The fly will keep groping till it finds the bottle opening and escape. Whereas, the bee being very intelligent will keep knocking its head against the glass wall to no avail. To a bee, a glass wall is not logical and does not exist. It just knows the light source and heads for it. The more knocks it takes, more curious it becomes and keeps at it. The moral of the story is intelligence without sense of discrimination and wisdom is the cause of many problems. The fly with its small brain does not need any discrimination. It just goes round and round and finds the opening by trial and error.  The Doctrine of Karma also helps in such cases. Instead of getting disillusioned and frustrated, we must accept the inexorable wheel of the law of karma, also known as Fate. One should be satisfied with what one gets. It is difficult because our ego, like bees, will not accept it. We often react and sometimes it is akin to a bee breaking its head against a glass wall. You may change strategy and tactics but still run into a new wall, if the time is not on your side. Good times and bad times are nothing more than the will of God. However, this does not mean one can get results without working for it. One must keep working and leave the results to God. He knows when to reward if you have done your work with a sense of devotion and duty. Tough times can bring down one's capacity to fight, make one demoralized and lose self confidence. If one takes it as the will of the lord, one will become calm, tough and face life stoically. Tough times do not last very long, but tough people do. Strangely, the tougher you are , harder is the test by God. While we should not be fatalistic in approach to life, there are something's in life which are pre ordained and pre destined. Life is a journey. What route we take to attain the predetermined destination is in our hands. Unfortunately, by the time some of us realize it, it may be too late to take corrective action. We can only take comfort in the fact that life is like a wheel. What goes up, comes down and what goes down, comes up. If we are down, we have to come up like a wheel at some point of time. That is decided by the will of God. We have to wait for that. Time and Tide wait for no man but a man has to wait for time and tide to come to him.  References: Sri Vishnusahasranama Stotram - This was recited by the great patriarch Bhishma of the Kuru dynasty lying on his death bed of arrows to King Yudhishtra at the end of the Mahabharata war. This hymn stresses the supremacy of one and only Lord Krishna, often referred to as an incarnation of Lord Vishnu. It is his holiness Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada who later said that Lord Vishnu is Lord Krishna's plenary portion having 93% of his powers as the protector of the universe.  Introductory paragraph by Mr. T Chellaswami, Retired Senior ILO Adviser and IES officer, Government of India, Chennai, India. Founder Srinivasa Gita Satsangh Trust, Chennai, India.   Written  by Madhavan T Gopalachary The views, opinions and interpretations are personal. Sponsorship does not mean that the sponsors endorse them. © Copyright, Apr-09 . MMG Communications. Without prejudice. All rights reserved