The Gunas: Sattva

Imagine all of our universe as a massive piece of magical fabric. This fabric is prakriti, or all that has become manifest. This ever-changing, ever expanding, extraordinary piece of fabric is woven together with fiber and the fiber is of three colors. We can consider these fibers the gunas. The guna fiber of tamas is black, the guna fiber of rajas is red, and the guna fiber of sattva is white. Dependent upon the amount of fiber guna used is the color that you see or the guna that is dominant, yet all three are always present and always movin and groovin in the creation of this fabric or existence. The fabric, the fibers, and the weaving is neither good nor bad, it just is. And of course we have preferences of colors and patterns of which are also always moving and groovin right along with the journey of our lives. Today we consider in depth the white guna fiber or that of sattva.

While the gunas are to be understood without the labels of good and bad, it is impossible not to acknowledge their hierarchy, at least when we consider the human being. Sure, we can rid ourselves of the “bad” label when we acknowledge our beautiful mother earth as tamasic, our life giving sun as rajasic, and our buoyant moon as sattvic. However, when we speak of a human and their qualities as more tamasic in nature or what we might describe as lazy and ignorant, it feels way more complicated to untangle judgement from those qualities. But of course, this is what we are required to do, to retain a more sattvic state. Sattva qualities are described as peaceful, light, illuminating, balanced, harmonious, fulfilled, and of pure intelligence. So perhaps we can consider the hierarchy without judging it or at least with the understanding that it is the judgement itself that is repelling the sattvic state of being from us. It is the judgement itself that is the imbalanced fiber in our own daily weaving that is making our weaving way too dark.

This reminder is an incredible weight lifted from my shoulders. “Oh dang, I am not responsible for anyone else, for their actions, their opinions, or their understandings. I am solely responsible for my own. I am solely responsible for my portion of the weaving, everyday. Everyday I am weaving with my thoughts, and words, and actions or non-actions. Here I am trying to weave for everyone else, or stuck on analaying the rightness or more likely, the wrongness of their weaving. And in doing so, my very own portion cannot be woven with the intricacy, care, and presence that are absolutely required to simply not stab myself with my own needle!”

Acknowledging and observing the fabric, its’ fibers, colors, and patterns is to be present with yourself and with life. More often than not, the act of freeing ourselves from the dialogue and judgement about the fabric, is the real change or action required to experience just a glimpse of the fabric as one whole, breathtaking and brilliant tapestry.

Thank you beautiful human,

I love considering that my day, each breath, each word, each touch, is simply my contribution to our universal fabric. It feels like fresh air to remember that is the most powerful way of being, and that what feels perhaps insignficant, is the most profound act I can contribute. Here’s to weaving along side of you!

Blessings,

Andrea Dawn