Karma by Sadhguru book Summary, important notes, and review

“Karma, A yogi’s guide to crafting your destiny” is a book by an Indian mystic, “Sadhguru”, I don’t think he needs some introduction over here. His book called, Karma is published in 2021. This article contains a brief summary of, “Karma”, also has some notes from the book itself under the “fair use” policy and also some best lines pickups from the book.

The book is divided into three parts, part one basically introduces the reader to the term Karma, the second part focuses on Karma yoga and part three mentions the frequently asked question about the topic Karma and the answers from Sadhguru himself.

Summary of Part 1 of Sadhguru’s “Karma, A yogi’s guide to crafting your destiny”

What is Karma for you? It’s generally said especially in South Asian countries that Karma it’s like a balance sheet where all your good deeds and bad deeds are recorded. Like in the balance sheet you subtract all your expenditure and add all your earnings, similarly, in Karma’s balance sheet you subtract all your bad deeds and add all your good deeds and if you have no bad deeds at the end, then you might end up in a Heaven. That’s the general concept in Nepali or Indian or the people influenced by the Nepali or Indian philosophy.

Then what actually is Karma? It’s nothing, but action. But what action? It’s the action on three levels, your body, mind, and soul. Basically, it is the residue of the impacts of whatever you have done in your life.

From the book itself,

Karma is about becoming the source of one’s own creation. In shifting responsibility from heaven to oneself, one becomes the very maker of one’s destiny.

-Karma by Sadhguru

Sadhguru writes, whatever you do, any small or big action you take leaves a certain imprint. The things you already have done have some imprints already so there is nothing much you can do with those. You definitely don’t have control over your past but you definitely have control over your present so you can change the karma you are doing right now at the present moment and have a different imprint of it. Then where the imprints are stored?

Sadhguru writes, there are 8 dimensions, or “membranes,” of memory they are: elemental, atomic, evolutionary, genetic, karmic, sensory, articulate, and inarticulate. Sadhguru writes, the first four aspects of memory are those in which personal volition plays no role at all but for the remaining four the personal violation does play a role.

The karmic memory is the one in which the collection of impressions that have shaped us over time and turned us into distinctive human beings, each with our own quirks and idiosyncrasies, likes, and dislikes, habits, and preferences are stored or creating the karmic memory.

The way our bodies and minds respond to the world and creating sensory memory.

The inarticulate memory is the enormous reservoir of generic and specific information accumulated over eons.

Likewise, articulate memory is the impact of all the conscious information that every human being carries within.

So, to sum it up, Karma is not about what happens to you but it’s about how you react to the situations in your life. Suppose you got a breakup, of course, a breakup is painful and you will get several emotional triggers, that’s basically natural but how you react to those is not natural, it’s up to you. Let’s take another example, you failed some exam, and after knowing the result how you react to that matters, whether you understand that you need to work hard or whether you blame your university, your society, your country, or yourself and just make it more worst is up to you.

He suggests various techniques related to mindfulness in his book and is practical enough for anyone. This is the concept that I have found a lot in the Buddhist books where it’s been talking about Vipassana, it’s a famous concept there and Sadhguru in his book as well talks in a similar way and gives you a technique you can follow. Also, if you wish to learn a free 13 days course on Mindfulness, Inner Engineering, and Self Realization (MMIS), then click here.

Summary of Part 2 of Sadhguru’s “Karma, A yogi’s guide to crafting your destiny”

This part introduces the reader to the notion of karma yoga, ways to address and handle karma, as well as to liberate oneself from it. Sadhguru writes karma yoga is the science of transforming memory into a choice, passivity into dynamism, identity into possibility, sleepwalking into awakening.

He simplifies it and says, Karma yoga is simply the process of using your karma as a process to liberate yourself.

Summary of Part 3 of Sadhguru’s “Karma, A yogi’s guide to crafting your destiny”

As I already have written that this part consists of series of frequently asked questions. I have written one of which I think important here:

Question: Sadhguru, you say that our life is the entire of our making. But questions come up for which I have no answers. When I read a news report about a little girl being raped, for instance, can I really say that she deserved it because of it her karma?

Answer: Not her karma. Our karma.

One-line review on Karma, A yogi’s guide to crafting your destiny, Sadhguru, Book Summary:

The reader who, has simply no idea about Karma yoga or has misinterpreted it will find this book very interesting.

Some beautiful lines from the book: Karma, A yogi’s guide to crafting your destiny, Sadhguru:

A day is but a piece of time that lets us live and die.
…This day day lets us live and Live totally.

Many human beings have yet to discover for themselves: that if they create a continuous mental focus toward a particular self-image, it will, in fact, come true.

Once you accept that this moment is all there is, you see that this moment is inevitable.

As far as the laws of existence are concerned, there is no good and bad, no crime and punishment. It is just that for every action there is a consiquence.

You cannot own life, you can only live it.

You have the choice and ability to be anyway you want in a given moment. This is the freedom and the curse. Most human beings are suffering their freedom.

You may know about the book or buy it from here.