S Sridharan was until recently the Managing Trustee, Krishnamacharya Yoga Mandiram, Chennai.  During his long association with KYM, he had the privilege of learning the nuances of Yoga Sastra directly under  Yogi TKV Desikachar.  Sridharan is now an expert Yogi and a Yogic teacher.  In this series on Yogasutra, Yogi S Sridharan elucidates every aspect of YOGA.

Klesas (contd)
 
As human beings, we are apt to go through the process of acting often with Avidya in us operating at any level; subtle or strong.  The very nature of Avidya is that we will not know when we have Avidya in us.  Only after better circumstances bring out the fact to us that what we perceived was in a wrong way and having acted at that time we have suffered, do we realise.  How often do we say ‘I am sorry, I mistook that”.  There can be numerous examples.  Let us see some situations which we face often.
 
Suppose we have been cheated by someone, who had a long beard and was wearing certain marks, etc., the next time, we see some other person approaching us with the same marks resembling the earlier one, we immediately desist from talking to or interacting with that person.  May be, the second person was really good and genuine and we would have lost a good contact.  There is an ancient story which goes as under:
 
A housewife had a mongoose as pet in her house to protect her newborn from snakes.  Once she had gone out to fetch water and on entering the house, she saw the mongoose with blood in its mouth.  She immediately assumed that the mongoose had bitten the child and threw the pot on the mongoose and the mongoose died.  On going near the child, she found that the mongoose had in fact killed a snake and thus had protected the child.  She, no doubt, lamented.  
 
Our great epics have a lot of such stories to explain these concepts.  It is said Gods enact their plays in the world and show how any one can be subjected to the influences of the Klesas.  In Ramayana and Mahabharata we have numerous instances.  Goddess Sita on seeing the Golden Deer is taken over and believes it to be true and the rest is story as to how she had to undergo ordeals that follow.
 
Normally, it is “lack of awareness” that is responsible for the Avidya to operate fully in us.  The conditioning takes over and unless we are alert and reflective, we end up in believing a wrong perception as right.
 
(more to come)