The other two are rajas, the projecting, moving energy and tamas, the concealing, covering, material energy. Unmanifested, the energies are pure.
But in manifestation these three are combined, or conversely said: when the three gunas are mixed, manifestation arises. And with manifestation comes confusion and ignorance in a living being.
Why is sattva so important? Because it is the subtlest of the three, it permeates the other three. What is the nature of the subtle? What is the most subtle? Well, at the basis of a manifested universe lies intelligence, knowledge, information, just as in an acorn lies the (genetic) information that makes a tree grow, and in seed and egg lies the contribution to the design of a human being. Sattva is the knowledge guna.
Usually I write these articles in the morning. Then my mind is clear (sattvic). I notice that as the day unfolds, more and more rajas and especially tamas contaminate my mind. The day becomes more confusing.
In the same way, before the Big Bang, sattva was still pure in māyā and the contamination with tamas (matter, darkness, ignorance) was like a fuse in a powder keg. This activates rajas, which makes everything explode. This means projection, superposition of a moving world. Rajas is projection and movement of tamas, matter. Sattva is the knowledge plan. The Big Bang was a fact, and we can see the world as the apparent effect of the sattvic blueprint of īśvara. Together, the guṇas perform a dance of īśvara’s laws of dharma. What was īśvara again? Consciousness plus its own māyā, or consciousness plus apparently its own three guṇas. Note: Consciousness remains pure: Apparently a kind of game is going on in it.
And so the world is nothing but apparent contamination. For luminous beings who have a lot of sattva in their system, let us call them devas (from div, to shine), heavens and worlds are seen as a pleasant wonder, they are happy without knowing why. For living beings with dominant rajas-tamas, the world is a rather confusing projection. A human being is a kind of combination of both. A human being experiences the reflected light of sattva and the darkness of tamas, and doubts. But note, just as īśvara is consciousness with an apparent māyā factor, a jīva (living being) is consciousness with an apparent ignorant factor of it. The jīva becomes karmically involved with it, and the play of saṁsāra continues. But the jīva, the apparent individual being, is and remains in reality pure consciousness.
The individual seems to be absorbed in this apparent dance of reality. For the individual it is therefore important to make his subtle body with the inner instrument sufficiently sattvic, to recognize after the words of the Vedas and the teacher that it is different. In a sattvic mind self-knowledge can arise and ripen. The self-knowledge that shows me that I am consciousness pure and free and that the māyā game (māyā līlā) in me is not what it seems to be. That too I am myself.
Vedānta invites us to understand the entire panorama of reality. For this understanding I need sattva, the revealing energy. Tamas, dark matter, causes ignorance, sattva the luminous energy, knowledge.
We could say that taking a correct knowledge position with sattva on an individual level is as good as the blueprint of the manifestation we talked about earlier on a macro level. Only we should not say: I am sattvic. No, satvva is also part of māyā. Sattva is also a projection. I am also free from sattva.
Moreover, sattva never stands alone. Sufficient sattva means that the other guṇas also remain active in the individual. After all, as people we must be able to move (rajas) and sleep (tamas). It is about a dominance of sattva.
For this, all kinds of practices are recommended. In fact, the whole qualification for ātma bodha (self-knowledge) is aimed at making sattva dominant in the individual, so that the blanket of tamas, which causes ignorance, can be lifted, and self-knowledge can shine, and the self, which was already itself of course, in the god-man knows itself.
To practice, we use the power and energy of rajoguṇa (rajas). To bring ourselves out of dominant tamas, we use rajas. Everything we do is rajas. When we meditate to become sattvic, we use rajas. When we meditate on īśvara (upāsana yoga) we use rajas for focus and sattva for knowledge.
When we practice karma yoga, we use rajas and the knowledge of sattva to shift the attention from egocentric use of objects to an attitude of devotion, accommodation and neutrality through karma and upāsana yoga.
The fourfold practice (sādhana catuṣṭaya): training discrimination (viveka), objectivity (vairagya), mind control (śamādi ṣaṭka sampatti) and an all-encompassing desire for freedom (mumukṣutva), is also meant to become sattvic. We already use sattva to know what we are doing, and so it is good to keep coming back to these kinds of qualifications for sattva and knowledge. Then it will be noticed that the next practice goes better, is sharper and more discriminating. Why? More sattva shines.
Lifestyle and a consciously practiced and healthy value system (dharma) also contribute to a predominantly sattvic mind. We want a refined, calm, ‘knowledgeable’ mind and no heavy energy of tamas in our body. At a certain stage, saying ‘no’ to temptations that lead me away from clear knowledge helps enormously.
The challenge is therefore to keep the mirror of the mind as clean and sattvic as possible, and therefore to reflect sat as purely as possible. This also helps in judging situations according to īśvara’s laws (dharma), to recognize and demarcate your own role in it (svadharma and svabhava), to be able to think neutrally. In short, to be able to feel, think and live clearly.
A lot of sattva in the psychosomatic system equals good karma. You can work on that yourself! With the knowledge of vedānta you can even work on that very well and quickly! Sattva is the mental atmosphere in which your freedom is recognized. How else could the knowledge of the Upaniṣads flourish freely without the fresh clarity of seers in the making? In order to be free, we must first cultivate good karma.
With the knowledge of vedānta, this can happen relatively quickly. But then one must take an intense, stable vow (dṛḍha vrata) within oneself, which produces an intense, stable conviction (dṛḍha niścaya) with intense, stable devotion (dṛḍha bhakti) as a result.
What is knowledge? My personality is only a reflection of and in consciousness (cidābhāsa), projected into me because of māyā. I, consciousness, am free from it, because the reflections are not real. A reflection is only a mirage, like a fata morgana in the desert sky.
So for knowledge to happen, I want a lot of sattva in my personality. Sattva brings relative happiness anyway. Regardless of whether you still identify with it, a sattvic personality is calm, balanced, stable and cheerful. Everyone wants inner peace, so long live sattva!
Sattva is the knowing, revealing, balanced, neutral, intelligent aspect of reality (something that is sattvic is called sāttvika). So when īśvara is reflected quite purely (objectively!) in my mind, my mind is predominantly sāttvika. This manifests itself in qualities such as neutrality, balance, calmness, happiness, pleasure, knowledge-orientation and righteousness.
The term sattva is the name given to the quality of jñāna śakti, the power of knowledge that in the individual case estimates how to ‘read’ creation, and respond to it. It is the power of knowing that is inherent in māyā. It is therefore in the individual the power that reveals truth.
Sufficient sattva is needed for living self-knowledge, because the mind (intellect) must be clear and subtle enough for ignorance to be removed by the subtle teaching. Sattva reflects consciousness-existence (sat) quite purely, and therefore gives a person the power of clear knowledge and the power of experiencing happiness without having to do anything for it.
However, a guṇa is also a force that apparently binds. One of its meanings is also tendon, string, cord or rope. A predominance of sattva means that vṛttis in the form of pleasure and/or knowledge arise. By identifying with these vṛttis (by identifying with being happy and having the knowledge that I am free) there is a subtle danger that the person becomes dependent on a sense of pleasure and knowledge for happiness, and thus becomes attached to it. This can happen in the spiritual world with people who meditate a lot and do yoga. Because you already feel good, you are no longer motivated for mokṣa, freedom. It can even create a certain arrogance. James Swartz calls it ‘The golden cage of sattva’, or ‘being stuck, stuck in sattva’.
So beware: a free feeling, self-knowledge, sattva, transporting devotion (bhakti/ karma yoga or dual faith) is not freedom. Freedom (mokṣa) is also being free (mukta) from that. Freedom is also not mokṣa. Freedom is being free from every concept and every feeling. Freedom is being the all-inclusive reality, without any idea or attribute.
If my person is a vedānta knowledge freak, there is the pitfall that I get stuck. Haha, the undersigned is suspicious here, as deep as he goes into the means of knowledge. What can happen is that one becomes attached to the reflected bliss in meditation, or thus addicted to vedānta knowledge. Because sattva is so attractive, sattva can also (seemingly) bind in this way, like a real guṇa.
Brahman, ātmā, the self, is not a feeling of happiness. The bliss that is spoken of is being boundless, full and infinite. It will express itself as being without fear, without threat, unity without another. The absence of something is not a discrete feeling. Neither is fullness. The rock-solid knowledge of being whole and complete naturally presents the wise with feelings of contentment, freedom and happiness. But he or she knows that experience is not it, but enjoys it without hesitation. Why is enlightenment not experienced? Because consciousness has no characteristics, and is therefore indescribable and inexperienced.
Also deep sleep and sattva is a subtle subject. In deep sleep there are no objects and no experiences. The mind is unmanifest. Due to the absence of sattva, no object is recognized. It is not sattva that causes deep sleep, nor is it sattva that you experience during deep sleep. The full blanket of tamas causes deep sleep, and there is only the tamasic vṛtti of ignorance. So during deep sleep I am unaware that there are no objects. The mind is unmanifest and gets rest. However, when the waking state comes, and the first clouds of dark tamas have cleared (you fell asleep with tamas, and wake up with it), sattva arises in the mind, which is rested, because not plagued by all kinds of thoughts and feelings. There is no concrete memory that it was pleasant in deep sleep, but there is the knowledge that the sleep was refreshing and now yields sattva. So the enjoyment of sleep is afterwards, not during sleep.
If the wise person thinks he or she is self-realized, but he or she is not cheerful and content, he or she will also have to be wise enough to see that there is still work to be done to make the mind clear. But this is optional, because the wise person in his or her pure nature is not a doer. A wise person does not have to be happy in theory, but this is very unlikely, because there are no real threats, tensions or fears for him or her. So to see your freedom you need sattva, but it will also give you apparent sattva.
As consciousness, the wise person knows no otherness and desires for something outside of him or her. The wise person is full. But the wise person himself or herself with his or her possible sense of happiness is of course just an object, and objects are mithyā (dependent). The wise person knows that all this is consciousness.