3 Profound Sanskrit Words Which Gave Me Deep Purpose Amidst My Confused Life

If you ‘just don’t have the words’ you may simply need new ones

From the moment I first heard this language, something within me woke up. It happened inside an ashram in India, where my aunt was reading out an inscription on the walls.

From the common Indian language we were conversing in (Punjabi) to its ancestor, the most ancient language on Earth — I would have thought Sanskrit to sound simpler.

But each syllable struck a resonance that strung together into words. Then grammar, sentences, and ideas so rhythmic it seemed to be pointing beyond words!

Later I learned every vibration in the language has meaning. Its etymology goes right down to the philosophy of language itself, meant to point beyond concepts. No wonder it sounded like something from a futuristic civilization!

For the past three years, I’ve been slowly absorbing this language. I know its depth of wisdom can nourish our restless modern hearts, because it’s offering solutions that are from outside the box.

Sanskara: more than just ‘habit’

• The root san refers to a similar idea to the English root ‘sum.’ It’s completeness, a conditioned formation; coherent and perfect.
• The root kr means action. Like ‘karma!’

Together, this word means ‘a completely formed action’ (or previous action) which influences our life’s progression.

In Buddhist psychology, a sanskara is a volitional action:

• An intentioned response (conscious or unconscious) which changes the mind, as much as it tries to change the object being reacted to.
• When all these habits are purified using perfect knowledge and equanimity, we are liberated.

For the Hindu community, sanskara has taken on the meaning of ‘conscious impression.’

• A series of rites of passage, to positively influence an individual’s life trajectory. There are 41— beginning with the mother attracting a wholesome soul to reincarnate into the family!

See how this word is describing a property, not an object. So the beauty is that it can (and should) mean something unique to everyone.

Consciously taken up as part of your lifestyle, a sanskara is like removing the impurities in a gem, and polishing it to give it qualities it doesn’t yet have.

It’s a commitment to imprint yourself in a certain way, by enacting controlled, consistent ritual, done with full mindfulness and knowledge of its purpose.

These imprints then build up, changing your life. And the negative ones gradually diminish, as more attention is given to the positive ones.

But it demands that you be more stubborn than all of your obstacles!

Vasana: more than just ‘personality’

• The root vas means to stay or reside.

What happens if you build up enough sanskaras? You get a vasana. Something that lives inside you, for better or worse.

This is the flip side of all those little habits you thought didn’t matter.

These are all the nasty inner demons that come up when people go off to ‘find themselves.’

The vasanas which you carry from past lives can be deduced through analysis:

• What traits do you have which couldn’t possibly be the result of nature or nurture? What is uniquely you, not an influence of genes, parenting, culture, or education?
• What causations/happenings could only have come from beyond your current life’s circumstances?

In the yoga sutras, a vasana is defined as a past configuration through action. These determine your destiny, even in future lives, and demand great time and effort to remove.

Better not to let unwholesome ones solidify in the first place!

Sanskriti: more than just ‘culture’

• Pra means primordial or primary. Prakriti is nature; the primordial doing.
• San means, in this case, consciously formed. Krti means creation. Sanskriti is a planned engineering; improvement upon nature.
• Vi means special, particular, or different. Vikriti means deformed doing; a corruption of nature and its norms of balance, or humanity’s ideals.

What is the ideal for all cultures across time, but consciously defined by India as its civilization’s root value?

Dharma, or that which sustains. Naturally, if a society can’t sustain, it collapses.

But Dharma also means what sustains reality, the human spirit, and the path to realizing this well-being and truth. Naturally, the word takes on a religious connotation (even though Dharma and religion aren’t the same).

To plan what is in tune with sustainability, human wellness, and reality — you may think it’s the domain of culture.

But culture merely describes what enculturates: surroundings that take on a certain character. Sanskriti is the conscious engineering of this, in order to uplift, educate, and benefit everyone.

These are movements, such as bhakti in India — which gave rise to the Hare Krishnas, Sikhism, and the art of Indian miniature painting. Hardly a bunch of ‘passing cultural fads!’

This word also presents a wakeup call. Unless our culture is consciously crafted to be of benefit, there is no sanskriti to impart us with positive sanskaras that can lead us to liberation.

Without sanskriti, we drift to vikriti.

Which means we must take up a supramundane responsibility upon ourselves — to find better circumstances that help us grow and evolve.

To learn something new, you have to think in a different way.

Consider that ancient times were not simply filled with barbaric cavemen. There was sophistication before the industrial revolution.

It just was cultural, linguistic, philosophical, artistic, and contemplative, not technological. The exact stuff we’re missing in an era of AI-written Netflix shows and mass chronic depression.

And this is the biggest message of the language spoken by much of humanity back then:

Every syllable counts. Every word has effect. Every action determines your future.

We’ve learned to be precise and measured toward the outer world — and it’s on the verge of ecological collapse. Now it’s time to notice and engineer the inner one!

For such an endeavor, it makes no sense to reinvent the wheel, so to speak.

You can just borrow what was already discovered, starting with learning and honoring what cannot be quickly translated — only patiently adopted, authentically.

ॐ सर्वे भवन्तु सुखिनः

May all beings experience happiness.