K defines each (14.6–8). Sattva, being pure and luminous (nirmalatvāt prakāśakam), binds by attachment to happiness and to knowledge — the pleasant chain of feeling wise and serene. Rajas, of the nature of passion, born of craving and attachment (tṛṣṇā-saṅga-samudbhavam), binds by attachment to action — the restless chain of always doing. Tamas, born of ignorance, deludes all embodied beings, binding by heedlessness, sloth and sleep (pramāda-ālasya-nidrā) — the dull chain of inertia.

Their proportion (14.10) is dynamic, not fixed: “sattva prevails, overpowering rajas and tamas; rajas, overpowering sattva and tamas; and tamas likewise.” So it is never a single sole winner permanently — the three are always all present, in shifting dominance, one rising as the others recede, like three wrestlers taking turns on top. This is why a person is sattvic in the morning, rajasic at work, tamasic at night — the mix is a moving average, not a label. Their signs (14.11–13): when the light of knowledge shines through every gate of the body, sattva is dominant; greed, exertion, the undertaking of works, restlessness and craving betray rajas; darkness, inertia, heedlessness and delusion mark tamas. And their fruits at death (14.14–15) follow suit: dying in sattva, one goes to the pure worlds of the knowers; in rajas, one is reborn among the action-attached; in tamas, in the wombs of the deluded (leading downward).