Gita 06.33 – Seeing equally is tough, but seeing devotionally is easier

Thank you This is 6.33 Arjuna is speaking Krishna has spoken The process of yoga in this chapter Krishna has been speaking From 6.1 to 6.32 And more specifically the process of yoga He has been speaking from, especially in terms of Going to the jungle from 6.11 Krishna has talked about the perfection Of yoga in terms of Seeing him everywhere in 6.30 Then seeing him Seeing Krishna And the indwelling Supersoul as one in 6.31 And seeing all living Beings with the equal compassionate vision In 6.32 So After describing this Summit of yoga Now Arjuna Has a question, or after hearing all this Arjuna Interrupts Krishna and asks A question So he says What has been spoken by you This path of yoga Samya Samya is Equanimity, equalness This I do not see how I can Follow this The mind Consciousness Just doesn't stay at one place Then its situation Is not in my situation It is very restless And Now The restlessness of the mind is talked about In the next verse And we'll discuss more about it there But here in this particular Verse Let's understand the broad principle So Krishna is saying Sam Krishna has used the word Samya Several times He used the word Samatvam Yoga Uchyate In the second chapter So in That was 2.48 And then after that Repeatedly being equipoised Happiness and distress has been talked about And the word Samya is used Specifically In 5.19 So Those who are Situated In sameness They They have conquered material existence And then Krishna Further states And apart from the specific usage Of the word Samya There has been the concept Of Samya in terms of being equipoised Of seeing Happiness and distress, success and failure With same vision With equal vision That has been talked about repeatedly So in this chapter itself 6.789 It has been talked about 6.7 it was So Samahitaha Being situated in such a way That one is equipoised towards The dualities of the body, the mind And the ego And Krishna talks about Samatvam In the next verse further With respect to objects in this world Things In 6.80 states The stone, pebble and gold See them equally And not only see things equally But in 6.9 he has also stated that See people equally Have equal vision Towards all of them Friends and enemies Those who are neutral and those who are mediators Those who are sinful and those who are pious Have seen all of them equally Like this the message of Samyatva Has been talked about repeatedly And Arjuna is stating over here That it is Napashyami I do not see it as possible for me It is not practical for me The yoga which you have told me It centers on Samya It centers on maintaining Equal vision towards all And I don't see it as practical I don't see myself practicing this anytime Why? Because Equanimity is Made impossible by The restlessness and turbulence Of my consciousness Krishna will Krishna will Respond to Arjuna by Speaking some universal principles Regarding the practice of yoga And then he will say that One has to follow some process Without a process one cannot be successful And then After that He talks about How one can Come to the level of Practicing this He will say Samyena madhusudana That actually One will come to the level of Developing equal vision towards everyone If that seems Impractical, Krishna will tell later That practice the principles of yoga Involving Abhyasindh kauteya vairagya jagruhyate And then He will go to general principles about how What are the obstacles in the path of yoga Arjuna will ask one more question That what if somebody is not able to Succeed on the path of yoga Then Krishna will answer that And then Krishna Completes this chapter of 6.45 By saying that The topmost yogi is the bhakti yogi And from the 7th chapter of the Gita Bhakti yoga starts And in the 8th chapter Krishna does a comparison of bhakti yoga And ashtam yoga And then there in he states Clearly that In 8.40 he will state that Bhakti yoga is the easiest way To calm the mind And he says that Rather than just trying to practice samya Samya means Trying to make the mind See everything in a similar way Practice Fixing the mind only So the principle Of controlling the mind is universal The specifics Of how that is to be done varies according to The process of yoga Which is being followed So in the process of ashtam yoga The focus stays on Trying to develop an equal vision towards everything And then Once one is seeing everything External as equal Then nothing external seems attractive Or fascinating Then one can just turn away from the external Things which are By virtue of being seen Equally Are basically equally Unpromising Then one turns inwards And discovers The inner wealth, the inner reality The inner source of happiness That the search for the inner source of happiness Ultimately culminates in the discovery Of the indwelling lord Vishnu So this is one process By which One develops Equal vision towards external things And then develops Active searching vision inwards Which culminates in the attainment Of Krishna in the internal territory of the Heart The other way is the process of bhakti yoga Wherein In the outer world Also We focus not on so much of Equal vision towards everything But on connecting everything with Krishna And making Krishna The Centre of our world And by connecting everything With Krishna and seeing everything As meant for the enjoyment of Krishna We can develop We can fix the mind In Krishna and thus More than just being pacified The mind becomes purified Pacified means it is no longer agitated Purified means that Its tendencies are changed Instead of being attracted to the matter The mind is attracted to Krishna And Krishna says in 8.14 that this is a Far easier process This is the only verse 8.14 in the Gita Where Krishna says I can be Easily attained by who? By one who Fixes the mind on me Fixes the mind on me constantly That person can easily attain I become easily obtainable for them So To summarize the flow of What unfolded in the next chapters After hearing how This process of yoga centres on Samyatva On seeing everything with equal vision Arjuna feels it is impractical And he voices apprehension In this verse And then Krishna responds by telling That you have to practice yoga You have to follow some process for controlling the mind And which process he recommends is He recommends a general practice of yoga But he doesn't recommend necessarily the practice of ashtanga yoga As has been talked over here He recommends bhakti yoga As will be seen Through, as will be seen by the fact That in this chapter Ashtanga yoga culminates in bhakti yoga And also we will see this again in the 8th chapter By explicit comparison Of ashtanga yoga and bhakti yoga Where in Krishna says bhakti yoga Enables one to attain To come to perfection easily Sulabha Thank you.