Gita 12.15 Avoid agitation coming from the social and the mental

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.

satisfaction with whatever we have materially becomes much easier.

Thank you. Bhagavad Gita 12.15. Krishna is continuing to describe the qualities of his devotees, the qualities that endear those devotees to him. Such devotees dear to me.

The quality that Krishna describes over here is loko, by whom others are not agitated. And who does not agitate people. That means, such a devotee lives peacefully.

Harsha marsha bhayo dvegair mukto. Mukto means a devotee lives mukto, liberated or rather unaffected by the emotions of harsha marsha, by dejection, by elation or dejection or apprehension. Harsha marsha bhayo dvegair, agitation.

Essentially, Krishna is talking about emotional agitation through externals and internals. Externals is, we often have interactions with people at different levels. And there are different kinds of peoples, people outside.

So, then some people may speak and act in a way that is pleasing. Others may speak and act in a way that is very agitating. Or with some people, we ourselves feel comfortable.

Some other people, we feel extremely uncomfortable, even feel, feel choked and we feel as if we want to burst out. So, what do we do in such a situation? We simply focus on recognizing that a devotee is one who doesn't disturb others and who is not disturbed by others. This talks about not getting worked up about external disturbances.

And then, further, harsha marsha bhayo dvegair. So, when there is attachment and there is a lot of inner instability, especially for children, very small children, for them, they don't understand the attachment, detachment. For them, it is good.

That enables them to observe, to learn, to grow. So, now, how is this verse to be understood? Because at one level, we also say that sadhus' words are meant to cut and enlighten. And that requires, at times, speaking strongly.

Krishna himself sets an example when he starts by saying that actually, don't lament for that. By lamenting for that, which is not worthy of lamentation. Arjuna, you are exhibiting your ignorance.

This is quite a strong statement of, you could say, condemnation for someone who is a respected king. Now, if we see in this case, Arjuna's mind was already agitated and Krishna was speaking so that his agitated mind could be pacified through spiritual knowledge. So, the purpose, we could say, is ultimately not to agitate the mind.

The purpose is to pacify the mind. So, there are some people who just like to speak in ways that are sarcastic. There are people who like to speak in ways that are, they just want to create a sensation.

They want to do things in a way that will lead to worsening or aggravation of the situation. And what do we do by doing such a thing? The only way we can move onwards amidst the situation is by recognizing that for us, as spiritual seekers, our focus should be on that we want to serve Krishna and we want to go closer to Krishna. And for that purpose, whatever is the best we can do, we should do.

And we also want to help others move closer to Krishna. And these both require, to some extent, a careful management of situations, a careful modulation of our speech in a way that our speech is used for the service of Krishna. Otherwise, we may speak, but we speak in a way wherein instead of serving Krishna, we are actually serving our own senses.

We are serving our own mind. We are simply becoming instruments for our impulses rather than being an instrument for Krishna. So, when we are in the lower modes of passion and ignorance, then our impulses dominate us, they control us.

And we basically function according to those impulses, governed by those impulses. And we can't suddenly overnight change from being an instrument of Krishna. And to do that, to bring about the transition, first we need to at least have the discernment, have the discrimination, have the capacity to recognize that this impulse is coming from somewhere else.

I don't need, I need to resist this impulse. I can't afford to indulge in this impulse, to succumb to this impulse. And the impulse to speak, just utter whatever comes out or whatever comes in our mind, that can be very damaging to our relationship because our mind often comes up with thoughts which are crazy.

Our mind comes up with desires which are wild. And our mind comes up with words that can be very hurting for others and for ourselves as well as for others. So, the important thing is to recognize what is happening and to evaluate whether what is happening is what is in accordance with our higher values or whether it is happening based on short term impulses which are actually not important for us, which are actually detrimental for us.

So, first we begin by discerning the importance of things and then we can take future steps to discern, to act according to Krishna's will. So, in general, a devotee's intention is to focus on the spiritual and for that purpose a devotee is not very concerned with the material, neither to agitate the material nor to be agitated by the material. And agitation can come from interactions with others or agitation can come from the emotions that arise within us based on various kinds of situations that happen in our life.

And Krishna says his devotee, the devotees who are dear to him, they stay equipoised in both. Krishna is talking here about devotees who don't let themselves be worked up, agitated by externals at the material level, either by their own words or by other words. And that means basically their consciousness doesn't get distracted by their interactions with others.

And similarly, similarly, the mind goes through a whole gamut of emotions at different times. And by recognizing that our purpose is higher than the world's commotions and the mind's emotions, we can stay purposeful and progressive in our.