Gita 18.15 Spiritual consciousness ensures that our actions give a favorable result

Transcript

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18.15 krishna is continuing his analysis of action in this section of the bhagavad gita guiding arjuna towards an understanding of how he can act without getting entangled in this verse he says with the body with the speech and with the mind the three primary faculties which we have for acting in the world usually these three are the primary resources and if we can spiritualize these then there is a very high probability that our whole consciousness and our whole life can get spiritualized sanyasis in the vaishnava tradition are three dandis the stick that they carry is a combination of three sticks and those three sticks represent the body the speech and the mind and all these three faculties are being used for one purpose the glorification of the supreme lord that one begins work with this and then one gets a favorable result or one gets an opposite an unfavorable result these five factors are involved they are the causes based on which the results come its interesting krishna used the word nyaya nyaya justice or fairness we could say krishna has earlier used the word anyaya in the 16th chapter and he talks about how excessive material desires impel one to immoral activities, unfair activities asha pashyatair baddham kama krodha parayanaham ihante kama bhogartham anyayen arthasanchayan anyayen arthasanchayan they act unfairly dishonestly illegally to fulfill their desires because they are driven by their desires they are dedicated to their desires parayanaham we all have, we all will be driven by our desires but we don’t have to drive for our desires that means they don’t have to be our goal they will pull us in particular directions and then we have to you know choose which desires are worthy to be cultivated and nourished and which desires to be neglected and thereby starved and weakened so here nyayam va viparitam va that means when we work hard sometimes it appears to us that we have got a fair result and sometimes it feels that we have got an unfair result when we get such an unfair result it’s natural to feel frustrated when we feel that we have worked very hard and still the results have not worked out when we feel that say we studied very hard for an exam but still we got poor marks that means at that time we can choose either to get frustrated thinking oh life sucks the world is so unfair or we can look at the bigger picture and understand that factors beyond our control also shape the results and that’s why we don’t have to take failure personally to the extent we take success personally to that extent we will be forced to take failure personally by personally means if we take personal credit for success just see I am so clever I am so powerful and that’s why I have succeeded then we will have to take personal responsibility for failure but if we understand that success and failure come and go and they don’t affect our core our core is that we are parts of the whole Krishna and we are souls who are indestructible and who have an inalienable relationship with Krishna our foremost purpose and our ultimate perfection is to become connected with him and stay connected with him indeed become absorbed in him through the practice of diligent devotion then with this understanding when we strive to practice our doing our roles in the world then the result that we seek primarily is the strengthened inner connection with Krishna and strengthening of that connection is always possible for us as long as we are determined to strive for it as long as we are endeavoring to the best of our capacity to do it so if we focus on simply doing our best Krishna will help us take care of the rest even if the rest doesn’t work out in terms of the desired result materially but still the desired results spiritually in terms of giving us greater absorption Krishna that desired result spiritually will always work out and that is what we strive for that is what we seek the fullest of our capacity and to the extent we seek that and achieve that to that extent we will stay situated in stability so this understanding that there are multiple factors involved in action this is meant to help us gain calmness and clarity by which we can move gracefully forward by which we can focus on gaining perspective and learning to attain Krishna by the firm resolution of our intelligence as long as we don’t let ourselves ourselves be consumed we will have the opportunity to grow in our life spiritually even if the material result doesn’t work out but if we let ourselves get consumed by the material dimension of our service and we think that the essence of our service the essence of our life the purpose of our life our very self worth comes only from the result then when the result fails to materialize we will be shattered we will start questioning the very purpose of our life itself thus by overall seeking balance we can move ahead in our life towards spiritual growth and through the inner stability coming from our spiritual understanding we can also focus on doing our best and increase the probability of getting the favorable material results too thank you