The Bhagavad-gita is a yoga text for emotional empowerment

[Talk at One Yoga Center, New York, USA]

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
to society.
So I used to go to, as a part of my college, I used to, not part of my college, while I was in college, there was an organisation which was doing social service. And I would go to some slums near my college. And I would teach free tuition classes for the students over there.
So I would teach English, history, mathematics. And I found, this was about 20 years ago. So I found that most of these kids were from dysfunctional families.
Their fathers were alcoholics, and there were domestic avenues in the family. So I started thinking that, just giving them education, helping them, but how much will it help them when their whole life is such a mess. So then, based on my discussion with other leaders of that organisation, we started going into broader kind of education, not just academic education, but also life education.
So we adopted a village, and we made the whole village free from alcoholism. That was a big achievement for us at that time. But then, after that, one of my friends, he came from that village, and he was just crestfallen.
I asked him what happened. He said that a few days ago, there were local municipality elections had been there. And the candidate, in order to get elected, had brought three bottles of free alcohol for everyone.
And not only the fathers, but even the children had drunk. So that was an eye-opening moment for me, in the sense that I felt that education opens more doors for people. But we don’t just need to open doors for people, we also need to empower people to walk through those doors.
Around the same time, or maybe a few months later, I was in one of the top engineering colleges in India, and there was a student who had been the university first rank holder for all the eight semesters, and brilliant student. I’d never seen any person as good in my branch of engineering. So he was also a chain smoker.
And then he got the highest paying job in the history of our college at that time. But then, while he was working on the job, in the first six months of his job, he was diagnosed with lung cancer, advanced lung cancer, and he died within a few months. So here I saw people who were uneducated, and who were succumbing to self-destructive habits like alcoholism, and people who were very educated, and they were also succumbing.
That was the time I felt that the education that is offered in the academic institutions today, gives us skills to earn a living. But it doesn’t give us the skills, the resources to manage our inner world. Martin Luther King said that we have guided missiles and misguided men.
So I felt that where is the knowledge that can help one to manage one’s inner world. That was the time I was introduced to the Bhagavad Gita. I knew it from childhood, but that was the time when I saw one of my friends, he was a very short-tempered, impulsive person.
He had started reading the Bhagavad Gita, and he was very transformed by it. That’s what inspired me to start exploring it. And I had for many years since my childhood, a very short temper.
But since I started understanding the Bhagavad Gita and living the Bhagavad Gita, I found that just within a few months, my temper went down substantially. And the Bhagavad Gita’s knowledge is primarily to help us to manage our inner world. So the Bhagavad Gita has a very dramatic setting.
There is the warrior Arjuna, who has to fight the most important war of his life. And just before that war, he becomes indecisive. So what should I do? So on the opposite side are his relatives, who have committed many atrocities against his family.
They have tried to dishonour his wife. They have tried to poison them. They have tried to burn them alive.
They have stolen their kingdom. So he has a duty as a martial guardian of society to fight and punish them, to establish the rule of law. So he has this one duty of his, and other duties, they are my relatives, how can I fight against them? So the situation is somewhat similar to say, if we have a judge, who has to judge a case of a young man who has committed manslaughter, who has killed someone.
And when the accused comes into the court, he finds that the accused is his own son. Now what should he do? As a parent, his duty is to protect his son. As a judge, his duty is to punish the wrongdoer.
So most judges would be expected to recuse themselves. So you cannot judge a situation. But Arjuna at that time, student of the Bhagavad Gita, he had to fight.
He couldn’t recuse himself. So what does he do in such a situation? And how does he decide what to do? That question is the basis for the unfolding of the Bhagavad Gita. So he is a warrior who has fought against the greatest warriors at that time and he has won against them.
But here, seeing this dilemma, he just becomes overwhelmed and puts aside his bow, saying, I can’t fight. His mind becomes overwhelmed with grief. He just can’t fight.
Now he just puts aside his bow. Beyond the specific ethics of the situation, which I’ll come to later. But the important thing is, here a warrior, when a warrior puts aside his weapons, it’s almost like he’s accepting defeat.
I won’t fight. So here, he loses the fight even before he begins the fight. And that is because the emotions are wreaking havoc in his inner world.
Just as our emotions can sabotage us, in this case, I saw people falling prey to self-destructive habits. Here, he was being sabotaged while he was doing his duty. So the Bhagavad Gita begins with this demonstrating that what happens in our inner world is profoundly consequential.
That unless we learn to manage that, we all have to face battles in our life. Battles against adverse circumstances, battle against bad health, battle against abusive relationships, battle against difficult economic conditions. And while facing these battles, we need our inner spirit, our inner determination.
But often, if our emotions are not managed, they overwhelm us. And we lose the fight even before the fight begins. There are some days when we may wake up and if something has really angered us, that resentment is there in our mind.
Why did he do like that? Why did she speak like that? Why, why, why? That keeps eating up our mental energy. And then we might wake up and within a few hours, we just feel tired. Although we have not done anything, we feel tired because our emotions are eating us up.
So what happens internally is very consequential, sometimes more consequential than what is happening externally. And the Bhagavad Gita’s message takes us to the core of the inner world. It explains that we normally identify ourselves as our physical selves.
Yes, I have this body, I have to keep it healthy, I have to keep it attractive. But as I said, beyond the body is our mind with our emotions. And they can affect people enormously.
Sometimes a person may be very good looking and healthy, but if they’re depressed, they may commit suicide, although there’s nothing wrong with their body. So that is because the mind is attacking the body. So we take care of the body, but there is the emotions which are far more consequential than the bodily conditions also at times.
But in the Bhagavad Gita, it takes us beyond the emotions to the experiencer of the emotions. Sometimes we identify with our emotions. I am angry now.
I feel furious. I feel depressed. Now we could do a thought exercise wherein, say, I’ll just repeat this.
You could just as you’re sitting, just be relaxed. Close your eyes. And consider whatever you are seeing to be like a screen.
There will be different thoughts, maybe what work you have to do after this, or something that happened yesterday. Or maybe just whether you’re feeling comfortable or uncomfortable. There are various thoughts going like a stream on the screen of your mind.
But you’ll observe that, or you’ll note that you are the observer of whatever thoughts are going on that screen. Now try to look back and try to look at that observer. You observe your thoughts, but now try to look back, take a step back and look at the observer of those thoughts.
If you try to do that, then the observer shifts back. No matter how much you try, you cannot find the observer of the thoughts. And just take a deep breath.
Yeah, you can open your eyes now. So if we decide we can observe our thoughts, okay, I was, you know, this person doesn’t make much sense. This person is irritable.
This person is like, these thoughts we can observe, but we can’t observe the observer of our thoughts. Marcus Aurelius, a famous European thinker, he said that what we are looking for is what we are looking with. If I want to look at my inner observer, the observer is what is looking.
So there are emotions which we strongly identify with. But we, the experiencer of our emotions is different from those emotions. So the Bhagavad Gita tells Arjuna that you are having those emotions, but understand that you are not those emotions.
You are something more. You are something spiritual. So basically the Gita uses a three level vision of reality.
There is the body, there is the mind, and there is the soul. So the soul is spiritual. The mind, as it says, mental, which is a transition between, a link between the body and the soul.
The simple metaphor could be, is like the body. The software is like the mind. And the user is like the soul.
So sometimes in our computer, certain notifications may just pop up. Certain messages may come up. Certain updates may come.
And if we are not very careful, you might just follow it. Let me watch this. Let me read this.
And we get carried away. Sometimes some people spend hours. Till now, I think the record is something like, a person has been playing, surfing on the internet for 76 hours continuously, without getting up even to eat or drink.
And then he just fell down and fainted. Had to be hospitalised after that. Just gets carried away.
Of course, he drank, ate something that was available. But then after that he just stopped it. Lost himself.
So just as we can get carried away by what we surf on the net. So like that, whatever is happening in the mind, you just get carried away. This thought, that thought, that thought.
Although all those pop-ups may be coming on our device, they are not necessarily sites that we want to visit or notifications that we want to see. So we often, if some link comes on WhatsApp for us, it’s not that immediately we click and see the link. We look at the sender of the link and think, what kind of messages will this person send? Just spams me with messages or send something useful.
Based on that, we decide whether to click on it or not. So our mind is like that. Very notifications, many ideas, many desires, many emotions pop up.
But we need to understand that I am different from those emotions and I have to choose which emotions to focus on and which emotions to neglect, which thoughts to develop, which thoughts to neglect. So, if we consider the process of yoga, it involves, the most well-known part in the Western world is about the asanas, which are very beneficial, as you said, not just for healing the body, but for improving the body in many ways, in calming the mind also. So, in Patanjali Yoga Sutra, the definition of yoga is given as yoga, yoga’s chitta vritti nirodha.
That chitta vritti nirodha is the moment of consciousness, nirodha, stop it. The consciousness going here, going there, going there, just stop it. When that happens, then the various agitating directions in which our consciousness is going, that agitation stops.
When the agitation stops, then there can be gradual pacification. Then we can think of who we are. Otherwise, we are just thinking about whatever is popping up in the screen of our mind.
Just like somebody who is continuously, okay, this link, this video, this advertisement, this news, but they may completely forget why they came to the computer for, what were they supposed to do. So, when we stop that, so we stop just following what was happening on the computer, then you can think, why did I come here? That in the computer of the mind, on the screen of the mind, so many things are popping up, let’s stop it all. Let’s stop it.
Get it all to stop. Then, after that, what am I supposed to do? What is important for me? In the Bhagavad Gita also, this idea of chitta vritti nirodha, that is present in the Bhagavad Gita also, it is also a yoga text, and it explains about the perfection of yoga. It says, yatra paramate chittam niruddham yoga sevaya yatra chaiva atmanatmanam vasyanatmanitushyati So, yatra uparamate chittam, the consciousness becomes calm, peaceful.
Nirodham yoga sevaya, the same word nirodha, is pacification. Yoga sevaya, by the practise of yoga, that happens. And then the Gita says, what will happen after that? It says, then, currently, I’ll use three metaphors for understanding how this, I talk about the screen of the mind, and the screen functions in various ways.
Screen acts like a window. So, through a window, I can see, okay, this guest has come, I want to meet this person, I don’t want to meet. So, the window helps us to see the outer world.
So, for example, right now, so you are hearing what I am speaking, I am speaking and I am observing how you are hearing it. So, in this case, our mind is acting like a window. So, you are perceiving me, I am perceiving you.
But our mind often tends to go off. We are physically sitting, but our mind goes off for a jog. It goes, okay, what will I cook for food today? What is there on TV afterwards? What am I going to do? So, when our mind starts thinking of other things, at that time, and sometimes we are talking with someone and the person says, sorry, what did you say? You know, I was lost.
I was distracted. People often say, what has happened at that time? So, they are in front of us, their ears are also there. But what has happened? The mind is not there.
So, the body, mind and the soul, the soul is there, the body, the ears are also there, but the mind is not there. So, then the perception doesn’t happen. So, sometimes the mind acts like, we could say something like a TV screen.
So, if here there is a window, I’ll be able to see what is outside. But if there is a TV screen over there, then instead of seeing what is outside, you say, on the TV screen, say, US Open Tennis match is going on. Then I’ll go to Flushing Meadows and I’ll be over there.
So, what happens is, for us, the mind suddenly changes from a window to a TV screen. And when it happens, we don’t know. So, we are thinking and doing one thing and suddenly it’s gone somewhere else.
And quite often, most of the stress that we experience in our life is because this mind acts like a TV screen. All of us face problems in our life. And today’s problems can always be dealt with today.
Today’s problems are never too much to deal with today. But if the mind is just as a window, this is the problem, how should I deal with it? But the mind becomes like a TV screen. To today’s problems, the mind piles on top yesterday’s problems and tomorrow’s problems.
And when both of them get piled up, then it becomes unbearable. So, often, if we look at when we feel stressed, it is largely because we are resenting what may have happened in the past or we are dreading what may happen in the future. But learning and preparing has to be done in a conscious, planned, intentional way.
I’ll think about the past and see what I can learn from it. I’ll look at the future and plan about it. But when the mind just goes off on its own, then it just makes us fearful or makes us resentful.
So, the mind often acts as a TV screen where it troubles us. But the Bhagavad Gita says that when we practise yoga and the perfection of yoga is when the mind starts acting like a mirror. In the mirror, we see ourselves.
Yatra chaiva atmanatmanam pashyan atmanitushyati. We see ourselves. And we see ourselves in the pristine beauty of our spirituality.
So, at a physical level, we’ll always have some sense of inadequacy. You may think, oh, I don’t look good enough. I look good enough, but there’s somebody else who looks better.
Oh, somebody else speaks better than me. Somebody else is better at social skills than me. Somebody is better at making money than me.
One of the easiest ways to make ourselves miserable is to compare ourselves with others. Very easily we can make ourselves miserable. So, then with this mirror, presently when we look at ourselves, we often either feel superior to others or we feel inferior to others.
So, we are actually not seeing ourselves as we are. We are seeing ourselves in relationship with our conception of others. And therefore, when we look at ourselves presently, sometimes people just look within.
If at present, unless we are pure enough, looking within may not necessarily make us peaceful. Looking within can make us even more agitated. Because we look within, you know, this is not right in my life.
That is not right in my life. So, we have to actually come to a level that the mirror shows who we are in our pure consciousness. Now, where yoga says that just stop the material movement of consciousness.
It also says that we need to regain the spiritual consciousness. There is a fundamental difference between the world of external objects and touches and the world of material consciousness. For example, if I decide that I don’t want to touch this, I can just put this down and I won’t touch it.
Now, I can decide I will not touch this and I can act on it. I will not touch it. But if in the world of consciousness, I decide, I will not think of this.
If an alcoholic decides, I will not think of alcohol. Actually, in not thinking of alcohol, one is thinking of alcohol. I will not think of alcohol.
Whichever is favourite brand of alcohol, it comes in our mind. The mental world is such that we cannot just exist in the negative. Yes, it is possible.
But it is not by resolving not to think of something. It’s rather by resolving to think of something positive. This feature, as they call it, the monkey phenomena.
The red monkey phenomena means it can be red monkey, pink monkey, whatever. It says, if you tell someone, don’t think of a red monkey. In their lifetime, they never thought of a red monkey till then.
But as soon as you tell them, don’t think of a red monkey, they’ll start thinking of that. So, when we want to stop the motion of our consciousness, we need to direct the consciousness somewhere higher. So, this is where I say the Bhagavad Gita takes us inwards from the physical level to the mental level, from the mental level to the spiritual level.
And it takes us from the spiritual also to the foundational or the universal spiritual level. It says that we are all parts of the absolute, parts of the whole. And our consciousness finds its natural rest when it is grounded in the whole of which we are a part.
So, actually, we all intrinsically know that we alone don’t do everything in our life. Yesterday, I came here from Jacksonville. Now, when I go and board a plane, at that time, I make sure that I have my tickets.
I make sure that I have my identity proof. But beyond that, I don’t worry whether the plane has enough fuel or not, whether the aeroplane pilot is trained or not, whether the devices in the aeroplane cockpit are working or not. I know there is someone else taking care of that.
I just have to play my part. My part is to have the ticket, have the ID proof and there is a whole system that will take care of everything else. So, similarly, the Gita explains that in life, we just have to play our part and there is a whole that is much bigger than us and that whole will take care of the rest of things.
So, the problem is that often we play our part improperly or rather disharmoniously. That means, if I enter into a plane, my part is, instead of sitting on the plane, I start quarrelling with my other fellow passengers. I start abusing the crew attendants.
Then I am becoming disharmonious. And to the extent I become disharmonious, I will get into trouble. So, the whole purpose of the Bhagavad Gita is to tell Arjuna that all agitation of the mind that comes from disharmony.
There is inner peace, then there is harmony. So, when we harmonise ourselves with different teams in different traditions, the whole is known by the name Krishna. But that whole, when we harmonise, how do we harmonise? Through love, through directing our affection towards each other.
That you are identifying yourself. You are thinking that, oh, if I belong to my, if I am a member of my immediate family, then I should fight against those people who are aggressors. But if I think they are a part of my dynasty, how can I fight against them? So, the Bhagavad Gita tells Arjuna that actually you are not just either a member of your family or a member of your community.
Your defining identity is that you are a part of the whole. And you are meant to act in loving harmony with the whole. So, at present, the opponents are actually disrupting that harmony.
So, you are fighting against them, not simply because they have stolen your kingdom or they have abused your wife. Yes, they are valid reasons. But more important is they are living disciples.
You fight not to take revenge, not to settle scores, but to restore harmony. So, the message of the Bhagavad Gita is actually a call for harmony. And to the extent that inner harmony comes, the Bhagavad Gita is not at all a book which is calling for war.
The point of the Gita is not to fight a war. The point of the Gita is to return to harmony. And that’s why when the Gita ends, Arjuna, he doesn’t say, I will fight the war.
He says at the end, I will do your will. I will do your will. That means I will harmonise with you.
Now, for us in our specific situations, how we harmonise will vary. What is required for us to harmonise? That will vary according to time, please. So, I started by talking about my experiences, whether there was education or no education, people have self-destructive emotions and they can destroy their lives.
And the Gita demonstrates that how a great warrior who could defeat anyone was defeated by his own emotions and just lost the will to fight. And that will was restored by inner understanding, inner harmony. So, we did a thought exercise where we look at our emotions, we can see them moving, our thoughts, our emotions, our desires, moving on our mental screen.
But we cannot observe the observer of the mental screen because that observer is who we are. So, this exercise purpose was to understand that our emotions are different from us. Something irreducible is at our core, which is who we are and emotions come and go.
So, to understand, the user is the soul, the spiritual essence. And just as in the software, many things can keep coming up in our browser, and this pop-up, this advertisement, this YouTube, this video, and people can get lost like that. Our mind, we can get lost.
So, the mind, when it acts as a mirror, as a window, it shows us what is there in the outer world. When it acts like a TV screen, it takes us into the past or the future and often it causes stress, adding the problems of yesterday and tomorrow to the problems of today. But the process of yoga is to purify the mind so that it becomes like a mirror.
Presently, if we look at ourselves because we compare ourselves with others, we either feel inferior, superior or inferior. So, the purpose of yoga is to stop this movement of the mind. That’s what the Patanjali Yoga Sutra says.
Bhagavad Gita acknowledges that and then takes it further. We cannot just stay with stopped consciousness because consciousness always has to be active, thinking of something. I cannot, I can choose not to touch this bottle of water, but I cannot choose not to think of this bottle of water.
I have to have something else to think of. Then the thought of the bottle will not come in. So that, what is it that we dwell on? That the Bhagavad Gita says, go to our, not just our spiritual essence, but to the spiritual core, the whole of which we are a part.
So, if we look at the way we function in the world, you know, we only play our part. I enter into a plane with my ticket and ID proof and there is a whole system which takes care of the other details of the flight. Similarly, in our own bodies, food, but how that food is digested, how it is converted into energy, we really don’t know that.
There’s something else which is taking care of that. I intend to speak, I think some thoughts, but exactly how the voice box moves and the exact sounds that I want to make, I don’t know that. So, we are playing parts and there is a bigger whole which takes care of other things.
It’s known by different names and different traditions. It’s known by Krishna, named Krishna in the Bhagavad Gita. And the Gita says that Krishna is present in our own hearts and our defining identity should not be in terms of our externals.
This family, this community, this race, this gender, this country. No, our defining identity is that we are parts of the whole. And even if we face obstacles or reversals in the externals, but if we turn internally and connect with Krishna, we may be unloved, but we are never unloveable because Krishna always loves us.
And even if nothing seems to be left for us, but still Krishna is always left within us, with us. And by learning to live in the light of His love, but by harmonising ourselves with Him through the process of the yoga of love, that is Bhakti Yoga, we can actually get that indefatigable confidence to face whatever life sends our way. This is Arjuna, he picked up his bow and became ready to fight.
Like that, our determination which may become lost because of some obstacles, gets restored and we become confident to face life when we live it in the light of this understanding of our spiritual identity and of our relationship with the whole. Thank you very much. Thank you, Krishna.
Are there any questions coming? Can we relate the issues today? In fact, I’m writing a book on this topic right now. One, I’ll talk from my own experience. I came to America first in 2015.
That time I had gone to Ohio State University. I gave a talk over there on regulating our mental diet. And after that, one student came and met me, American student.
He said that just before this talk, I was contemplating suicide. He had been in a relationship with a girl and she had broken up and gone with some other boy, and he was traumatised. So when that had happened, he just decided, he saw a poster of this programme, and he just came for the programme.
He said, now I understand that it is not I who wanted to commit suicide, it was just my mind that is prompting me, do this, do this. I don’t need to do this. So I told him to read the Bhagavad Gita.
And the Bhagavad Gita teaches various process of yoga, especially talks about Bhakti Yoga, the yoga of love, by which we connect with the whole, with Krishna. One of the most powerful ways we connect is through singing prayers, singing mantras. We sing the Hare Krishna mantra, but there are various mantras like that.
So then every year when I come, I meet him. So this year when I had gone, this is the second time I’m coming to America, in the first half when I had come, I met him again. And he said that he had got again into a similar situation.
He had got a relationship with another girl, and she had also left him to go to some other boy. This time, the thought of suicide also didn’t enter into his mind. He is a good violin player, and he likes to sing.
This is when she sent that message, breaking up with him. He just went into his room, locked himself in the room, and he took his violin and started singing the Hare Krishna mantra and playing it. He said, I played continuously for six hours.
And he said that was the richest experience of my life. I could feel the presence of Krishna. I could feel in the sound of the mantra, a deep spiritual love.
So that which could have been the most devastating experience of my life, it actually became the most uplifting experience of my life. And all this happened because the Bhagavad Gita’s wisdom helped him to direct his love inwards, towards Krishna. So I feel that rejection, I was just a few days ago, I gave a college talk on people’s top 10 fears.
What are the people afraid of? So especially in youth, one of the biggest fears is rejection. So here you see actually, that fear of rejection can be dealt with through our inner connection that is established through yoga, through bhakti yoga. And that’s what the Bhagavad Gita offers us.
Second, I talked earlier about how people get into addictions. And if we consider that the wisdom of the Bhagavad Gita provides us a higher satisfaction, it gives higher wisdom, higher satisfaction. And literally thousands of people who have all over the world, according to the practises and principles of bhakti, given up addictive behaviours.
I’m just corresponding with one professor in Nebraska. He is doing a meta-study of bhakti practitioners all over the world, and what transformation the Bhagavad Gita has brought out in his life. And he’s working with some Yale and Cambridge professors.
So it’s a very promising study where actually this correlation can be also statistically, empirically demonstrated that bhakti yoga practise can transform people, not just in their inner worldview, but in their outer habits also, helping them overcome addictive habits. A third thing which the Bhagavad Gita encourages is eco-friendly living. Today’s world, we do recognise that we have got our planet into a lot of trouble, and we need to do something about it.
And yes, there are many environmentally conscious people who are trying. What we need is not just efforts to clean the environment, clean the rivers, but we also need some worldview which will clean the heart of the mentality that makes people pollute the rivers. We can clean the polluted rivers, but people will again pollute the rivers.
So we need some wisdom which will clean the pollution of the heart. And as long as we think, this is not just my statement, the World Watch Institute has said that as long as people believe that consumerism is the way to happiness, then we cannot have environmental sustainability. People want more and more and more.
And there’s only so much that the earth can provide. This is the only sustainable way to eco-friendly living is if people can find non-material forms of enrichment. And the Bhagavad Gita’s wisdom can offer that.
And it’s not just I feel good. The Bhagavad Gita offers us a whole worldview explaining why we feel good. We all want to feel good.
But the Bhagavad Gita offers us a worldview about why by becoming spiritual, we’ll not just feel good, but we’ll feel the best that we can feel. And in that way, it is the impetus for eco-friendly living is not just negative. Oh, otherwise the planet will be damaged.
That’s why I live eco-friendly. No, that is, with the Bhagavad Gita’s worldview, the impetus for spiritual living becomes much more positive. This is the way we can be truly happy.
We can find the best happiness because through the inner connection with Krishna, we experience such a higher satisfaction that the pleasure through outer gratifications, it doesn’t seem so attractive. So in this way, the Gita, if applied properly, it works at changing the world from a grassroots level. It addresses the fundamental problem.
Henry David Thoreau, he said that a thousand hackings at the shoots of evil are not as effective as one hacking at the root of evil. So the shoots of evil are the specific problems. We can have crime, we can have terrorism, we can have corruption, we can have dictatorship, autocracy, can have different problems.
These are all in the shoots. But the fundamental problem is that we have become materialistic instead of being spiritual. And that when it is addressed, then the specific shoots, they will be cut down automatically when the root is cut down.
So this is the, so by encouraging us and through us others to become more spiritual, the Bhagavad Gita addresses today’s social issues at the most fundamental level. So when the Bhagavad Gita says that work without expectation of result, especially the western society is very expectation driven. Not only do we expect results, but we expect them immediately.
So how do we apply this teaching? Let me be careful in understanding what the Bhagavad Gita exactly is teaching. It is, there are goals and there are results. The Bhagavad Gita is not against setting goals.
It is about not being attached to results. That in the, in Arjuna as a warrior, when he was fighting every day, he would set a goal. You know, I have to, I have to win this element of the war.
I have to overcome this segment of the army. We all need to set goals. So the whole, this is, I’ll try to explain it as simply as I can, but it’s a little complicated subject.
The point is that from our action to the result of the action, it is not just a single causal chain. It is not just my actions that produce the results. So there is, there is, the broad wisdom of the Gita explains that there is my action, then there is destiny, then there is time, and then there is a result.
So, for example, if a farmer sows the land and ploughs the crops and ploughs the land, that is the work of the farmer. The rains coming on time in appropriate quantity, that is the destiny. And then the seasons have to change till the harvesting season comes, that is the passage of time.
And then the results will come. So my work is only one component in the production of the result. So, when I think that my work is going to produce the result, then I am neglecting the other factors.
And there are many reasons for this, but one of the reasons that mental problems are so much in the Western world is because we deny these other factors. We think that I alone am the producer of the results. If I work hard enough, or if I work smart enough, I can do whatever I want.
Well, it does not work like that. We all see in our life that an athlete will be a brilliant athlete, fully prepared for Olympics. But it is just before the Olympics that athlete falls sick, cannot play over there.
So there are factors beyond our control also which determine the results. And when we don’t acknowledge those factors, then we hold ourselves responsible for things for which we are not actually responsible. And then we burden ourselves.
So a lot of mental problems come because we don’t accept our place in the total scheme of things. Our place is that we play a part in the production of the results. But we are not the sole cause of the results.
So when the Bhagavad Gita is saying that don’t be attached to results, that means don’t think. If you see the same verse which is often called, कर्मन्नेवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेशु कदाचिन, मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर् माते संगोष्त्व कर्मण। This 2.47 in the Gita says, do not think that you are the cause of the result of the work. So yes, I do my work.
We all have to prepare whatever we are going to do. But we alone don’t produce the result. There are factors beyond us which also play a role in determining the result.
So when I am attached to the results, then I am fixating my consciousness on something that is not under my control. So if say a student has to give four exams, today, tomorrow, day after and the day after that. So today the student has given the exam and it’s done well.
Whatever has done is done now. Now the point for the student is now prepare for tomorrow’s exam. Students are thinking, how many marks will I get? Now what’s this answer? How much marks the teachers will give? Will I get full, will I get 4.5 C GPA, 4 C GPA, 3 C GPA? Now that’s all, the chapter is over.
Student has done the work, now move on to the next. So attachment to the results actually prevents us, it distracts us from focussing on our work. Now before the action, before the action, if we set a goal that can actually inspire us to become wholehearted.
Yes, I want to achieve this much percentage, so I’ll work this hard. That’s fine. So setting goals is not the problem.
Because setting goals inspires us to do our part well. But being attached to the results, it actually detracts us from doing our part well. Because those results, our work is in our control, the results are not in our control.
So therefore, when the Gita says, don’t be attached to the results of your work, it is saying that acknowledge your place in the scheme of things. And you are one doer. So that’s why the last part of that verse is, Maate Sangostva Karmani.
Do not be attached to not doing your work. Normally we think, if I’m not, if I don’t, if I’m not supposed to be attached to the outcome, then why should I do any work at all? Gita is saying, no, you do your work. So the idea is that whatever I’m doing, I focus on that which is in my control and leave the rest to the whole.
So I have today, tomorrow I have my exam, I study wholeheartedly today. And by that study, I do my best. But after I’ve given the exam, just move on to the next thing.
Don’t be attached, worrying about the result. So in that sense, if we see the detachment that the Gita talks about, it is actually empowering. Because it enables us to focus on that which is in our control, and it frees our mind from fixating on that which is beyond our control.
Okay, yeah, good point. So the farmer is, farmer sowing the seed is like doing one’s work. The rains coming is like destiny.
And then that passage of time is like the change of seasons, like the time. So in every work that we do, the student studies, that’s the work. The whole correction process takes its own time.
The results come from the exam. So how the whole correction process happens, that is the destiny. And after the correction process happens, the results come, that passage of time is there, and the result comes.
So basically, our work is one part of the process. It’s not the whole process. This may be a slightly personal question, but in an engineering college, most kids are focused on either inventing something to make more money, be more successful.
So what was the drive that you were looking for to do something, to give something back to the society? So what triggered me to want to give something back to society? So there are two main factors there. One was that, one was circumstantial. One was more deep-rooted.
Before I got into social service, I was very much focused, almost obsessed, you could say, on being an academic achiever. So I wanted to be the first in my class. India is a very education-obsessed country.
So, and I was always among the best students, but I was never the best student. I was second, third, joint, first, but I was never the number one. So then, in my third year of engineering, I gave GRE.
That’s for coming here to America. And I used to like English language from my childhood. And that’s where Indians struggle usually, in English.
Math and general aptitude is not that difficult for Indians. So because my English was good, at that time, it was GRE about 2400. I got 2350 at that time.
So I was the, not just first in my college, I was the first in the history of my college. I was the first in my whole university. I thought, yahoo, I’m going to be happy now.
And I was for some time. But then afterwards, I realised that there’s no happiness just looking at the mark sheet. Oh, I got 2350.
It’s that you need someone to come and congratulate you. Then you feel happy. And somehow it happened that three of my friends just forgot to congratulate me.
One, two, three. And then, first time it happened, I was okay. Don’t you know what I’ve Second time.
Third time it happened. Again, I was agitated. But then it struck me at that time.
It is almost like I look at myself from above. And I thought that in this achieving the marks in GRE has not made me happy. Actually, it has made me more dependent for my happiness on others.
Earlier I could just meet my friends and talk with them. Now when I meet with them, I’m expecting, when will you congratulate me? And if you don’t, I’m agitated. So I felt I could just continue on this chart, this trajectory.
I might top in another exam, but the same history would repeat itself. So I felt there must be some other way that I can find some satisfaction in my life. That was what actually activated me in my social service activities.
So sometimes I say that I was frustrated with success. So that was circumstantial. More conscious and more long term was that my grandfather was a part of the Indian independence movement.
He had been imprisoned for that also. And he had instilled a lot of values of nation building in me. And I felt that we need to contribute.
So that was something which I always had in the mind. But because of the academic pressures, I felt I would do that later. But when at this particular point, it just, this is not the way to fulfilment.
Then I started focussing more on contributing to