What does the Gita verse karmany evadhikaraste mean?

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then there will be return to Krishna Question is what does karmanye vadhika raste actually mean how can we apply this verse and devote ourselves to karma actually this verse comes in a particular context in the Bhagavad Gita it comes in 2.47 in the Bhagavad Gita and quite often this verse is translated as karma ki puja hai work is worship now actually this verse doesn’t talk about worship karmanye vadhika raste you have a right to work there is no implication of worship over there ma phaleshu kalachana do not be attached to the fruit of the work ma karma phalaghetra do not consider yourself to be the cause of the fruit of work ma aatei samgo spra karmanye at the same time do not be attached to not doing work so now there is no verse in the Bhagavad Gita which directly says that karma ki puja hai work is worship and we have to devote ourselves to work there is another verse in the 18th chapter in 18.45 Krishna talks about the nature of work and there he says svakarmanatama bhyarcha siddhim vindati madhava svakarmanatama bhyarcha means by your work, worship him he is not saying work is worship he is saying by your work, worship him and then he refers to the Supreme Lord so now work is worship is used as an ethical slogan at times to remind people that all work should be given dignity and no kind of work should be frowned upon or looked down upon and as far as it goes that is good but work as worship is not a philosophical principle if work were worship then the donkey would be the greatest worshipper so work in and of itself is not worship work can be made into worship and that requires a particular kind of consciousness so I will talk about both these verses in that context and then I will explain their application so now we see karmanyavadhika raste that comes in a section where Arjuna is confused about what I should be in 2.7 the Bhagavad Gita Arjuna surrenders in 2.11 to 2.30 Krishna explains to Arjuna that you are not the body of the soul and in 2.31 to 2.37 he says therefore you should work to attain heavens and from 2.30 onwards Krishna says ok don’t just look at heaven, look for something higher in you, look for something eternal and then there is comparing fruitive work with non-fruitive work fruitive work means work which is done for a particular fruit it may be fruit in terms of you fight so that you get a kingdom in this world or fight so that you can attain heaven both are fruits then he talks about non-fruitive work now non-fruitive work what does it mean does it mean that one doesn’t want anything from the work and how is that kind of work practical does it mean that we don’t think about the fruit at all you know if say if say a housewife is cooking then karmanyavadhika she is so busy cooking she doesn’t care about the quality of the food student is studying I don’t care about the marks at all no it is not about not caring about the fruit it is about not being consumed by the fruit we care for the fruit but we care about the fruit not for ourselves but for the sake of contribution for the sake ultimately of service to the Lord so when our goal is the fruit itself then if the fruit doesn’t come we will be dejected the fruit comes we will become proud we will become attached and eventually that fruit is also going to go away nothing in this world is temporary so when we do work only for the sake of the fruit then we short sell ourselves now we can get much better what Krishna is telling in this section is we do our work without being consumed by the thought of the fruit the fruit we want the fruit whenever we are doing something we do want the work to be quality if Arjuna was practicing as an archer hours and hours and years he was practicing and he was shooting at the target if karmanyavadhikaaraste meant that I don’t care for the fruit he would not care to hit the target but he didn’t do that he painstakingly practiced so firstly it doesn’t mean not caring karmanyavadhikaaraste doesn’t mean not caring for the fruit it doesn’t mean don’t care only for the fruit care that the fruit is to be offered to someone and that higher reality is told in the Vedas so karmana tamakya worship him by your fruit so now the implication of this is that the bhagavad gita shifts our focus to what is in our control instead of what is out of our control when our focus is on the fruits then actually the fruit is not in our control a student may study very diligently but sometimes there is a blackout at the time of the exam or sometimes something happens and the student doesn’t get good marks we may work very well but sometimes the company goes down or suddenly the market trends come up and because of market goes into recession so many things can go wrong so if we wear our sense of self identity and self worth on our acquiring the result then we sentence ourselves to anxiety and misery so Krishnaveni Krishna says karmanye vadikasti ma phaleshu kathacharya that don’t be caught in the phali the remaining two things are also important karmanye vadikasti ma phaleshu kathacharya that’s all that is usually quoted ma karma phaleshu why should you not be consumed by the fruits because understand that you are not the cause of the fruits now when you say how can I not be the cause of the fruit I studied so I got marks Krishna says here ma karma phaleshu hetu here refers to the cause in terms of final cause we are not the only producer of our results the results don’t come only because of us our effort is important but other things are also important cricket most of you are familiar with cricket many cricketers are famous for their superstitions there is a famous Australian cricketer he would always have a red handkerchief hanging from his right pocket and he would think that that red handkerchief will give him kunda and if you drop a catch first you have to drop the handkerchief maybe because of that I dropped the catch so there was another cricket batsman whenever he would go to batting first he would go to the rest room and cover all the commodes and then he would go to bat and if he would get out early first he would go and check the commode and if it was open he would go and blast his team members now you may say what does this handkerchief got to do with playing but the thing is although cricket is such a performance driven sport the individual performance is important but every sports person knows that there are factors beyond their control and these are attempts by which these cricketers are trying to appease that which is beyond their control somehow try to appease that and get it in their favor so the Bhagavad Gita describes that no not the Bhagavad Gita, the Puranas describe Bhagavad Gita is condensing the Puranas so there is karma, daiva, kala these three together lead to phala so to give a simple example if somebody is farming so plowing the land, sowing the seeds, that is the karma the timely coming of the rains is the daiva and then after that also there is the passage of time then there will be the harvest that will come so in every phala that comes phala comes as a result of karma plus daiva plus kala and Krishna says don’t think that you are the cause of the result that means don’t think that you alone are producing the result, see when we think we alone are producing the result, when we get the result we become proud and when we don’t get the result then we get inferiority complex so this as I said Bhagavad Gita shifts our focus to that which is in our control and what is in our control is our endeavor somebody may say if I am not supposed to enjoy the fruits of my work then why should I work Krishna says in the last line do not be attached to not doing your work what that means is that he is saying you endeavor, endeavor is what you are controlling, the world sees the result but God sees the endeavor, if the endeavor is there God will be pleased with that even the result is not there so in this way by doing the endeavor by keeping our focus on that which is in our control we can actually optimize our performance and we can also increase the probability of getting the result because our focus is not caught in things which are not in our control now how if we are living in this world and if we think that the trappings of worldly success are the standard of my success I have to get this pay raise, I have to get this car, I have to get this house then we really cannot do Karamalini Vadika because we want the money but if we think okay I am working whatever I am doing, I am doing this in a mood of service to Krishna so even if I don’t get the results but because I am doing it in a mood of service to Krishna Krishna accepts the attitude Krishna is Bhavagrati and in that sense even when we don’t get the results still we are successful spiritually because we have endeavoured and that endeavour is pleasing to Krishna so that’s why Krishna said Svakarmanatam by your work worship him and this way you will attain perfection Krishna doesn’t bring in any discussion about the fellow over there it’s not that you have to give the power to him to attain perfection, just by your work worship him so in that sense Karamalini Vadika is talking about not to be consumed by the fruit but by focusing on the object to whom we are worshipping by doing that work and focusing on our endeavour instead of the fruit is that your question? thank you very much