Geeta says that Karma Yoga is better than just action. Karma Yoga means doing actions without dwelling on the results. The moment we focus on the result, our concentration wavers. We can not focus on what we really want to do. Then we may not achieve what we really want to. Then we suffer and question why this is happening to me? This becomes a vicious cycle. even though we understand this problem, still we get dragged into a mire of delusion. Bhagavan describes in Geeta about the techniques to understand this mire and how to get out of this.
Yadha te mohakalilam buddhirvyatitarishyati!
Tadha ganthasi nirvadam srotavyasya srutasya cha!!
When your intellect crosses beyond the mire of delusion, then you shall attain to indifference as to what has been heard and what has yet to be heard.
Some times we think too much about certain issues and this is fine to some extent but this should not cripple us. We do so many routine things every day without much thinking. Some of the karmas are complicated and bring unforeseen consequences which could be detrimental. Some times some of the actions could be bad for us or for our loved ones. Then we go into some kind of conflict and Arjuna in the middle of battlefield had similar conflict. He felt killing his own people is a sin. He resorted to inaction and forgot the Dharma here. The feeling of me and mine will throw us into this mire of delusion. The mire means muddle or swampy ground. If someone falls in this it is difficult to come out of this. When we fall into this mire, we lose sight of real vs unreal. We do not use our intellect. Whenever we act without intellect we have to face hurdles or hard ships. If we think for a while we can understand this fact.
How can we avoid falling into this mire of delusion?
1) We need to understand the extent of our duty in every action and have to be careful in crossing the limits.
We perform so many actions everyday and we have our likes and dislikes. Lot of kids does not like the discipline and they might not enjoy this act of studying. But they go to school and lot of them finish their education. In this process parents and teachers help them to focus on their studies otherwise having discipline is a tough task. After we become adults, we do our own things. Then we have our own notions and ideas. We would like do what we think is right. We do not know whether we are treading the right path or not. This is where we think money, fame, material objects will give us happiness. We all know that this is not the only thing that we need in our life. We need to understand the reality of life.
2) Understanding real vs unreal and how this impacts our lives.
The reality we all know is we come empty handed into this world and we leave the same way. But we are not able to grasp this reality because of our sense organs. We are in some kind of delusion. Our society brainwashed us to the extent that it is difficult to come out of the clutches of this materialistic world. This is what Bhagavan in Geeta calls as MOHAKALILA (The mire of delusion)
3) We have to perform our actions with a duty minded approach but not with selfish attitude.
This society threw us into a specific pattern of thinking which trips us into difficulties. If we are duty oriented then we can escape this trap. This is called Karma Yoga. This Karma Yoga helps us to avoid this mire of delusion.
4) We need to understand the difference between needs and wants.
We need material objects to live. But to enjoy these we also need good health. If we do not have good health then there is no benefit of our hard earned wealth in our life. We might earn enough money for few generations but what good is this if it can not protect you from ill health. We run after things that do not help us and not make us happy. We have to wish that we need to be happy. We also need to understand what really makes us and our loved ones happy.
5) Satsangh (good company) is essential in life. We have to be with people who are positive.
We learned to run with society and our educational system is playing a big role in this material pursuit. Parents also lending a big hand in this. The meaning of real education changed. We all understand that our kids are growing to be selfish and we are teaching them the same thing. Even volunteer work for charity is done because this is going to help them to get an admission into a better college. This means we are keeping our kids away from right thinking and good habits. Because normal became abnormal and abnormal became normal. We all learned to accept this. We are cheating our selves by resorting to this so called routine.
6) We have to have spiritual mind and perform our actions with this attitude.
If we have to perform actions without selfish attitude and with out result obsessed mind, we have to have some kind of spiritual out look in life. We have to have God in our lives. We made our lives difficult. We like going into this muddle. This fog keeps us away from God. When we are preoccupied with what is not essential, we obviously can not focus on God. These are called in the above verse as SRUTAM & SROTAVYAM.
What has been heard is Srutam and what is yet to be heard is called as Srotavyam. Since our birth or from previous births we saw, heard, experienced so many things and these things left so many impressions on us. These are called as Vasanaas. In the future also we are going to learn and experience new things. All of these cause so much chaos in our lives. We can not change what already happened and we cannot acknowledge what will happen in the future. Instead of becoming helpless in this situation, we can focus on what we have to do now. If someone gets serious illness the best thing to do is focus on how to get better rather than focusing on why you got that.
Bhagavan wanted us to have "Vairaagya" - Renunciation. This does not mean we need to leave every thing behind. But leaving the obsession over the results of an action. Esavasyopanishad also teaches us the same principle. When we do this we can differentiate the real from unreal. We can gain the knowledge about our own self. Unless we experience our SELF we can not come out of the clutches of this mire of delusion.
OM SRI SAI RAM!
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