Gita Is Not This
Questioner: Sir, my question is regarding ‘Karma'. I have achieved, some things like I started reading Bhagavad Gita just two years ago and following the philosophy I have achieved quite a lot. Whenever I followed the principles of Karma Yoga — doing duty equipoised, I have achieved it.
Acharya Prashant: What did you say? What did you say, whenever you have followed the principles of Karma Yoga..
Questioner: I have achieved what I set out. But there was the goal, I have not set the goal but I have just worked towards it as through the principles that are in the Gita, that’s it. Equipoised, completely without the attachment to goals and results that is.
Acharya Prashant: So what have you achieved if there were no goals?
Questioner: So, I set out. Yes, first of all, I set out myself a goal then I forgot about the goal, I just work through the process, that’s what I am saying.
Acharya Prashant: But the goal was there, right? And you might have forgotten it and you set the goal and you work towards it, forgetting the goal.
Questioner: Yes. It wasn’t like it, it wasn’t like a path that I am just traveling without a direction.
Acharya Prashant: What was the, what was the goal?
Questioner: To qualify an examination. There’s an examination that I qualified. The first examination I qualified on my own, completely on my own.
Acharya Prashant: See, congratulations that you qualified. I am happy that you qualified but this that you are narrating is not Karma Yoga.
Questioner: Might be. Sir but..
Acharya Prashant: No. Not might be, not might be. If you are a seeker here, then this is a very improper response to give, are you actually?
Questioner: So, I am learning things. I won’t say that particularly it is seeking.
Acharya Prashant: See, this is how it feels when the audience is not even listening. This is not a Karma Yoga kid (laughing). Who told you all these things? To qualify an entrance exam, and work towards it, without thinking of the results, that’s not what Karma Yoga is.
Anyway, congratulations. Yes, proceed with the question.
Questioner: So, when you said that it was not Karma Yoga, it definitely isn’t a question to be asked regarding that, I guess.
Acharya Prashant: If I said that it is not Karma Yoga and if you are even trivially interested in learning at all, must you not ask, “What is Karma Yoga then?”
Questioner: Yes sir. The first question I would ask is not this one but rather, what is Karma Yoga? Sir, the question that I was going to ask— pardon me for being posing myself as someone who would know Karma Yoga. I understand that just reading the text and doing things on my own is like my own interpretation of Karma Yoga. I would definitely look into those things. But now I am really intrigued as to what actually is Karma Yoga, if you can tell?
Acharya Prashant: First of all, Karma Yoga is not about setting tangible worldly targets and going after them. It’s a moment-to-moment thing in which you are very conscious whether the objective of your action is personal ingratiation or larger welfare. You are acting all the time, you are not acting merely when you act towards a distant and a larger cause. Karma is happening all the time, right? Therefore, Karma Yoga has to be a moment-to-moment thing. There is not a moment when you are not in action. You are always acting.
So, being utterly conscious, “Where is my action coming from.” and “What does it want to bring me,” these two are actually the same things. And you have to be conscious of that. Am I working just to feed and fatten my own ego? Or is there a larger purpose? That larger purpose can be called Shri Krishna or Nishkamta or any other word of your choice.
Even in this moment, you must know how you are listening. Are you listening to defend your ego? That is not Karma Yoga. Is the ego prepared to be dissolved through the action in this moment, that is Karma Yoga.
Life is dynamic, different things are happening every moment. You have a choice with respect to action. Karma Yoga is about exercising that choice very consciously. What have I chosen to act for? What do I want as a result of my action?
Choosing a very tempting target or destination and then striving tirelessly towards it, that may not be the best example of Karma Yoga. Karma Yoga is firstly not about the intensity of your action. In the first place, it is about the desire of your action — ”What is it that you desire through your action.” Typically, the ego desires only its own pleasures through its actions.
So, see spirituality is a living thing. It is not a bundle of concepts. When you said, “Principles of Karma Yoga and Principles in the Gita, there is a problem.
There are no principles at all in the Gita. Gita is not a system of thought. It’s about something in the heart that is alive and watching every moment. A continuous knowledge of oneself and continuous empathy towards the other, not principles really.
Gita is a most widely read text. It is also a most misunderstood text. If you misunderstand normal pamphlet, not much damage done, but if you misunderstand the highest document, then a lot of damage has been done. Because then what’s going to come to save you now? Books like the Gita are one’s last and highest hope. If even the last hope is lost or becomes ineffective, then there is nothing left to come and save you, no? So, one has to be extremely careful. And that’s why these holy scriptures have to be read again and again because one can be rest assured that the initial interpretations are all very, very misplaced, one’s own interpretations.
And as you go through the text repeatedly, it’s then that some clarity starts emerging. And this process must actually never stop. With every successive attempt you will find that you are peeling off a layer of ignorance within, a layer that you might not even have known to exist. So, remain a student. And the ego wants to rather quickly believe that it has sized up even the scriptures. Keep it in check.
Questioner: Yes sir. Thank You sir for that and definitely I will go through it once again and we’ll try to read the Gita again and try to understand it, make it a continuous process.
Acharya Prashant: Just once again!
Questioner: Yes sir?
Acharya Prashant: Just once again!
Questioner: Not once again, it will, I’ll make that a continuous process.
Acharya Prashant: Yes. Good. Thank you.
Questioner: Thank you sir.
