II: 50

[Krishna Jaya]

Chapter 2, Verse 50

 

"With this wisdom

They go beyond

What is accomplished

And what is not accomplished.

Yoga is skill in action."

 

Paramahansa Yogananda:

 

"Strive above all else to become merged in constant divine union.  To work united with God is the greatest art to be mastered in this world.  When people are identified exclusively with material life, owing to a false consciousness of themselves as the doers of actions, they are bound to reap the good and bad results of their actions; whereas the wise experience God's creative power at work in all their actions and are freed from the bondage to results.  Every moment spent in meditation, every effort to practice equanimity, thus dissolving the attachment to action’s fruits removes some suffering and establishes some peace, lessening errors in attitude by ever-greater attunement to God's guiding wisdom.  This is skill in action indeed."

 

[Devotion is the key to not getting lost in the mind.  It brings everything down into the heart where it is much easier to access the mind’s true role as servant so that it can be used the way it’s supposed to be used…in service to the divine.  I fail daily to make the devotion constant.  I play hide and seek with the Lord.  I know that this is because of the way I have acted (and reacted) yesterday, last week, last month, last year, last lifetime… With this understanding there is some patience with myself, some compassion towards myself.  At the same time, it’s ever so easy to be overly patient with idiot compassion and therefore complacent, just as it’s a slippery slope when one is overly critical.  This fine line has been compared to “walking the razor’s edge.”]

 

Srila Prabhupada:

 

“Since time immemorial, living entities have accumulated the various consequences of good and bad work.  As such, they are ignorant of their real constitutional position.

One’s ignorance can be removed by the instruction of the Bhagavad-gita, which teaches one to surrender unto Lord Sri Krishna in all respects and become liberated from the chained victimization of action and reaction birth after birth.  Arjuna is therefore advised to act in Krishna consciousness, the purifying process of conscious action.”

 

[Re: “…the purifying process of conscious action...” to me this means that whenever we do something while we’re thinking of Krishna, feeling Krishna’s presence, carrying an image of him in the heart, etc, we’re reinforcing the remembrance Samskara and weakening the forgetfulness Samskara.  Is this the Krishna consciousness that SP is

talking about or am I making it a bit too simplistic?]

 

Daniel Clark:

“Yes, what you're talking about is Krishna consciousness, as I understand it from Prabhupad. You're not being simplistic…really, there's nothing simple about always thinking of Krishna. It may be simple to describe. But not simple to do. Still, that's all there is to it. ‘Man-mana,’says Krishna (Bg. 9.34, 18.65), ‘Think of me.’ Then, ‘Bhava Mad Bhakto.’ ‘Become my devotee.’ Then, ‘Mad Yaji.’ ‘Offer to me.’ And last, ‘Mam Namaskuru.’ ‘Bow down to me,’ that is, surrender. The official rules, regulations, rituals, and processes are all intended to stimulate those simple affairs of the heart and mind. OK, now I've described it...the rest is not so simple.”

[Krishna Jaya]

Sri Aurobindo:

“They rise to a higher level beyond good or evil, skillful or unskillful, founded as they are in the liberty of Self-knowledge. Action done in Yoga is not only the highest, but the wisest, the most potent and efficient, because it is informed by the will of the master of action.”

[A skillful action or motive may be described as that which brings us closer to the liberty of constant steadiness in God-awareness. An unskillful action or motive increases selfishness and shackles us until we learn how to break free. For the one who rests in steady wisdom, there is no action at all, in the sense of agency, but only pure instrumentality. And yet, at the same time, in this spontaneous out-pouring, his or her unique gifts and characteristics manifest according to the “pattern” of the given situation. The wave “waves” as a unique and never-to-be-repeated expression of the totality, as it is one with the ocean of existence. In this sense, the Self-realized are “agents” of the divine.]