Yoga and Action

Today, I want to discuss one of the verses from the Shrimad Bhagavad Gita, a text that resonates deeply with the consciousness of mankind. The verse is as follows:

योगस्थ: कुरु कर्माणि सङ्गं त्यक्त्वा धनञ्जय | सिद्ध्यसिद्ध्यो: समो भूत्वा समत्वं योग उच्यते || 2.48||

“Be steadfast in yoga and act, O Arjun, abandoning attachment to success and failure. Such equanimity is called Yoga.”

The question that always arises before us is: What is the right thing to do? How do we choose the right action, and why should we do it? This shloka, spoken by Shri Krishna, explains how action is deeply connected to yoga.

To be steadfast in yoga means to let the unknowable Self take over. Once the Self, or Atma, takes over, action happens naturally. Atma or the Self represents the highest potential within each of us. Success and failure only exist when there is a goal attached to them. Typically, when we speak of a desirous person, we imagine someone who has goals and desires. A desireless person, on the other hand, is seen as someone who doesn’t care about goals. However, in this shloka, Krishna speaks of a person who is steadfast in yoga — not only does he not care about the results, but he also has no attachment to the goals themselves. For him, success lies in the dissolution of the ego, which manifests as fear, anger, greed, and desires.

We usually celebrate when we reach a certain goal. However, when there is no goal, and when you have surrendered yourself to your highest potential, life itself becomes a celebration — the celebration of the dissolution of the ego. When one is celebrating life, success and failure lose their meaning. To reach that state, one must follow the process of negation.

To understand the “chooser,” one must examine their choices. Only through self-observation can we see the futility of our choices. Once we realize that our choices are constantly deceiving us, we begin to question the chooser. Only after rejecting the choices do we come to the point of rejecting the chooser itself. This is what we call surrender. This process of surrender is what yoga truly is — it is the complete surrender of oneself, the moment when the chooser no longer exists.

What happens when the chooser is no more? Does it mean everything comes to a standstill and no work gets done? No. Now, the chooser is governed by the flow of Nature. Our true nature, which is one of constant continuity, eternal peace, and love, manifests itself when the chooser fades away. The chooser is merely a shell of fear, greed, and anger.

Rejecting the chooser begins with the rejection of its choices. We must be strong and examine our choices with all our might. Humans possess a unique capacity for self-observation. We can see, without attachment, shame, or worry, how misguided our choices are. This ability is strengthened when we begin to make right choices. If we cannot harness the ability to be both the actor and the dispassionate observer within ourselves, we are no different from an animal. One must be completely honest with oneself in examining one’s actions. The ego must not become the auditor. Only then will we realize that the deeds of the body are mere deceptions, and they do not serve our true self-interest. It becomes clear that all the choices made until now have been harmful, as they have stemmed from fear or blind desires. We are still far from experiencing eternal peace and love.

When we no longer have a higher stake in being who we currently are, it becomes easier to let go of that identity. This is because, as we are now, we suffer greatly. When one realizes this, it is called yoga. The more we recognize the foolishness of our choices, the more detached we become from them. In essence, yoga is the process of seeing the foolishness of our actions through those very actions. This is the only right thing to do: to continuously observe one’s own folly. The right action will naturally follow.

“The above article is based on the teachings of Acharya Prashant. To know more about his mission, please visit www.acharyaprashant.org.”