The Duty of Karma Yoga: Cooperating with Our Higher Self: 3. Swami Krishnananda.

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Sunday 09, October 2025, 19:40.
Article
Spirituality
The Duty of Karma Yoga: Cooperating with Our Higher Self: 3.
Swami Krishnananda
(Spoken on October 14, 1984)
Post-3.

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We may say that the second instruction is easier than the earlier one, where we have to totally become another thing. The second instruction does not expect that much of sacrifice, and only advises us to do some practice; still, we will find that even the practice is not easy. One session of practice cannot continue for a long time because monotony is resented by the mind. The mind requires diversity, variety, a picturesque presentation of things. A uniform conundrum is never appreciated by the consciousness. We cannot go on enjoying one picture always. We cannot even do japa for a long time because of the same reason, the same difficulty, because japa is a monotonous repetition of a single formula or a sound or a name, and the mind wants variety because it is fickleness in its essentiality. It is a chameleon in its nature, changing its colours and expressing various needs at different moments of time.

So abhyasa, if it is to be a continuous attention of the mind on one given ideal, will also be difficult. Even this is a hard thing for us. We cannot be the same persons every day. We are different persons on different occasions, and having the same place, same time, same method of practice is also a hard thing. Uniformity is not known to us because we never see uniformity anywhere. In all the world we see diversity and discreteness, and Bhagavan Sri Krishna knows this difficulty of the human being that even this, even abhyasa, is difficult.

Abhyāsepy asamarthosi matkarmaparamo bhava, madartham api karmāṇi kurvan siddhim avāpsyasi (BG 12.10): “At least make yourself acquainted with whatever is pleasing to Me, whatever is in harmony with My nature, and all the actions that are in the satisfaction of God may be resorted to.” Commentators on this verse generally tell us that this is an instruction on that kind of karma which is related to God's satisfaction, and they equate it with love of God, or what may be called bhakti yoga.

The karmas related to God are the various types of affection which we manifest in our devotions in respect of God the Almighty. We have navavidha bhakti, the ninefold method of devotion to God, and the five attitudes called bhavas. These are said to be the indications of the meaning of this particular verse. Śravaṇaṁ kīrtanaṁ viṣṇoḥ smaraṇaṁ pāda-sevanam arcanaṁ vandanaṁ dāsyaṁ sakhyam ātma-nivedanam (Bhagavata 7.5.23) is a verse that occurs in the Srimad Bhagavata Mahapurana. Always listening to the glories of God, and not being interested in listing to anything else, is sravana. It is singing His glories. When we speak, we speak only the glory of God, and nothing else. We have nothing else to say. This may be said to be kirtanam. Smarana is continuous remembrance of the existence of God. It is a memory that shall never fail. There is a continuous awareness that there is something pervasive existing everywhere in the universe. This may be equated with japa yoga, which is also continuous remembrance, especially when japa becomes mental. Pada-sevana is explained by traditional followers of bhakti yoga as worship of the feet of the Almighty, which extreme traditionalists tell us is possible only to Mahalakshmi, Parvati or Saraswati because they are directly in contact with these forms of the Almighty. But this need not be the only meaning of pada-sevana if it means the worship of the feet of the Almighty, because in the Upanishad we are told that the Earth is the footstool of God. Padbhyām pṛthivī hy eṣa sarva-bhūtāntarātmā (Mundaka 2.1.4) is the conclusion of a verse occurring in the Mundaka Upanishad. The whole Earth is the feet of God, and therefore, everything that is on Earth may also be said to be so. Sarvataḥ pāṇipādaṃ (BG 13.14) says the Gita itself: Everywhere we have the feet of the Almighty. The feet of everyone are the feet of Almighty God. Everything that we touch and sense is a finger of God and indicates the feet of God. Service of humanity, service of God's creation, and unselfish dedication to an altruistic cause may also be considered to be a part of pada-sevana, worship of the feet of God. Archana is ritualistic worship or mental worship. In places of religious pilgrimage, in temples and churches and mosques, worship is offered to God in a ritualistic traditional manner with gestures of performance. Where physical gestures like kneeling down, bending below, or offering flowers, waving a light, etc., are involved, we may say such a worship is the external form of worship.

In the Saiva Siddhanta School, especially as is prevalent in southern India, four types of worship are mentioned, and they go by the name of charya, kriya, yoga and jnana. Charya is externalised worship, a service that one can do in a temple, for instance, by collecting flowers from the garden or bhel leaves from the forest, by sweeping the outskirts of the temple, by cleaning the veranda, washing the vessels and other things. But there is an internal type of service which is carried on by people inside the temple, inside the holy place, within the holy of holies. You must have seen in temples that there are people who work outside, and there are also those who are directly connected with the worship itself. The internal association is clear, but both charya and kriya are external in the sense that they are performances with the limbs of the body.

But worship can be more internal, and that is yoga. In the sixteenfold worship described in traditional circles, one way is mental invocation of God, though it may sometimes be expressed in recitations, chanting of mantras, etc. There is a procedure called nyasa in the traditional form of Indian worship. Anganyasa, karanyasa, etc., are read in books and are sometimes chanted by people who are proficient in the practice. Nyasa actually means 'placing'. They touch different parts of the body. But people who do not know the meaning of it merely touch, not knowing why they are touching. The touching is a mystical invocation in that particular part of the body which is a corresponding part of the universal Almighty's personality. Our head is tuned up to the cosmical head, our eyes to the cosmical eyes, our heart to the cosmical heart. Whatever part of the body we touch in nyasa, in the sacred placement, as it is called, we are tuning ourselves with the corresponding counterpart in the universal total that is a preparation for the internal worship which is yoga, landing us finally in a total unawareness of ourselves, being tuned up to that counterpart so much, in such intensity, that we feel as if we are that. This is jnana. All these four methods are archana, one of the nine modes of bhakti, devotion.

Vandana is prayer. We have the Lord's Prayer in the New Testament, and various types of prayer in other religious groups. We chant mantras, prayers and passages from the scriptures or we compose our own prayers through our own feelings, whatever they be, a supplication of ourselves before the Almighty, a dedication of ourselves before that Great Being which may be manifest either through utterances of words, by singing, by quoting passages from recognised scriptures, and the like. Essentially, it is requesting God to be condescending, gracious, kind, and protecting. This is also one form of bhakti.

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