Commentary on the Bhagavadgita: 2-4. Swami Krishnananda.

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Monday 03, March 2025, 11:15.
Books
Srimad Bhagavad Gita
Commentary on the Bhagavadgita: 2-4.
Discourse 2: The First Chapter – Visada Yoga, the Yoga of the Dejection of the Spirit-4.
Swami Krishnananda

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The sentiments, the inner subconscious forces, take possession of the individual, and finding the weak point of the individual sentiment, they take the opportunity to ambush and attack him, and the advanced spiritual seeker becomes a petty individual who is practically helpless: “God has not come; the world has gone.” At a particular time we will either feel that the world has left us or that we have left the world, but God has not come. That is the situation in which we find ourselves—neither this nor that, as if in a vacuum—and it is at that time that we can develop a neurosis or have a breakdown, or develop a peptic ulcer or peculiar illnesses where the brain malfunctions and the mind becomes deranged. I have seen one swami who kept shaking his head. He said, “I have done meditation on the great truth of the presence of consciousness everywhere. I began to see consciousness in objects. This made me very happy. I went on concentrating on the presence of consciousness in everything. One day I suddenly got a bolt from the blue, as it were, and now I am feeling like this. Is there any remedy that you can think of?” I gave him some remedy which helped him, satisfied him.

Arjuna should be well prepared for all the psychological eventualities that he may have to face, rather than merely being prepared for the physical eventualities. To fight with the mind is more difficult than to fight with people, as it is the mind that sees values in things and considers people as friends or enemies, etc. Who tells us that so-and-so is a friend or an enemy? It is the mind. Hence, there is a particular psychological reaction from ourselves that is the determining factor in defining our envisagement of values. Otherwise, we cannot know who is a friend and who is an enemy because a relationship of this kind, positive or negative, is a counteracting medium of the mind itself, which has some mould into which these values are cast, and if the susceptibility to react in terms of affection and hatred were not to be in our minds, we would not experience affection and hatred. There is some weakness in the mind which is submerged in ordinary social life, because when we are in a good society we do not always think in terms of affection and hatred, etc. Everything looks fine, and we are all well off. But when we are totally alone, the possibilities of the otherwise-ignored aspects of the mind will come up and tell us that we have totally ignored them, we have not paid our debts to them; the tax has not been paid and, therefore, we will not be able to move further. Arjuna asked: “Even if I face these people, and even if I am the best of spiritual seekers, what is the guarantee that I will succeed? I may conquer the world—or the world may conquer me. I may perish in this attempt.” Arjuna himself put this question: “If somebody perishes in the middle, having attained nothing, what will be his fate?” Lord Krishna answers this in some other chapter.

Do we find ourselves in a helpless condition spiritually? We will not be able to answer this question unless we live an individual life. We should not be in society. When I say we should not be in society, I do not mean that we should sit under a tree or go into the jungle, etc. The mind should be dissociated from any kind of social contact. A person may be sitting next to us, but we may not be socially connected with him or even be aware that he is there. It is like a railway station. We are travelling in a coach of the train. Many people are sitting in the same coach. Are we connected with any one of them? It is a society, no doubt. We are sitting in the midst of a large number of people, which is nothing but human society, but we are not even aware of the existence of these people and we do not care what kind of people they are. It is total detachment of our minds, for reasons which are obvious. So we can be in the midst of thousands of people and yet be unconcerned with them. Similarly, the detachment that is required socially is not actually a physical running away from Rameswaram to the Himalayas. That is not of any utility, finally, because it is the mind that works havoc, and not the body.

“Will I succeed? If I perish, what happens?” This is Arjuna's question. Secondly, Bhishma, Drona, Karna, etc., are not ordinary people. They are ten times stronger than Arjuna, and Arjuna knows that. Nobody can face these people.

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Continued

Swami Krishnananda meeting Swamiji's mother and sisters

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