I found this on a website in an introspective moment:
'Krishna said,"Do you duty, Arjun, as your nature dictates. All work fetters, as all fire gives smoke. Only selfless duty saves. Fix your mind on me. Surrender all deeds to me. All problems will be solved by my grace. Pride will lead only to your moral ruin. If, filled with pride, you say, 'I will not fight,' it is all in vain. You are foolish. Fight you will, your nature will make you fight. Your karma will make you fight. You will fight in spite of yourself." '
'Do your duty' - not 'do your work' - because 'work fetters' (of course). It should be selfless duty - hmmm, I wonder if I am capable of that. By default, my approach seems to be one of ensuring personal gain, playing with my own 'empire building starter kit' - the only thing that varies is the extent to which I fabricate excuses to pretend it is not.
'Fix your mind on me' - I know this is beyond me most of the time, there are so many distractions, so many temptations and what's more, God is not cool these days anyway... mainly because God is inextricably linked to religion, which is not doing a great PR job at present. He/She/It/They would be better off without men of learning tending the flock in their name. If only God was like the internet - ethereal, yet full of answers and no one gives a toss whether you use AOL or Yahoo, whether you have a wheezy old desktop or a snazzy new laptop. If only spiritual access was truly equitable.
'Surrender all deeds to me' - almost impossible if I cannot fix my mind in the first place. Moreover, it is a potential escape hatch for all sorts of weirdos to exonerate themselves from their crimes - easy enough to say it's all in God's name. As if we are all spoilt brats with a Big Daddy to bail us out when we run into trouble.
'All problems will be solved by my grace' - to what extent do I truly believe in this, and why? Do I believe because I will be happy? Do I believe so that God will be happy? Do I believe this on a superficial level so that God will think I believe? But then surely God will know if my belief is superficial anyway, so why bother? Or is it the spiritual equivalent of burying my head in the sand?
To each his own (placebo), I guess
'Pride will lead only to your moral ruin' - tell me about it! This is the one bit that I believe in wholeheartedly, for I see how my pride degrades me everyday, even as I type these words hoping that someone will read them and find them profound and intelligently crafted.
'You are foolish' - yep, so they tell me, that was not very tough to figure out, was it?
'Fight you will
your nature will make you fight
your karma will make you fight
you will fight inspite of yourself'
So, do I have a latent memory to fight when the time comes? A Bourne Identity of the soul, maybe? Or is it the cliched old survival instinct that we are expected to have buried in us? A primeval evolutionary trait to swim against the current? Or is it no more than the chest-thumping of a silverback, the graveyard whistling of troubled minds? If only I could fight inspite of myself - but I know I never will.
I love me too much for that
I wrote this at the lowest of my lows, and yet...
and yet...
I found it in me to have faith and fight the hardest when it truly mattered and the chips were down
maybe there IS something in the Gita after all!
'Krishna said,"Do you duty, Arjun, as your nature dictates. All work fetters, as all fire gives smoke. Only selfless duty saves. Fix your mind on me. Surrender all deeds to me. All problems will be solved by my grace. Pride will lead only to your moral ruin. If, filled with pride, you say, 'I will not fight,' it is all in vain. You are foolish. Fight you will, your nature will make you fight. Your karma will make you fight. You will fight in spite of yourself." '
'Do your duty' - not 'do your work' - because 'work fetters' (of course). It should be selfless duty - hmmm, I wonder if I am capable of that. By default, my approach seems to be one of ensuring personal gain, playing with my own 'empire building starter kit' - the only thing that varies is the extent to which I fabricate excuses to pretend it is not.
'Fix your mind on me' - I know this is beyond me most of the time, there are so many distractions, so many temptations and what's more, God is not cool these days anyway... mainly because God is inextricably linked to religion, which is not doing a great PR job at present. He/She/It/They would be better off without men of learning tending the flock in their name. If only God was like the internet - ethereal, yet full of answers and no one gives a toss whether you use AOL or Yahoo, whether you have a wheezy old desktop or a snazzy new laptop. If only spiritual access was truly equitable.
'Surrender all deeds to me' - almost impossible if I cannot fix my mind in the first place. Moreover, it is a potential escape hatch for all sorts of weirdos to exonerate themselves from their crimes - easy enough to say it's all in God's name. As if we are all spoilt brats with a Big Daddy to bail us out when we run into trouble.
'All problems will be solved by my grace' - to what extent do I truly believe in this, and why? Do I believe because I will be happy? Do I believe so that God will be happy? Do I believe this on a superficial level so that God will think I believe? But then surely God will know if my belief is superficial anyway, so why bother? Or is it the spiritual equivalent of burying my head in the sand?
To each his own (placebo), I guess
'Pride will lead only to your moral ruin' - tell me about it! This is the one bit that I believe in wholeheartedly, for I see how my pride degrades me everyday, even as I type these words hoping that someone will read them and find them profound and intelligently crafted.
'You are foolish' - yep, so they tell me, that was not very tough to figure out, was it?
'Fight you will
your nature will make you fight
your karma will make you fight
you will fight inspite of yourself'
So, do I have a latent memory to fight when the time comes? A Bourne Identity of the soul, maybe? Or is it the cliched old survival instinct that we are expected to have buried in us? A primeval evolutionary trait to swim against the current? Or is it no more than the chest-thumping of a silverback, the graveyard whistling of troubled minds? If only I could fight inspite of myself - but I know I never will.
I love me too much for that
I wrote this at the lowest of my lows, and yet...
and yet...
I found it in me to have faith and fight the hardest when it truly mattered and the chips were down
maybe there IS something in the Gita after all!
