Bhagwad Gita - Post 73

Verse 3 

Aarurukshormuneryogam

Karma kaaranamuchyate;

Yogaaroodhasya tasyaiva

Shamah kaaranamuchyate.

For a sage who wishes to attain to Yoga, action is said to be the means; for the same sage who has attained to Yoga, inaction (quiescence) is said to be the means.

To one who is "DESIRING TO SCALE OVER THE PRACTICE OF MENTAL CONCENTRATION AND SELF-IMPROVEMENT, WORK IS SAID TO BE THE MEANS". By working in the world with neither the egocentric concept of agency nor the ego-centric desires for the fruits of those actions, we are causing vasanas to play out without creating any new precipitate of fresh impressions.

The metaphor used here is borrowed from horse-riding, and it is very powerful in its suggestions. When a wild horse is being broken in, for some time, it will ride the rider before the rider can ride it. If one desires to bring a steed under perfect control, there is a period when, with one leg on the stirrup, the individual has to hang on to the saddle and with the other leg on the ground, must learn to kick himself off from the ground and spring up and throw his legs over the back of the animal, until he sits, with the steed completely between his own legs. Having mounted, it is easy to control the animal, but till then, the rider, in his attempt to mount the horse, must pass through a stage  where he is neither totally on the horse nor on the ground.

In the beginning, we are merely workers in the world; desire-prompted and ego-driven, we sweat and toil, weep and sob. When an individual gets tired of such activities, he comes to desire to mount the steed of the mind. Such an individual, desiring to bring the mind under his control and rise over it (Arurukshah) takes upon himself the same work as before, but without the ego and ego-centric desires.

God, in the form of Bhagwan Sri Krishna teaching the Bhagwad Gita, does not propagate non-action, as we have already seen. Therefore, we cannot interpret the word ‘śama’  in this verse as absence of activity  because throughout the Gita the point is hammered into our ears again and again that inaction does not mean yoga, and inaction does not mean Sannyasa. Hence, the state of total, perfect establishment in yoga should not necessarily be interpreted as a state of total negativity, or absence of action. 

In the case of a person who is totally established, action is not supposed to be the means. Śama, or tranquility, is the means. ‘Tranquility’ is a very intriguing word and various commentaries have looked upon it from various perspectives. 

But keeping in view the total vision of the intention of the Bhagwad Gita, we should consider the life of Bhagwan Sri Krishna as the best commentary of the Bhagwad Gita. There is no commentary on the Gita greater than the life of Bhagwan Sri Krishna himself. 

Sri Krishna was a total inclusive personality. Was Sri Krishna a householder? Was He a Sannyasin? Was He a warrior? Was He a saint? Was He a Brahmin or a Kshatriya? What kind of person was Bhagwan Sri Krishna? We will not be able to have a straight answer to this because It is an incarnation of the Absolute that came in the form of Sri Krishna. 

The Absolute does not behave like a householder, and It does not behave like a Sannyasin. It does not behave like a person who keeps quiet. It may appear to behave like a warrior, but It does not mean that It is really behaving like a warrior. It is calm and quiet—utter tranquility. 

The power that Sri Krishna wielded is commensurate with the knowledge that He had. Sri Krishna was a mastermind who had the power to contact even Brahma, Vishnu and Siva. He could immediately contact these great gods, and he could work on earth as a charioteer in the battlefield, driving Arjuna’s chariot with five horses into the battle. 

He could speak the highest philosophy as in the Bhagwad Gita, and He could be in His palace in Dvaraka like an emperor. He could be like a child, a baby in the lap of Yasoda. He could be a terror to wicked people like Kamsa. 

Thus, Sri Krishna was not an inactive person; nor can we say He was an active person restlessly moving about here and there, trying to uplift the world.

Neither was He that type of person, nor was He the type who kept quiet without doing any service. And no Sannyasin could equal Him. Millions of Sannyasins could not stand before Him, and yet He was a General and a Field Marshal. What a contradiction: a Sannyasin behaving like a Field Marshal before whom no warrior could stand! No Sannyasin could stand before Him, no yogi could stand before Him, and even the Gods could not stand before Him.

This is the kind of personality that He wants us to become, and that state is the ultimate tranquility that we achieve in the condition of establishment in yoga: the divine tranquility of God Himself, who is not a restless individual. 

Yogārūḍhatva is a state of utter tranquility in the divine sense, not in the sense of absence of activity, because we cannot say that God is free from activity.  But His being busy is totally different from our being busy—because we are busy physically, socially and psychologically, but Lord Krishna is the Absolute itself working. 

We cannot know how the Absolute acts because its action is within itself and, therefore, it may look like non-action. An action that is taking place within itself is no longer an action, and yet it is a tremendous action, a most heightened form of action. 

But because it is the highest form of action, it looks like no action. Śama, which is the tranquility that is spoken of here as the characteristic of a perfect yogi, is to be understood in this sense. 

Love.