Excerpts from “The Essence of the Bhagavad Gita” 1.0

While interacting with friends, family and clients, many have shown interests towards Bhagavad Gita. They want to read, know more about it but for various reasons, it has remained a wishful thinking.

So, this thought dawned upon me that I have read this holy book then why not share it with everyone. Hence decided to put this for each one of you- excerpts taken directly from “The Essence of the Bhagavad Gita”

I shall put it in parts, this is part I.

I want to mention this with due respect and all honesty that I have not done any tempering with the original material and putting the excerpts as it is which I have taken from the holy book.

“The Essence of the Bhagavad Gita” Explained by Paramhansa Yogananda

– Man’s actual need, as explained in the Bhagavad Gita, is not to understand how he got into delusion, but rather to understand how he can get out of delusion!

– Victory over delusion is absolutely crucial to man’s true happiness and freedom. It is very difficult to discern what is true victory, however, what is merely a hollow victory, and what, though it wears the appearance of victory, will prove in the end to have been a crushing defeat.

– Pitted against each other are the life of the spirit and the abandonment of those qualities which lead to soul- bliss. Death of the body, Krishna reminds Arjuna, is nothing: the mere doffing of a garment. To reject spiritual principles, however, means to embrace spiritual death.

– Wilderness, in spiritual writings, is often used allegorically to describe the inner silence, enjoyed in soul- communion. In that silence, no cultivated flowers of sense- pleasure bloom.

– Mahabharat describes the descent of Spirit into the ego and the delusion of separateness – from God, from other egos, and from everything- and the struggle to rise again into oneness with Spirit.

– Each of the Pandavas stands for one of the five chakras, or spinal centres. The path of divine awakening is the Spine! Energy enters the body through the medulla oblongata at the base of the brain. From this point the sperm and ovum, after uniting, begin the process of creating embryo. Energy, which then solidifies as matter, passes through the nerves into the brain, down the spine, and out to form the body. When the consciousness withdraws from the body at death, the energy withdraws first from the extremities to the spine, then up the spine, and at last emerges through the medulla oblongata again, leaving the body.

– The spiritual eye is a reflection of the light in the medulla, through which the energy moves down the spine in three nadis- subtle channel of life force. The brahmanadi is the spine of the causal body through which the divine consciousness descended into the body. The spiritual eye is universally the same: a field of dark blue light surrounded by a golden halo, in the center of which is a five- pointed star. The golden aureole represents the astral world; the blue field inside it, the causal world and also the omnipresent Christ consciousness; the star in the center, the spirit beyond creation.

– As the energy enters the body and descends the spine, it becomes locked at the lowest pole. For the energy to be raised in the spine, Kundalini must be “awakened”. Non attachment to matter frees the energy to rise up the spine. The rising Kundalini must spiritually awaken each chakra. As the portal of that chakra is opened, a fresh surge of awareness and spiritual power is released, enhancing one’s clarity of awareness.

– Circumstances are always neutral. They appear positive or negative according to the corresponding reactions of the heart.

– Magnetism is generated, not created. Its presence is latent in every piece of metal- indeed, on subtler levels of manifestation, in everything. Thus, people can be magnetic; their magnetism can cause others to feel toward them a strong attraction or repulsion.

– Our individual qualities resemble the iron molecules in the sense that, if they are focused on a single goal, they can produce seemingly miraculous results. On the other hand, when they are directed haphazardly, they can render us ineffective.

– Magnetism is the key to success in everything!

– We must transform our faults into virtues! never should one become discouraged. Discouragement itself is simply a characteristic to be fought and conquered by the steady, indomitable pressure of resolute courage.

– You need to get enough of the citizens among your inner population to support you; then only will you be able to make the over-all change you desire. The good side of the problem is that, when you succeed in converting enough mental citizens to the side of goodness, they will outnumber the unruly ones and will gradually win them over, resulting in your rapid spiritual progress.

– Every human trait is born in the mind. there is nothing man can achieve or even conceive that is inaccessible to any other human being.

– Krishna tell Arjuna of the importance of the guru, a spiritual savior. A guru is more than a mere teacher. The power of the guru can transfer his magnetism to that disciple who tunes into his consciousness.

– Self-transformation can be accomplished not so much by laboring painstakingly to purify and spiritualize every flaw, but above all by directing all one’s energy toward the spiritual eye.

– Dhritarashtra’s blindness represents that aspect of mind which can perceive reality only through senses. The war of Kurukshetra is not fought literally on an earthly battlefield but takes place within every individual. Dhritarashtra consults Sanjaya, who represents introspection. Introspection alone can tell the blind mind which side is winning.

– The very mind with which you would banish delusion is already steeped in the very delusion you want to banish! It is not always easy, even, to know right from wrong. Introspection helps, and is, indeed, essential. Even more important, however, is the intuitive guidance of a wise guru, especially from within!

– There are certain guidelines that can help one to understand which side has been the winner in any Psychological battle. One guideline is an inner expansion of happiness or, better still, of joy. Another is an expansion of consciousness. A third and even more important one is an expansion of sympathy. Fourth, but equally important as all the others, is inner calmness.

– If any of them are missing they make us restless even though we might have won externally. Only when these guidelines are met, it gives sense of calmness and peace prevails both externally and internally.

– An expansion of consciousness may seem to accompany any increase of power, or dominion, or even knowledge. Yet these accomplishments often give one, instead of an expansion of consciousness, a swelling sense of self-importance, of self-involvement, and, a swelled head!

Here comes the Jitatma! If these accomplishments not handled and understood in right manner it may turn into inflated pride!

– An expansion of sympathy can be binding if it provokes one to hold expectations of others, to become possessive toward them, or to become centered in their emotional demands rather than in wisdom.

– How is one to know what course in life is right or wrong? The first rule is, “Do what works.” Only from the outcome of a course of action can it be known with any certainty whether the act was justified or not.

– A right course of action will produce harmony, good health, a balanced state of being, and an ability to keep moving sensibly toward whatever fulfilment one seeks with discrimination.

– Where there is joy, and an expansion of consciousness, sympathy, and inner calmness, one will always experience a rising energy in the spine.

– The forces for error are “innumerable”, whereas the forces of righteousness are “few in number”. Countless are the ways one can slip into error, even as the outside of a large circle has room for taking many approaches to the center.

– Uplifting virtues are few, for they lead into, and are already close to, the center of our being. Hatred can be defined in terms of countless objects capable of being hated, whereas kindness springs from the inner self, and bestows its beneficence impersonally on all.

– Judge your thoughts and actions by their effects- on yourself, first; then on others. Are they peace-inducing? Do they help to expand your understanding and sympathies? Have they brought greater harmony to your environment? – or have they produced disharmony? Do they inspire you and others? Or have they brought less hope, generally- even despair?

– Anger in a righteous cause can be productive of good. Indeed, such anger, if it is spiritual, is not anger at all but only a strong flow of energy toward the promotion of justice.

– Bhagavad Gita plunges right from the beginning into the inner life of meditation, which, it becomes clear bit by bit, is for everyone. This is not a scripture of pious platitudes. It urges people from the very beginning to seek deep soul-communion through direct, inner experience of God.

– As long as one’s essential sense of individuality is safe, their cause is secure!

– Symbolically, the chariot represents the human body, the horses representing the five senses. Arjuna invited the Lord to guide the chariot of his life, holding the reins of his senses and steering his course through the coming battle. Thus, the devotee also must try always to see God alone as the Doer of all his actions.

– Krishna then reassures Arjuna that the soul in any case never dies. It is a part of God, as is therefore indestructible. He then portrays reincarnation as a fact. The soul doesn’t continue its existence only in a higher world, but returns to this world, body after body, until it achieves liberation.

– The energy invested in a fault cannot be destroyed: it can only be transmuted. The same energy that went into hating people, being angry with them, trying to hurt them, and listing after the pleasures of this world cannot ever be destroyed. The energy invested in them becomes simply redirected toward spiritual pursuits.

– Life is not determined by the existence or non- existence of a physical body. It was never the body which gave us life. We, rather, gave life to the body. The soul is ever- existent, and that soul is what we ourselves are: manifestations of Eternal Spirit.

– The way to wisdom is to be non-identified with anything outside the self.

– (2:16) That which is unreal does not exist. That which is real cannot cease to exist. Those who possess wisdom know the final nature of reality: of what is, and what is not.

– This Self is not born, nor does it perish. Self- existent, it continues its existence forever. It is birthless, eternal, changeless, and ever the same. The Self is not slain when the body dies.

– The soul is never touched; it is immutable, all-pervading, calm, unshakable; its existence is eternal.

– The soul cannot even be pondered by the reasoning mind. It is unmanifested and formless. Realize this truth, and abstain from lamentation.

– Paramhansa Yogananda discussed the three main philosophies of India: Shankhya, Yoga, and Vedanta.

– The wisdom taught in Shankhya underscores the need to escape from maya, or delusion. Yoga tells the sincere seeker how to make good his escape. And Vedanta describes the nature of Brahman.

– Spiritual growth is rarely sudden, unless an individual is already blessed from birth with exceptionally good karma. The Lord does not necessarily speak with human lips, through vision, though He manifests himself in physical form through the human guru. Even the guru, however, teaches primarily through the disciple’s own intuitive perception.

– Pity for past pleasures can bridge once more the gap one has created between himself and them (the foes). It is a great mistake on the spiritual path to toy even idly with thoughts of what one has left behind. Renunciation of the world in thought as well as in deed is essential.

– Watch the heart for any ripple of attraction there. You may feel safe from worldly desire, but if in your heart you find the least tremor of excitement, even on hearing about the pleasures of the senses, or on listening to stories about them, shun them like the infection they really are. People may, scoff, saying, “it’s just in the mind.” Exactly so! The mind itself is the battlefield. There is no other.

– The bliss of the soul, experienced especially in deep meditation, is Self-born. The instant that soul bliss, or love, is felt, it is recognized. It does not have to be learned, and the taste for it does not need to be acquired.

– God is no stern judge of human behavior, but is “on our side”. He wants us to advance spiritually, and forever forgives us if we err.

– The opposites of duality are inseparable from one another. Excessive sense- pleasure produces a “hangover” of many kinds.