Chapter 2, Verse 47
karmaṇy-evādhikāras te
mā phaleṣu kadācana
mā karma phala hetur bhūr
mā te saṅgo ’stv karmaṇi
You have the right to action, but only to action, never to its fruits; let not the fruits of your works be your motive, neither let there be in you any attachment to inactivity.
As I said earlier, if you work, if you do your duty, but your mind is only focused on what you want to gain, you will never be free. And that work will not be fully effective, because there will always be doubt about whether you will do it properly or not. There will always be doubt about whether you will achieve your goal or not. Because of this deep fear of unknowing, this fear of not doing it properly enough, you will not do it effectively. Here Krishna says that you have the right to action, meaning you have to do your dharma. But you only have the right to do your dharma – the action, the work.
“Let not the fruits of your works be your motive.” Don’t be attached to the results, to the fruits of your actions. The result doesn’t depend on you, it depends on Him. In life it’s like this. You have a big plan to do something. And you plan it, maybe for days and for months, but when it happens, it happens the opposite way! What is your reaction? Even if the result is good, you are sad, because it’s not how you planned it. But if it is not good, you’re also sad. There’s no freedom in this.
In work, Krishna says, “Let not the fruit of your actions be your motive.” “You have the right to action, but only to action.” You have the right to action only. Krishna gives a certain freedom here: the freedom of choice – a freedom that human beings alone have. When you are attached, you become ineffective, because when you are only focused on trying to do things properly, you are not free! You don’t have any freedom inside of you, because you are tense. Krishna says, “If you do your action with the aim of serving the Lord, if you renounce this attachment to the result of the action, you will attain God-Realisation. You can’t renounce your actions, but do your actions with a selfless motive. Do them without egoism.”
If you try to renounce your actions by force, you will not succeed. Everything which is done by forcing, will not lead one to freedom. One will not be free, but will be under pressure, and always be thinking, “Oh my goodness, am I doing it right or wrong?” When you sit in meditation, you say, “When will I finish?” When you’re doing your japa, you say, “How many malas have I done? Where am I? Oops I missed one!” You’re sitting and doing your Atma Kriya Yoga and instead of enjoying the practice, you are thinking, “Which chakra am I on? Am I on the fifth chakra? No, I guess I was on the fourth one.” Isn’t it like this? You’re doing your pranayama, and thinking, “How
many did I do? One more or one less?” You’re not free. But if you do your duty, if you do your sadhana – just do it and be happy that you’re doing it! It doesn’t matter whether you breathe five or ten times. You will gain the fruit of the sadhana. Your intention is very important. That is why Krishna says, “Let not the fruits of your works be your motive, neither let there be in you any attachment to inactivity.” By this He means that if you do your action being free, everything good will come to you. But if you do it with tension, nothing good will come to you. Then you will be disappointed and you will be miserable afterwards.
Bhagavad Gita
