Chapter X-9-11. Those who think of me, those who have their lives in me, enlightening each other and speaking of me always, are satisfied and rejoice. To those who are every steadfast, worshiping me full of love, I give the Yoga of discrimination, by which they come to me. Indeed, out of compassion for them, I destroy the darkness born of ignorance within their beings by the luminous lamp of knowledge.
There is a reciprocal relation between God and human beings. We need to open ourselves to God by thinking about the Divine and living our lives aware of the Presence. To do this it helps to be with other who share God-centered values, talk about our practice and encourage each other. The measure of our progress is how contented and joyful we are in our lives. When we reach out and are open, we can receive God's freely given grace. Through God's grace we can discriminate between the real and unreal and so be fully "with" God. In reality God is always one with us, but through centering we get Gods' help in seeing the everlasting light.
Chapter XII-1 Arjuna said, "Who are the better Yogis, the devotees who are thus ever steadfast, who worship you with love or those who worship the imperishable and unmanifested?"
In Chapter XI, Krishna has shown himself as the Cosmic Form encompassing all past, present and future in an awful brilliance and power. He tells Arjuna that one can know, see and enter into God in Majesty through single-minded devotion. One who does all actions for God, who looks upon God as Supreme, who bears enmity towards no creature, will attain God. However, in earlier chapters Krishna, particularly Chapter II on Jnana Yoga, speaks of the eternal God without form and attributes, the qualityless Supreme Brahman. Arjuna is confused and asks which is better?
In the next several verses (Chapter XII-2-5) The Lord summarizes the answer to this question. Those who steadfastly fix their minds on me and worship with Supreme Faith are the most connected to me, in My opinion. However those who worship the imperishable, indefinable, unmanifest, omnipresent, unthinkable, immovable and eternal (Supreme power), with restrained senses and even-minded, rejoicing in the welfare of all creatures, they also come to me. But the trouble of those who set their mind on the unmanifested is much greater because there is great difficulty for seekers to reach the unthinkable.
Chapter XII-6-7. Those who worship and renounce all actions in me, as the supreme goal, meditate on Me with single minded Yoga; before long I become for those whose minds are set, the savior out of the ocean of secular existence.
As we focus on God, God's saving grace comes to help us. Life is a cycle of birth and death, success and failure, pleasure and pain that swirls and undulates, is sometimes placid and at other times has crashing waves like an ocean. Our emotions often oscillate. Forces within and without ourselves drive us as little corks on a great sea. With God as our focus, we are removed from being affected by those storms of life.
CHAPTERS XII-9. If you are not able to steadily fix your mind in me, then seek to attain me by the constant practice of Yoga.
God wants us to be steady in our remembrance of the wonderful pervasion of the world, asking for our wholehearted attention, heart and soul. Yet our Supreme Refuge knows that our minds are distractible and our hearts are pulled by our relationships, so we are promised that it is enough to try and try again – to practice at any time we can, being attentive to God's Presence. If we are regular in the practice of day prayer and meditation, our minds and hearts will become focused; we can then attain God.
Chapter XII-10-11. If you are incapable of daily practice, do all work for God's sake. Even if you do work for God's sake, you will attain perfection (supreme peace). If you are unable to do even this, resorting to My Yoga (any path to God), be self-controlled and renounce the fruit of your actions.
Some people are so active that they can't quiet themselves enough to sit for concentration and meditation, others are so lethargic or depressed they fall asleep, an alternative is to stay busy doing what is called for in our lives but to dedicate all actions to God. Many times someone will do a job they don't like, knowing they are supporting their children and that it is for their benefit, they keep their mind on the children, in this same way whether you are a student or teacher, pulling weeds or planting seeds, whatever you think, say, read, write, or do, do it for God. Also you can use this as one measure of the rightness of your activity: is it a fit offering. The perfection mentioned is to be perfectly at peace and content, because as a religious devotion, no activity will cause you to feel "put upon" or overworked.
However, sometimes it is very hard to do this, so then continue with the work for whatever reason you are doing it, but recognize that the results really aren't in your control and don't feel that you deserve anything out of the work. You should restrain yourself in going after this or that while you are doing actions and restrain your tongue from saying anything that is not true, beneficial and pleasant.
Chapter XIII 7-11. Humility, unpretentiousness, non-injury, forgiveness, uprightness, service of the teacher, purity, steadiness, self-control, dispassion to the objects of the senses, absence of egoism, keeping in mind the miseries in birth, death, old age, sickness and pain, non-attachment, non-clinging to son, spouse, home and the rest, constant even-mindedness on the attainment of the desirable and the undesirable, unswerving devotion to me by single-minded Yoga, resort to solitary places, dissatisfaction with social events, constancy in Self knowledge, perception of the end of true knowledge – this is declared to be knowledge, and what is opposed to it is ignorance.
Yoga begins with a regulated, kind, and moral life with the attempt to grow the awareness of the littleness of ourselves in relationship to the vast Divine Presence. This grows into a final loss of identification of the "I" into the Cosmic One. Humility, unpretentiousness, non-injury, uprightness, service of the teacher, purity, steadiness and self-control are habits of mind to prune the ego. Dispassion, awareness of the defects in life's stages and non-attachment to the family and home are mental practices to wean ourselves from our desires. Constant even-mindedness regardless of our situations, unyielding devotion to God, an attraction to solitary places, dissatisfaction with social events, constancy in Self knowledge, perception of the end of true knowledge are some to the later stages we aspire to. These habits, mental practices and modes of being on the way are knowledge because through them we achieve the Knowledge of the Self, the only permanent knowledge. Therefore all else is ignorance because it pulls us away from this knowledge into the world.
