Art of successful living

[Guest guest]

Art of successful living (An Article from the Religious Section of The Hindu

taken with permission: "Copyrights 2000 The Hindu & Tribeca Internet

Initiatives Inc.")

 

The Bhagavad Gita in one of the verses of the concluding chapter shows how

human life can become successful. A human being achieves success and

fulfilment in his life when he performs what he has to do, worshiping Him from

whom this entire manifestation has streamed forth and by whom all this

universe is pervaded. When this is the objective one's lifestyle must give

scope for discovering oneself. On the one hand man is propelled by the desire

to be successful in life and on the other he has to gain mastery of himself.

Human desires can be looked at from two standpoints - the desire to accomplish

and the desire to retain critical requirements of life like wealth, youth and

relationships. All these pursuits demand time and energy.

 

Lord Krishna classifies all of them under desire (Raga). Likewise, human

beings naturally like to avoid illness and old age, loss of money, power and

of face in society. These are also time- consuming and action-oriented and the

Gita categorizes them as Dvesha. Raga and Dvesha are by themselves neither

good nor bad. They are realities of life and cannot be wished away. Human life

is driven by these likes and dislikes. The problem is not likes and dislikes

per se, but the fact that they decide when a person must be happy or unhappy.

They become dictators instead of remaining man's privileges. So one has to

learn to manage them without letting them dictate one's life.

 

Success in life involved being in charge of one's life, said Swami Dayananda

Saraswati in his discourse. The Lord introduces this subject right at the

outset in the Gita where He describes Yoga as skill in action. The whole

objective of this exercise is to enable man to gain mastery of himself and

this problem of self-management cannot be solved without looking at oneself

objectively. The Gita tackles it with some statements of facts and some which

are intended to make man act. ``Your right is to work only, but never to the

fruit thereof,'' is one such statement Lord Krishna makes. It amounts to

saying, ``Perform action but do not expect results.'' But nobody, even a

simpleton, will do anything without expectation of reward. So, is the Gita

wrong or our understanding wrong? In nature all beings except man are not

vested with the freedom of choice. Only man is singular in this respect and it

is this fact that the Gita is drawing attention to. Man has the choice to act

but the result of his action is controlled by natural laws, by many variables

like Karma, over which he has no control. So the result is taken care of by

the Lord.