Verses 18.59–18.61
यदहङ्कारमाश्रित्य न योत्स्य इति मन्यसे | मिथ्यैष व्यवसायस्ते प्रकृतिस्त्वां नियोक्ष्यति
yad ahaṁkāram āśritya na yotsya iti manyase / mithyaiṣa vyavasāyas te prakṛtis tvāṁ niyokṣyati / / 18.59
If due to ego you think: ‘I shall not fight,’ your resolve is useless, and your own nature will compel you.
स्वभावजेन कौन्तेय निबद्ध: स्वेन कर्मणा | कर्तुं नेच्छसि यन्मोहात्करिष्यस्यवशोऽपि तत्
svabhāvajena kaunteya nibaddhaḥ svena karmaṇa / kartuṁ necchasi yan mohāt kariṣyasyavaśo ‘pi tat / / 18.60
O Kaunteya, you are controlled by your own natural conditioning. Therefore, you shall do even against your will, what you do not wish to do out of delusion.
ईश्वर: सर्वभूतानां हृद्देशेऽर्जुन तिष्ठति | भ्रामयन्सर्वभूतानि यन्त्रारूढानि मायया
īśvaraḥ sarvabhūtānāṁ hṛddeśe ‘rjuna tiṣṭhati / bhrāmayan sarvabhūtāni yantrārūḍhāni māyayā / / 18.61
The Supreme Lord resides in everyone’s heart, O Arjuna, and is directing the activities of all living entities who are acting as machines under the illusion of the material world.
Kṛṣṇa delivers an ultimatum to Arjuna. ‘Whether you like it or not, Arjuna,’ He says, ‘you will fight. In seeming intelligence, your ego tells you that you should not fight. You are under the illusion of your superficial knowledge that it is not right to wage war against friends, relatives and teachers. But you forget that your nature and your conditioning as a warrior drive you. You are a puppet in the hands of Existence, prakṛtis tvāṁ niyokṣyati. You will fight.’ These are extraordinary words. Whether we like it or not, whatever our intelligence may be, and whatever our will may be, Kṛṣṇa says we will be driven by our root patterns, saṁskāras.
The Divine power drives the machine that is the kārmic cycle. There is no escape. Nothing can be clearer. The law of nature drives us to fulfill our unfulfilled desires. Our past conditioning invokes these desires. Even though they may be in our unconscious, inaccessible to us, they determine what we do. The Master sees this even if we cannot. That is why Kṛṣṇa makes this bold statement. The mind creates and stores the root patterns, saṁskāras. You can refuse to bow down to your mind and refuse to accept these saṁskāras that control you. All meditation techniques bring you into the space of completion, being in the present moment.
When you are in the present moment, you renounce attachment to fantasies about the future. You detach yourself from the results of your action. This alone leads you into liberation from the bondage of saṁskāra. Surrender to the Master, surrender to the Universe, is the ultimate technique to do completion and rid oneself of all bondages—karma, vāsanā and saṁskāra, of the past, present and future. When people come to me for help, I usually say one of two things. To those who come purely for material assistance, health and wealth, I say, ‘I shall pray to Nithyānandeśvara (presiding deity of Śiva at Nithyananda temples) to help you.’ To those who come as sincere seekers, connected to me at the being level, my disciples and devotees, I say ‘I will take care.’
Ask my disciples about the power of these words. I say this to those who come in a mode of total surrender. They have such absolute trust in me that they tell me, ‘Please say you will take care.’ They know at their being level that once they have downloaded their problems and pain to me, it is no longer their burden. It is mine. They know it so deeply that there is not an iota of doubt in their minds that the problem has disappeared. I do nothing with them. All I do is pass their problems onto Parāśakti, the Universal feminine cosmic energy; that is all. I have already surrendered to Her.
Not one finger of mine can move without Her command. So, what can I do? But such is Her compassion that She responds every time. When the being surrenders, when the ego and mind surrender, She takes over. On the other hand, if you are filled with your ego, there is no place for Her. This is what Kṛṣṇa, the greatest Master of all, the Parama Guru, the Jagat Guru, has repeated throughout the Gītā. He does not ask you to surrender to Him out of His ego. He asks you to surrender to Him out Mokṣa Sannyāsa Yogaḥ Drop Everything And Surrender 1309 of His deep compassion. What can you give Him that He does not have?
Where else would you want to go since only He can grant everything you want? More importantly, only He can grant you what you need to free you from your suffering forever. Who else can do this for you? No one. Don’t lose hope. There is no need to do that. Kṛṣṇa is situated in everyone’s heart. All you need is trust in Him. Surrender To Him Completely