Chapter 3 Karma Yoga Verse 22
Sloka
Mayi sarvaani karmaani sannyasyaadhyaatma chetasaa;
Niraasheer nirmamo bhootwaa yudhyaswa vigatajwarah.
Translation
Renouncing all actions in Me, with the mind centred in the Self,
free from hope and egoism, and from mental fever, you should fight.
Interpretation
In this shloka Lord Krishna talks about how the work should be done. Till now we have seen various aspects of doing work and now Lord Krishna says that one should approach the work by trusting the Lord completely. Once the person surrenders himself to the Lord he then should make himself free from the hope of the result and the egoism associated with it. He should then surrender all actions to the Lord with the thought: “I perform all actions for the sake of the Lord only.”
Extending Interpretation to Mankind’s Life!
What is “prasadam”? It is the food item that is offered to God first before we eat it. Why do we offer prasadam to God? It is with the belief that the action of preparing the food is done for the sake of God only. So when it is done for the sake of God, it is natural that we offer it to God before eating them. Now if we extend the same logic to other things, do we do all our actions for the sake of God? It is an interesting question because when you think of different actions you do in a day you can never imagine that you can do every action for the sake of God.
But the reality won’t change if we are in denial. Every action we do for the sake of God only. If a human being understands that then there will be a huge transformation in his attitude. Next time before using a bad word against anyone, the person speaking will think before saying it. If the thought comes to his mind that like prasadam which comes to you through God, this bad word also goes to the other person through God, he never utters it. The same holds good before cheating someone or harming someone or making someone’s life miserable.
Life is a gift of God and it is given to us to do things that makes everyone’s life good and better. That is why there is God’s hand in everything that we do. The food that we eat is God’s gift, so we never throw food. The words we speak is God’s gift so we should speak kind and good words and the acts we commit are also gifts of God so we should commit good acts. Imagine if the whole world follows this, then how beautiful and enjoyable will this World be!!!
