Motivational Quotes

In our lives, all of us go through situations where our emotions go extremely wild thereby pushing us to react in an impulsive manner. We regret those actions and therefore try to become self controlled.

But it is not so easy to control those feelings. Even though we might have tried to control ourselves in the past, but in the future, in the middle of infuriating situations, we again feel angry.

Feeling disheartened that we cant control our feelings , we again react angrily.

What is the solution? How can we do better?

We can feel better by changing our focus. It is difficult to control how we are feeling, but we definitely strive to control our actions.

Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 05, Text 23  askes us to accept the presence of desire and anger without giving in to them.

When something makes us feel angry or bothers us, resenting that feeling is just fighting in a lost battle, that is because we are already feeling angry and it is not possible to ignore or send away that feeling.

What must be done then?

In spite of trying to control or send away that feeling, if we acknowledge that feeling and give it an identity that yes “The feeling of anger is there inside me and xyz person or thing has triggered it,” we will be fighting a battle where there are chances to win, means:

“Even though I am feeling angry, how can I act wisely?

Let’s understand how this strategy works:

Let us compare our emotional reactions with our physical reactions.

In case our body is sensitive to the cold weather, whenever there is a drop in the  temperature, we start shivering.

Now, if we keep trying not to feel cold, is a lost battle, because we can’t change our body’s sensitivity. But just because we are feeling cold doesn’t mean that we will quit whatever we are doing. We can certainly find a way to preserve ourselves from feeling cold by putting on warm clothes and continuing our work.

In the same way, whenever we feel angry, we can still continue or carry on with whatever we are doing, by putting on an emotional shield.

What we need to do to shield ourselves emotionally?

We are souls, eternal parts of lord Krishna. In order to shield ourselves emotionally, We need to go deep within ourselves, to our core identity.

When we connect devotionally with Krishna, we get inner security and peace that shields us amongst the various dualities like, heat & cold, pleasure & pain, honor and dishonor( Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 06, Text07 ).

According to ( Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 05, Text 26 ), We gradually become purified and transcend all the troublesome emotions by staying devotionally attached to lord Krishna.

Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 16, Text 11

The Bhagavad Gita, 16.11, explains that as long as we are going to be attached, we will be fearful.

Whenever we start experiencing fear, we allow that fear to activate our imagination and feel overwhelmed. Our fears always point towards something that we hold very close to ourselves.

What can our fears tell us about Ourselves?

If we use our fears as an inspiration to introspect ourselves, we can find out:

• What we are attached to?

• What is so special about the object, that it attracts us so much?

How does Bhagavad Gita’s knowledge inspire us to redirect our attachment?

The study of Bhagavad Gita, allows to understand that whatever pleasures or shelter we are expecting to get from the object we are attracted towards, we can get all that pleasure and infact much more from Krishna.

Why?

Because he is the source, source of all shelter, pleasure and attractiveness (BG 10.41).

The long standing process of Bhakti Yoga allows us to make Krishna our supreme object of attachment and start seeing all our other attachments in relationship to him.

So, does becoming attached to Krishna means that we don’t take any practical measures to deal with our fears?

No

It simply means, that only practical measures, alone, are not enough – we also need  to take transcendental measure to spiritualize our  attachments, by means of practicing Bhakti Yoga.

How does attachment to Krishna calm us amidst our fears?

The consistent practice of bhakti results in divine attachment with Krishna  and directs our consciousness to flow naturally towards the Supreme personality of Godhead.

This flow of consciousness towards him, calms us amidst fearful situations. This is because we start understanding that he is the supreme spiritual reality and always resides us inside our hearts.

It does not matter how fearful the things are and how much they try to threaten us, he always remains our supreme well wisher and is competent enough to bring good even in the worst of the situations.

Therefore, when we are attached to Krishna, we become better in tolerating and transcending our fears.

The uncertainty of the material world still remains there, but our attachment towards the uncertain material world ends.

Whenever we come across various difficult situations in our life, we start feeling negative emotions like anger, irritation, self-pity. Even though such feelings may appear to be natural they do not have the right determine our consciousness.

There is no doubt that the situations and their associated emotions will certainly affect our consciousness but we can still choose what we have to focus our thoughts onto.


Unfortunately, most of the time we, unknowingly let our thoughts be obsessed with our negative emotions and hence end up even feeling more worst then what the situation actually demands for.

If we keep dwelling ourselves onto those negative emotions, it becomes a habit. We should keep a check on how often we dwell ourselves onto those emotions. 

Negative emotions are similar to the psychological emotions. Just like, if we keep scratching or rubbing our physical wounds they become even worse, if we keep worrying all the time about our negative emotions, our psychological wounds become worse.

If we allow our emotions to heal in spite of worrying about them all the time, they get healed in the due course.

So what we need to do in order to facilitate such healing?

We need to decide, to consciously redirect our thoughts towards something beyond those difficult situations.

How does Bhagavad Gita’s knowledge help us in such  decision – making?

Bhagavad Gita helps us to understand that we are much bigger than our situations – bigger not in an egoistic sense but in an integral sense.

According to Bhagavad Gita, we are eternal spiritual beings, part and parcel of the Supreme eternal being, Krishna; whereas our situations, no matter how worst and stressful they are, are temporary.

So complementing the above said statement the Bhagavad Gita offers was the time-honored process of Bhakti-yoga, through which we can redirect our thoughts towards Krishna. 

When, with full consciousness, we decide to focus our thoughts onto him, we regain inner strength to calmly face our difficulties & intelligently find the best way forward.

The Bhagavad Gita, Chapter 18, Shloka 58 , assures us that when we become conscious of him, by his grace, we will cross over all the obstacles.

Therefore, our consciousness, our attitude & ultimately our destiny are not determined by our situations, but by our decisions.