The Spiritual Import of the Mahabharata and the Bhagavadgita : Ch -18.6.

Chapter -18: Fix Your Mind on Me Alone-6.

Now having said this much, a beautiful prescription is given in the very middle of the twelfth chapter which sums up what we know as ‘the four yogas’, in modern terms.

Though the names of these yogas are not mentioned there, these are equivalent to what we know as jnana, raja, bhakti and karma yoga. “Absorb yourself wholly in Me.”

Mayy eva mana adhatsva is the first instruction. Mayi buddhim nivesaya, nivasisyasi mayy eva ata urdhvam na samsayah : -

A total absorption on God is the supreme yoga.

A whole-souled attention—twenty-four hours a day we are only concerned with That, our mind is thinking only of That, and there is no other interest in life except an entertainment of God thought.

This is the greatest achievement that we could conceive, if it could be practicable.

But Sri Krishna says that if we find this is hard, if we cannot maintain this thought throughout the day, then—abhyaasa-yogena tato mm icchaptum dhananjaya—try to practice the art of repeated concentration.

Fix your mind again and again on the chosen object, and continue this practice day in and day out. This is abhyasa yoga.

Today you may find it difficult ; -

tomorrow perhaps it may be a little easier on account of practice done today, and so on and so forth.

Every day the difficulty will be lessened and the mind will attain greater and greater composure and concentration.

Swami Krishnananda
  To be continued  ....