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evenness of mind, move away from both good and evil deeds in this life;

Devote yourself to Yoga. Skill in action is Yoga.

2.51 The wise, having abandoned the outcome of their actions and possessed of knowledge, are freed from the cycle of birth and death.

They go to the state which is beyond all sorrow.

2.52 When your wisdom takes you beyond delusion,

You shall be indifferent to what has been heard and what is yet to be heard.

2.53 When you are not confused by what you have heard and your wisdom stands steady and unmoving in the Self,

You shall attain Self-realization.

Krishna reiterates and emphasizes what He has said before and ends with a punch line.

He says, 'Act without attachment. Do not worry about success or failure in results. Center yourself in wisdom that takes you beyond action and the desire for fruits of action. Once you are centered in wisdom you will act wisely. Once you give up attachment to results, you will be freed from the cycle of birth and death and will be beyond sorrow.'

He then adds, 'When you are centered in wisdom you will no longer be deluded by what you have heard and are yet to hear. When you are no longer deluded by what you have heard and are centered in wisdom, you are liberated.'

Krishna's immediate reference here is to the scriptures, the Vedas, an oral tradition. Arjuna earlier quoted these scriptures to Krishna, using them to emphasize the potential implications of his actions. Krishna chides Arjuna and says, 'Don't be confused by what you hear, even if it is supposed to be divine knowledge, the Vedas. Remember: if you are really centered in wisdom, you can never be deluded; you will be in awareness.'

Krishna's words resonate even today, and perhaps are far more relevant today. We are bombarded by information from all sides 24 hours a day, whether we like it or not. When something is stated repeatedly, especially by an authority, we tend to believe and accept it without reservation. No one even needs to force you to believe; your brain can be washed without any pressure, without coercion.

This is what many political and religious institutions use to instill fear and greed in people to obey their commandments. This is also what all marketing and advertising executives do to convince you about their products. This is what someone called a 'Hidden Persuader'.

A small story:

A CEO died and went up to the gates of the higher world. There was a beautiful receptionist who welcomed him with a huge smile. She said: You have a choice. You can choose between heaven and hell, but once you choose, it is final. We shall now take you on a preview tour.

The CEO was taken to heaven first. There he saw many old bearded men sitting with closed eyes and once in a while some angels playing soulful music on their harps. It all looked pretty dull.

Then they took him to hell. Hell was rocking. Rock bands were playing, people were dancing and every one seemed to be having fun. It was very different from what the man thought hell would be.

The receptionist then queried him, 'Where do you wish to go?'

'To hell,' announced the CEO.

'Are you sure?' she asked, 'you cannot change your mind later.'

'Oh, I am sure,' he responded.

The next moment he found himself in a hot and dirty place where he was set upon by tough guys with whips. 'Come on,' they yelled, 'you have work to do. Move!'

'What is this?' the CEO gasped. 'The hell I saw a few minutes ago was very different. They have brought me to the wrong place.'

'No, no,' the guards answered. 'This is hell alright. What you saw before was our marketing department's promotional tour! This is reality!'

We all tend to believe all that we see, hear and read. Often, what we perceive is not the truth.

The first response of most of us is to believe rather than doubt. This is especially true when what we see, hear and read was already instilled into us from childhood. If we are told again and again from childhood as most of us are, that we must listen to elders and read figures of authority, we grow up tending to do just that. It also happens that when what we see fits our fantasies, we don't bother to question.

Social, business and religious institutions use this power with great effect upon us. All religions and cultures have some book or other that is believed to be divine in origin and which must be obeyed implicitly. Does our inner experience tell us that whatever such a book says is relevant to us? More importantly, do we perceive it to be relevant today?

The Vedic scriptures, the sruti, divine in origin, and the smriti, rules and regulations laid down later by Manu and other sages, make no such claims. In fact, Hindu scriptures have both the humility and the arrogance to challenge us to transform ourselves according to the needs of the day, but stipulate that we first experience what is said. Vedic scriptures are not dead knowledge that is a burden upon us to abide by, but living guidelines that lead us into wisdom and liberation.

‘So,’ Krishna says, ‘let the Vedas say what it wants. You may hear whatever you must, but put what you hear, see, and read to the test of wisdom to take you beyond delusion.’

He asks Arjuna to experience what he is exposed to and then to decide what he must do. Krishna has already said in the Gita that He is the Vedas; He is knowledge, and yet He asks him to experiment and be guided by his inner wisdom, not by what he merely hears.

What courage, what authority! Only one who is so sure about the truth can say, ‘Do not listen to what I say and how I act, but listen to your inner voice of truth born out of your own awareness and experience.’

One can write hundreds and thousands of pages but they will be meaningless when judged against these words of the Master.

Some of the social and corporate institutions are quite direct in imposing their truths on us without giving us a chance to verify and accept them. ‘You must fall in line with our mission if you want to included in our corporate family,’ they would say. That is why sanyasis, monks, get out of the rule-bound world, seeking the freedom of truth, but unfortunately, many get caught in the rules of religion. In society, wise men have been punished for expressing truths that they experienced which violated the beliefs then held by their leaders. Socrates, Copernicus, Da Vinci and many others suffered when they refused to accept what they heard. They were revered as visionaries years after they passed away.

In today's corporate world, people who stand up to what they believe is right when they see their companies doing unethical things are referred to as 'whistle blowers'. Today it is a respected word. Even three decades ago this was a derogatory word, referring to traitors.

Why is such a person a traitor? Is it because he or she sees a truth that is at variance to what his institutions, the company, the Government or religion tells him? If, in the wisdom of one's experience, one realizes a truth different from what one has heard, the individual not only has the right but also the responsibility towards humanity to tell them about that truth. The truth may be joyful or painful but it must be told.

Krishna is taking Arjuna through the path of enlightenment through simple steps. He says, 'Don't be inactive, do what you need to do. Do it with no expectations and no attachment to results. Do it with a centered mind and in wisdom. Do it with the wisdom of your own inner calling and not because of something you have heard. You will then go beyond all suffering and be liberated.'

These steps are so simple that everyone can practice them; in fact every one should practice them. Stay in the present moment of your awareness without worrying about what you have heard and experienced in the past or what you expect to hear and experience in future. Stay fully centered in the experience of the present, and based on the truth of that experience, act. You can never go wrong. I promise you that.

Q: Master, in the corporate world everything revolves around budgets and objectives. How realistic is it to work without goals in such an environment?

Please understand, not only is this possible, but this is also the only way to live in bliss without suffering.

You seem like a professional or a corporate person. You will work to some budget, forecast, milestones, goals, objectives and so on. How many times can you honestly say that you achieved all that you planned and budgeted? I have talked to many CEOs. They have been honest in saying that in their budgets what is met is the cost projections but not profit projections. This is a universal truth. Expenses always exceed the budget while profits fall below the budget.

Yet, the whole corporate system swears by budgets and stresses everybody in trying to meet them.

Krishna does not tell you to destroy budgets. He advises you not to be obsessed with budget and goals. He tells you, 'Do what you have to, act for the sake of action, fight for the sake of the fight, without worrying about the outcome.'

He says to focus on the present moment.

This is the full circle your management science has now come to. Everyone talks about process control. What does that mean? It means to focus on what is happening at this moment! Unless you get what you are doing now right, there is no way you are going to do it right any time in the future. The future becomes the past through the present only.

I am told by my disciples from the business world that it is only recently the discovery has been made that even you inspect 100% of what is produced in a factory of office, there will still be about 1% of defectives. You cannot reduce it to zero.

They say that the Japanese developed the method of focusing on the process instead of the product and this led to zero defects! All your great systems of Six Sigma are based on the belief of being in the present moment.

This is what Krishna said over 5000 years ago. 'Forget about the end product,' He said, 'focus on the process of what you need to do.' Can anything be simpler?

Krishna's message is very simple. He says: surrender the outcome to Me and focus on your action. Why is it difficult to do? In fact this will lift a huge weight off your shoulder. You will no longer be stressed constantly about the result. Instead, you will focus on the activity and will perform better.

Just try this approach. Relax completely and completely focus on what you have at hand at this point in time. Make sure that you do it with awareness and well. You will see that the results follow automatically without you having to worry about them.

Understand this: when your path is right, your destination will always be right. You will travel light and you will travel in bliss and whichever destination you reach will be the one most suited for you.