What is Karma Yoga? | Eckhart Tolle Reads The Bhagavad Gita

And the more dependent you become on the way things are going to turn out, the more likely it is that they are not going to turn out the way you want them to turn out because there's fear in you. The most important teaching in the Bhagavad Gita that runs through it will be mentioned in almost every chapter is what's called Karma Yoga, which is a way in which you perform action in this world. I already briefly talked about it in our first session. But since this is perhaps the central theme and it's the main spiritual practice, one could say recommended in the Bhagavad Gita is to do whatever you do in a certain way. And what that is, I'll explain again briefly. And if you do whatever life gives you to do in a certain way, that will lead to a deepening and spiritual realization. And that can be really. You can summarize that as in the words of the Bhagavad Gita, do not be attached to the fruit of your action, which of course simply means don't look to the goal of what you want to achieve through whatever you are doing now. Give your complete attention to the doing, rather than where you want to get to through the doing. And that's again, a very important lesson nowadays, because most humans don't know that yet they are always one moment ahead. They want to get there. You may find in your own life still a lot of the time you are not present, moment centered. You are focused on the next moment that you need to get to. So whatever you are doing at this moment is designed to get you to the next moment. And internally, you project yourself away from what you're doing now, because the doing becomes a means to an end. This is very normal. Everybody lives like that. Whatever they do is a means to an end. And in their mind, the end is more important than what they are doing. That is so habitual and unconscious that most humans don't even know that that is how they live, that they always live for the next moment, but they're never completely in this moment. They also don't know that by living in that way, they create frustration and suffering and stress and discontent. Basically, they're condemning themselves to continuous, distinct discontent and to stress. Because if you ignore the present moment continuously and ignore means, you make it into a means to an end because the next one is so important that you need to get to. Then you miss life completely. You miss the depths that potentially is there in life. And life becomes shallow because it's all mental, because the next Moment is always mind formation. The next moment is a mental projection. The next moment is never a reality because it doesn't exist when the next moment comes. Okay, one minute from now, I've got one minute to finish this. And then after one minute, it's not one minute, it's, oh, it's now again. And then there's the next thing to do. Of course, immediately you look to the next thing because you, you have become used to being uncomfortable with the present moment. Conditioned since childhood to feel ill at ease in the present moment. Oh, I should be doing something. And doing implies some future projection. You can never be. You're always doing. And now the Bhagavad Gita, by recommending as a spiritual practice to renounce, as it's called here, to renounce the fruit of your action. Sometimes it is called a sacrifice. What is really in this ancient terminology, what is, to put this into modern terminology, is really designed, telling you to pay attention to what you are doing in this moment and make this moment the primary focus of your life. Whatever you're doing in this moment. And the secondary focus is what you want to achieve through whatever you're doing. And that is called a sacrifice. One could say you sacrifice the future. Renounce the fruit. It says if you renounce the fruit, a different energy flows into what you do. And then many helpful factors come in, and that is the truth. And it's a new way of living where you actually, whatever you're doing now, give it your complete attention. This is more important than what I want to achieve through it. Yes, I know what I want to achieve through it. But since there's only ever the present moment and nothing else, surely this must be important than the projected future moment. And then you can give your fullest attention to the doing and not to the desired outcome. And also then you are not dependent for your sense of fulfillment on the way things turn out. Because if you're dependent for your sense of fulfillment on the way things turn out, quite often you will become frustrated because they may not turn out the way you want them to turn out. And especially. And the more dependent you become on the way things are going to turn out, the more likely it is that, that they are not going to turn out the way you want them to turn out. Because there's fear in you. And when you need things to be in a certain way, there's already fear in you. So the fear flows into what you do. It contaminates what you're doing. Now. The quality of your doing is contaminated by Fear. And so the very thing that you were dependent on is less likely to happen because the quality of your doing diminishes. In other words, you are less conscious in the way in which you act. The less consciousness flows into the way in which you act, the less likely it is that the outcome is going to be productive and satisfying. So the more you depend on a satisfying outcome internally for your well being and sense of identity or sense of worthiness or whatever it may be, the more you depend on the desired outcome, the more likely it is that you're not going to get it. It'll fail in some way, and that makes life very frustrating. But if your sense of fulfillment is derived from the doing itself, the outcome is secondary. You no longer need it to make you feel fulfilled. The fulfilling thing is what you're doing now, the attention behind it, the consciousness behind the doing. If you can feel the consciousness flowing through you as you do something with your hands or as you speak, or whatever it is you do, relate to other humans. If you feel that and you enjoy the doing of this moment. Let's say you have a business negotiation. The outcome is you want the contract to be signed. And if your focus is excessively on wanting the contract to be signed for the company you work for, whatever, then the quality of your interaction with the other humans, the humans that you need to sign the contract, diminishes. The other human, the other person, will intuitively feel your unease. You are uneasy because you are fearful about the outcome, so will also intuitively feel that you are not truly relating to him or her as a human being. You are making him or her a means to an end unconsciously, because you want them to sign the contract. Now these are the people that you're dealing with. They don't know these things consciously that I just mentioned, but they can feel that. And they will feel, no, I don't think I want to sign the contract with this person. It doesn't feel quite right. Or something will come in, they'll verbalize it in some way. No, it doesn't feel right. Or they see, bring up some obstacle and magnify it and say, no, no, I can't do that. And then you have the alternative. Somebody who doesn't, who doesn't need the outcome, but who gives his or her complete attention to the other person and actually enjoys the negotiation, the talking, enjoys not just what is, not just the words that are being spoken, but enjoys the presence of the other human being there behind the words. But you can only enjoy the presence of the other human being. If you can enjoy your own presence beyond the mental constructs, in touch with yourself. So there comes a sense of goodness and rightness in the present moment of being with this other human. So you acknowledge their being, you're not using them as a means to an end. Primarily, yes, it would still be nice if they signed the contract, you know that. But that is not your primary focus anymore. And if they don't sign it, you're not suddenly turning hostile. In the business world, often you find if the people, if you don't do what they want you to do, they become hostile or they walk away, immediately lose interest in you, you haven't signed the deal. And that's quite normal. The people who are most effective and successful actually are people who, perhaps without even knowing it, perhaps because they have good karma, as the Bhagavad Gita would say, they live in this way. They like every moment of it, of interacting with you, if you are the client. They love interacting. They love that present moment. They don't transform the present moment into some means to a future end. And this is the, this teaching about renouncing the fruit of your action is the primary teaching of the Bhagavad Gita, which is 2 or 3,000 years old and still most humans haven't learned that lesson.