Bhagavad Gita 14.23

udāsīna-vad āsīno

guṇair yo na vicālyate

guṇā vartanta ity eva

yo ’vatiṣṭhati neṅgate

 

Like one detached, unmoved, aware,

Unshaken by the modes’ affair;

Seeing “the modes alone engage,”

Steady, unmoved—beyond their cage.

 

My dear Lord, the world externally and the mind internally often overwhelm me with events and emotions. Yet when I am overwhelmed, I neither truly experience the events nor the emotions. I am simply engulfed by them.

O transcendental Lord, you exist far above the ocean of material existence, and yet you are within each heart. Help me connect with you and anchor myself in you. Being thus centered, may I become an observer—dispassionate, yet not disgusted or disillusioned. Paradoxically, the more I distance myself from events and emotions, the more I can observe them objectively.

O supreme enlightener, help me see that through the drama of the world externally and the drama of the mind internally, it is you who are ultimately acting, illuminating, guiding, and molding. The less I see the events of the world in terms of how they titillate or threaten me, the more I can move beyond my self-referential frame of reference and the more I perceive the world in reference to you—your presence, your purpose, your power.

O merciful Lord, by making me dispassionate toward the world and receptive to you acting through the world, please transform the same experiences that once deluded me into experiences that illuminate, enrich, and liberate me.

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14.23 He … who is unwavering and undisturbed through all these reactions of the material qualities, remaining neutral and transcendental, knowing that the modes alone are active; who is situated in the self … [– such a person is said to have transcended the modes of nature].