Beyond Captivity to Futility and Utility ! Diksha Mataji (Gita Daily)

Based on Bhagavad Gita Chapter 09, Text 27

As practicing spiritualists, we may face the question, “What should be my attitude towards the material world?”

Let’s first look at the three broadattitudes that we can have towards the world:

1. Captivity: When we live primarily for material pleasures, we try to bring the material world under our captivity. We hope to bend the world to our will so as to extract our desired pleasures from it. Paradoxically though, as long as we try to bring the world under our captivity, we stay under its captivity; we remain captivated by its seductive promises of pleasure. We can’t strive for anypleasures beyond the worldly.

2. Futility: When we chase after worldly pleasures, we realize that they are elusive to get; even if we get them, they turn out to be shallow and unsatisfactory; even if we settle for them, time drags them away. Thus realizing their elusiveness, shallowness and temporariness, we reject them as futile.

3. Utility: Gita wisdom informs us that we are souls and children of Krishna. We can relish spiritual happiness if we become pure by rendering devotional service. To that end, we can use all the worldly resources that are helpful in serving him. The Bhagavad-gita points to this principle of utility when it (09.27) urges us to offer all our activities and resourcesto Krishna.