Does the Gita ask us not to care how things turn out? No. It asks us to do the work fully, to hold no claim on the result, to stay even in success and failure, and it adds that work done this way is better work. The work is ours, and the result is not. That is a more skilful way of working, and it is not a colder one.
Here we take the five verses in order (Gita 2.47 to Gita 2.51). Each answers one plain question: what is mine, how do I hold it, why is this better, what is it called, and where does it lead? The verses come from the second chapter, where Buddhi Yoga has just described the resolved intellect.
Where the teaching comes from
Arjuna has heard about the self that cannot be destroyed (Gita 2.20), and then about the yoga of the resolved intellect. The verses we read here are the working centre of that second teaching: how to act with such an intellect. The listener stands at the front of a battle, a man who must act and whose action carries enormous consequences. So the teaching is practical from its first line.
What is mine
मा कर्मफलहेतुर्भूर्मा ते सङ्गोऽस्त्वकर्मणि ॥ २.४७ ॥
You have a right to perform your prescribed duty, but you are never entitled to the fruits of action. Never consider yourself the cause of the results of your activities, and never be attached to inaction.
The verse gives four instructions. The right is to the action alone. It is never to the fruits. The person must not make the fruit the motive, and must not think that they alone cause it. And there is to be no attachment to inaction.
Each instruction shuts one way out. The right to action shuts carelessness, since a right to the work is a charge to do it. The second shuts anxiety, because what is not ours cannot be held. The third shuts greed and pride. The fourth shuts quitting. The question why inaction is no way out is the subject of the next hub, Can We Simply Stop Acting?.
Why is the result outside our right? Because it depends on more than the doer. The Gita counts five causes of any action: the seat, the doer, the instruments, the many kinds of effort and, fifth, fate (Gita 18.14, Gita 18.15; see Who Is the Doer?). We are one of five.
How to hold it
सिद्ध्यसिद्ध्योः समो भूत्वा समत्वं योग उच्यते ॥ २.४८ ॥
Established in yoga, O Dhananjaya, perform your actions, abandoning attachment and remaining equal in success and failure. Such equanimity is called yoga.
The Lord says, "established in yoga, perform actions". The person is to give up clinging (sanga) and remain equal in success and failure. He then names it: such evenness is called yoga (yoga). The full meaning of evenness is read in Equanimity, where pleasure and pain, gain and loss, and victory and defeat are all met the same way (Gita 2.38).
The order matters. The Lord does not say that a person should first become even and then act. He says to act while established. The steadiness comes with the work and not after it.
Why this is better
बुद्धौ शरणमन्विच्छ कृपणाः फलहेतवः ॥ २.४९ ॥
Action done with desire for results is far inferior to action done with the yoga of wisdom, O Dhananjaya. Seek refuge in wisdom; those who are motivated by the fruits of action are wretched.
Action done with desire for results is far lower than action done with the yoga of wisdom. The Lord adds, "seek refuge in wisdom" (buddhi), and says that those who are moved by fruits are pitiable.
The reason is plain. When the fruit moves the work, the work follows the fruit. It takes shortcuts when the fruit is near, it stops when the fruit looks far, and it bends when the fruit demands. When wisdom moves the work, the work follows what is right. "Pitiable" is not scorn. It names the condition of one who is always waiting on something outside.
Skill in action
तस्माद्योगाय युज्यस्व योगः कर्मसु कौशलम् ॥ २.५० ॥
One endowed with wisdom casts off both good and bad deeds in this life itself. Therefore strive for yoga; yoga is skill in action.
One with wisdom casts off both good and bad deeds here in this life. This does not say that deeds have no effect. It says that for the person who works without clinging, deeds do not bind. Then comes the instruction, "strive for yoga", and the definition: yoga is skill in action.
Skill means undivided attention. A person answering an examination who is also hearing the examiner's verdict in their head answers worse. The mind that is whole on the task does the task better, and this is the practical argument behind the whole teaching.
Where it ends
जन्मबन्धविनिर्मुक्ताः पदं गच्छन्त्यनामयम् ॥ २.५१ ॥
The wise, endowed with wisdom, renouncing the fruits born of action and freed from the bondage of birth, attain the state that is free from all suffering.
The wise, joined to wisdom, give up the fruits born of action, are freed from the bond of birth and reach the state beyond suffering. This is not a deal in which a person gives up a small fruit and receives a larger one. The state is what remains when clinging goes. Peace follows the giving up (Gita 5.12, Gita 12.12; see The Ladder of Devotion).
How clinging to a result turns into anger
The Gita describes how the mind slides when it holds on to an outcome. Dwelling on a thing gives rise to attachment, attachment to desire for it, and desire, when it is blocked, to anger (Gita 2.62). From anger comes delusion, then loss of memory, loss of the intellect and ruin (Gita 2.63; see From Thought to Ruin).
Applied to a result, the slide is easy to see. A person dwells on the outcome, becomes attached to it, wants it badly, and is angry with everyone and everything that stands in its way: the colleague, the weather, the market, themselves. The teaching of the five verses cuts the slide at its first step. If the result is not held as a claim, there is nothing to dwell on, nothing to be blocked, and nothing to be angry at.
Three questions to ask before a task
The verses and the verses around them suggest three questions that can be asked before any task.
First: is this mine to do? The right is to the prescribed action (Gita 2.47), and the duty that belongs to one's own place is read in One's Own Duty (Gita 18.47). Second: have I weighed the consequences, the harm and my own capacity? An action begun without these is called dull (Gita 18.25). Third: can I do it as an offering, with no ownership and no fever? (Gita 3.30). A task that passes the three can be done with the whole mind.
What changes when the result arrives
The same teaching governs the moment of result. In success, the person is not the sole cause (Gita 2.47), so pride has little to stand on. In failure, the evenness holds (Gita 2.48), so the collapse is smaller and the learning is possible. The Gita describes the one who is content with whatever comes and is equal in success and failure (Gita 4.22). And it promises that effort on this path is not lost (Gita 2.40).
What the "fruit" covers
The fruit is more than the outcome of a day's work. The verses just before speak of people whose minds are full of desire and who look to rites for enjoyment and power, and to heaven as the highest goal (Gita 2.43). So the fruit includes the reward that is hoped for beyond this world as well as the result in it. The teaching turns the listener from both to the work itself.
The Lord acts this way too
The teaching is not asked of Arjuna as something the Lord himself does not do. The Lord says that there is no duty for him in the three worlds and nothing unobtained that he needs to obtain, and yet he engages in action (Gita 3.22). Actions do not bind him, because he has no desire for their results (Gita 4.14). The model of the teaching is the Lord at work, tireless and unbound.
Four ways people work
| Kind of work | What moves it | What the Gita says |
|---|---|---|
| Moved by the fruit | Pleasure and ego, with much effort | Passion-driven (Gita 18.24) |
| Begun without regard for result or capacity | Delusion | Dull (Gita 18.25) |
| Done because it ought to be done, without clinging | Duty | Pure (Gita 18.23, Gita 18.9) |
| Offered | All actions given, with no ownership and no fever | The fuller teaching (Gita 3.30) |
The duty in the third row is read in Relinquishment and Renunciation of Action, and the offering in the fourth in Offering All Actions.
Other chapters say the same thing
The point is repeated across the Gita. The Lord says that one who does the duty well without clinging reaches the Supreme (Gita 3.19; see Acting for the World). One who has dropped clinging to the fruit, and is content, is engaged in action and yet does nothing (Gita 4.20; see Karma and Akarma). The true renouncer is the one who does the duty without depending on the result (Gita 6.1; see Renunciation or Karma Yoga?). And the Lord asks that whatever a person does be offered, and promises freedom from the bonds of good and bad results (Gita 9.27, Gita 9.28; see A Leaf, a Flower).
Common misreadings
"Do not care how it turns out." Yoga is called skill in action (Gita 2.50), and an act begun without regard for consequences is called dull (Gita 18.25).
"Have no goals." The work has a purpose in the duty it serves. What is removed is the claim and the fever (Gita 3.30).
"Results do not matter, so effort is optional." The right to action stands, and so does the warning against attachment to inaction (Gita 2.47).
"It is only for monks." The teaching was given to a warrior on a battlefield (Gita 2.47).
"Giving up the fruit means refusing what I am owed." The claim is dropped. Wages, thanks and results can be received, but the mind is not tied to them (Gita 4.22).
An example
Take Hemant, who runs a small bookshop and starts a children's reading hour, hoping it will bring families in. On the first day eleven children come, and the next week only three.
He begins to check the count every hour. He cuts the stories short, and in the fifth week he stops the sessions.
A friend points out that the count is not in his hands, while the quality of the hour is. Hemant tries one month with only one aim, a good hour. He stays even when four children come. By the third month families have heard of it.
The point is not that the count rose, since it might not have. The point is that his work improved, and so did his nights.
A practice from the verses
- Name the work that is yours today (Gita 2.47).
- Do it with the whole attention (Gita 2.50).
- When the mind jumps to the result, bring it back (Gita 2.48).
- Meet both outcomes in the same way (Gita 2.48).
- Offer what comes (Gita 3.30).
If no one ever knew the result, would I do this task the same way? Which part of my worry is about something that is not in my hands? Where do I cut corners when the fruit looks near, or quit when it looks far?
Questions readers ask
Does "never to the fruits" mean I may not enjoy the result?
No. Enjoy what comes. What is dropped is the claim and the clinging, and not the joy. The Gita describes a person who is content with whatever comes, and equal in success and failure (Gita 4.22).
Is "do not be the cause of the fruit" the same as "do not care"?
Care goes into the work, and humility goes into the claim. The fruit depends on five causes, and we are one of them (Gita 18.14). Not claiming the fruit is not the same as not caring about the work.
Is it a contradiction that 2.51 promises freedom as a result?
No. The state is not a bargain. Clinging is the bond, and freedom is what remains when it goes. The deeper reply is in the deeper reading.
What do I do if my duty is unclear?
The right is to prescribed action (Gita 2.47), and the duty that belongs to one's own place is read in One's Own Duty (Gita 18.47).
How is this different from fatalism?
Fatalism drops the effort. The verse keeps the right to action and asks for full effort, while it releases the claim on the outcome (Gita 2.47).
The work is ours, the fruit is not
The teaching comes to this: the work is ours, and the fruit is not. This is a more skilful way of working, because the mind is whole on the task and the work follows what is right. It is not a colder way, since the care stays in the work. The Lord states the pure form of it in a single line.
सङ्गं त्यक्त्वा फलं चैव स त्यागः सात्त्विको मतः ॥ १८.९ ॥
When a prescribed action is performed simply because it ought to be done, giving up attachment and the fruit as well, O Arjuna, that relinquishment is considered sāttvic (pure).
For the simple version, see the simple reading. For the finer points, the traditions and the objections, see the deeper reading. This is the second stop on The Path of Karma Yoga, after Buddhi Yoga and before Can We Simply Stop Acting?.