Gita 5.9
Karma Sanyasa Yoga
प्रलपन्विसृजन्गृह्णन्नुन्मिषन्निमिषन्नपि | इन्द्रियाणीन्द्रियार्थेषु वर्तन्त इति धारयन् ||९||
pralapan visṛjan gṛhṇann unmiṣan nimiṣann api | indriyāṇīndriyārtheṣu vartanta iti dhārayan ||9||
In essence: Speaking, releasing, grasping, even blinking—the wise one holds firm to this truth: it is merely the senses moving among their objects, nothing more.
A conversation between a seeker and guide to help you feel this verse deeply
Sadhak-Guru Dialogue
Sadhak: "Guruji, Krishna even includes blinking in the list! Is he saying even my eye blinks aren't really 'mine'?"
Guru: "Precisely. Can you blink consciously right now?"
Sadhak: "Yes—I just did."
Guru: "Good. Now—can you remember every blink you've made today?"
Sadhak: "Of course not. That would be thousands!"
Guru: "So who performed those thousands of blinks? Were 'you' doing them? If you can't even recall them, in what sense did 'you' do them? The body blinked. The body breathed. The body digested your breakfast. 'You' showed up to claim occasional blinks as 'yours,' but the vast majority happened without any input from this 'you' at all."
Sadhak: "What about speaking? Surely I choose my words."
Guru: "Do you? Before speaking this question, did you consciously select each word, or did the words form themselves and emerge?"
Sadhak: "They... came out. I mean, I know what I want to say, but the exact words seem to form automatically."
Guru: "And who formed them? If you observe speaking closely, you'll find: an intention arises, the speech mechanism activates, words emerge. At no point do 'you' construct sentences from individual words. The process is far too fast and complex for conscious control. You experience the result and claim ownership, but the production happened without 'your' involvement."
Sadhak: "What about 'grasping and releasing'? That seems very intentional—I decide to pick something up."
Guru: "Trace it backwards. You reach for something—but why? Because an impulse arose to reach. And before that? A perception of the object, an arising of desire or need. At what point did 'you' enter the chain? The perception wasn't chosen, the desire arose on its own, the arm moved in response. The sense of 'I did that' is reconstructed after the fact. The senses grasped; the mind claimed."
Sadhak: "This phrase 'the senses moving among sense objects'—what exactly does that mean?"
Guru: "It means exactly what it says. The eye is a sense; form is a sense object. When they meet, seeing happens—automatically, mechanically, without any 'you' required. The ear is a sense; sound is a sense object. Contact produces hearing. The whole manifest world is just this: senses and objects dancing together according to their natures. The 'person' watching and claiming ownership is itself just another phenomenon—thoughts and sensations claiming to be a watcher."
Sadhak: "Why is 'holding firm' (dharayan) emphasized? If this is truth, shouldn't recognition be automatic?"
Guru: "The recognition must compete with a lifetime of contrary conditioning. Every moment, thought claims: 'I am doing, I am seeing, I am speaking.' This habit is relentless. Dharayan—holding firm—means actively maintaining the counter-recognition against this pressure. It's like remembering you're dreaming while inside a very vivid dream. The dream wants you to forget; you must actively remember. Over time, with practice, the recognition becomes effortless—the default instead of the exception. Until then, hold firm."
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🌅 Daily Practice
Practice sense-observation meditation. Sit quietly and systematically go through each sense. Eyes: notice that seeing is happening. Forms appear, colors register—but can you find 'you' doing the seeing? Or is seeing simply occurring in awareness? Ears: sounds arise and pass—but locate the 'hearer' separate from the hearing. Touch: sensations of pressure, temperature, texture—but find the 'toucher' apart from the sensations themselves. Smell, taste if anything is present. In each case, look for the agent behind the sense, and find only the sense operating. Set your intention: 'Today, I will remember that it is merely the senses moving among their objects. I will hold firm to this, even as thought claims otherwise.'
When speaking, practice 'dharayan'—holding firm to the recognition. Before a conversation, remember: words will emerge through this mouth, produced by the speech faculty responding to thoughts and circumstances. 'I' will not construct them. During conversation, notice: sentences form themselves faster than 'you' could possibly assemble them. After speaking, catch the thought 'I said that' and question it: Did I really? Or did speaking happen? Similarly with grasping and releasing—notice the hand reaching, and ask: Who moved it? When opening and closing the eyes becomes conscious (usually only in unusual circumstances), recognize: the blinking mechanism operates. 'I' am the witness of its operation, not the operator.
Review the day with the question: Where did I forget and where did I remember? Recall moments when the illusion of doership was strong—stress situations often reveal this, where 'I' felt responsible and anxious. Recall moments when the recognition was present—when actions flowed without a sense of 'me' doing them. Notice: in which state was there more suffering? In which more ease? This isn't about self-criticism for forgetting—the forgetting is also just happening, not 'your' failure. Simply note the pattern. End with the settling contemplation: 'All day, the senses played among their objects. Speaking happened, grasping happened, seeing happened. And throughout it all, awareness—what I truly am—remained untouched, the still point around which everything moved. Tomorrow the play continues. I will watch, and remember to watch.' Let go into sleep as the ultimate releasing—'I' doesn't sleep; the body sleeps while awareness remains the witnessing space.