A core teaching · devotional in mood · a little context helps
“A divided mind settles when both thought and feeling rest in the divine.”
Fix your mind on me alone. Place your discerning mind in me, and you will live in me beyond doubt.
The verse in reading order — each Sanskrit word with its meaning beneath. Tap a word to focus on it.
Read literallyin me · alone · mind · place · in me · discerning mind · fix · you will dwell · in me · alone · therefore · afterward · not · doubt
Keep your mind and discerning mind fixed on Krishna. Then you will abide in him, with no doubt about the result.
Krishna speaks this verse, on the battlefield of Kurukshetra, in the chapter titled "Bhakti Yoga" (The Yoga of Devotion).
Verse 8 sits in Chapter 12 of the Bhagavad Gita — Bhakti Yoga, "The Yoga of Devotion". The chapter has 20 verses in total.
A cook making a festival meal for forty guests keeps her attention on the stove, and the dishes come out right. Krishna asks Arjuna to give both his mind and his judgement to him in the same way.
Did you like this verse?
Mind and buddhi both on Krishna, he says, and Arjuna will live in him without doubt.
What this verse means
Keep your mind and discerning mind fixed on Krishna. Then you will abide in him, with no doubt about the result.
Context & commentary
After promising rescue to those devoted to him, Krishna now gives the inner method: place both mind and discernment on him alone.
What it looks like today
A cook making a festival meal for forty guests keeps her attention on the stove, and the dishes come out right. Krishna asks Arjuna to give both his mind and his judgement to him in the same way.
“Single-pointed devotion quiets inner conflict and gives the heart a place to rest.”
Explore related themes: bhakti (69 verses), manas (49 verses), buddhi (26 verses)