Shloka 24
Kapila’s Conclusion: Limits of Karma and Yoga; Supremacy of Bhakti and Qualification to Receive the Teaching
यदास्य चित्तमर्थेषु समेष्विन्द्रियवृत्तिभि: । न विगृह्णाति वैषम्यं प्रियमप्रियमित्युत ॥ २४ ॥
yadāsya cittam artheṣu sameṣv indriya-vṛttibhiḥ na vigṛhṇāti vaiṣamyaṁ priyam apriyam ity uta
When the exalted devotee’s mind becomes even amid the senses’ activities, he no longer grasps at the difference of agreeable and disagreeable, and thus abides in transcendental equipoise.
The significance of advancement in transcendental knowledge and detachment from material attraction is exhibited in the personality of a highly advanced devotee. For him there is nothing agreeable or disagreeable because he does not act in any way for his personal sense gratification. Whatever he does, whatever he thinks, is for the satisfaction of the Personality of Godhead. Either in the material world or in the spiritual world, his equipoised mind is completely manifested. He can understand that in the material world there is nothing good; everything is bad due to its being contaminated by material nature. The materialists conclusions of good and bad, moral and immoral, etc., are simply mental concoction or sentiment. Actually there is nothing good in the material world. In the spiritual field everything is absolutely good. There is no inebriety in the spiritual varieties. Because a devotee accepts everything in spiritual vision, he is equipoised; that is the symptom of his being elevated to the transcendental position. He automatically attains detachment, vairāgya, then jñāna, knowledge, and then actual transcendental knowledge. The conclusion is that an advanced devotee dovetails himself in the transcendental qualities of the Lord, and in that sense he becomes qualitatively one with the Supreme Personality of Godhead.
FAQs
This verse teaches that spiritual steadiness arises when the mind does not label sense-objects as “pleasant” or “unpleasant,” refusing to cling to preference and aversion.
Kapila instructs Devahuti on the path to liberation: controlling the mind’s bias toward pleasure and pain is a key symptom of inner purification that supports bhakti and freedom from bondage.
Practice noticing sensory triggers without immediately reacting as “like/dislike,” and choose responses aligned with devotion and duty rather than impulse.