In our previous post, we talked about how the Yogi, through continuous practice is able to remove all traces of desire and restrain all his senses with his mind. The next Sloka describes how such a resolute Yogi remains firm in his conviction…
शनैः शनैरुपरमेद्बुद्ध्या धृतिगृहीतया ।
आत्मसंस्थं मनः कृत्वा न किंचिदपि चिन्तयेत् ॥६- २५॥
shanaiH shanairuparamed.h bud.hdhyaa dhR^itigR^ihiitayaa .
aatmasa.nsthaM manaH kR^itvaa na ki.nchidapi chintayet.h .. 6.25..
Through gradual practice the yogi should attain calmness and fixing his mind on God using his reason and being firm in his path, he should think of nothing else.
shanaiH shanaiH – through gradual practice : uparamed.h – should attain tranquility: dhR^itigR^ihiitayaa bud.hdhyaa – becoming firm using his intellect : manaH – mind : aatmasa.nsthaM kR^itvaa - focussed on God, within himself : ki.nchidapi na chintayet.h – and thinking of nothing else.
The yogi is told here that gaining control of the mind is a gradual process. 
Although the yogi tries to focus his mind on God, it keeps wandering and thinks about the worldly objects. The yogi has to gradually bring back his mind to thoughts of God. He has to constantly try and be firm in his path. When a small child is running around the house and picks up a dangerous object, say a knife, the mother tries to stop it by cajoling and coaxing it. If she does not succeed she tries to distract it or explain to it or finally punish it. The child also keeps going back to the same knife every time. Similarly the mind has to be coaxed and cajoled or even forced not to deviate and the yogi should bring it back to the right track.
How does the yogi try and focus his mind on God? Every time his mind deviates to something else, he should realize that all that is not God and saying thus, he can bring his mind back to God. Over time, he should also negate the process itself. He should get rid of the feeling that he is meditating on God and thus he should become one with God. This is the ultimate stage where “Nothing else matters” to him because he thinks of nothing else but God. In this stage there is no process of meditation and there is no one who is meditating, because he is himself God. When he becomes totally absorbed then even the thought that he is meditating will not be there. This is the meaning of “na kinchidapi chintayeth”.
Once a woman came home and shouted to her husband, “Pack your bags! I won the lottery!” “Should I pack for warm or cold weather?” asked her husband. “It doesn’t really matter, so long as you get out of this house in an hour!” This is the nature of desire for worldly objects! It is such that it turns even a husband against a wife, a friend against a friend and makes a person extremely selfish.
On the other hand, when we perform actions with the understanding that it is God who is present everywhere, it makes our actions just and unbiased. We do not act selfishly, because we do not think of ourselves as different from anybody. We will not fear that somebody might take away something because we see don’t see them as different from us. If one can perform all actions keeping in mind that God is present everywhere, only then, the same thoughts persist while meditating as well. When we truly understand this, only then we would be able to remain established in God without thinking of anything else – then we reach the stage that “Nothing else Matters!”.
Good info, thanks for the post!