Now, here the word yogam is also explained. What sort of yoga Kṛṣṇa is recommending? Mayy āsakta-manāḥ: keeping the mind always attached to Kṛṣṇa, this yoga system. This Kṛṣṇa consciousness is yoga system. At the present day, they are concentrating their mind on something void, impersonal, according to their own prescription. The real process is to concentrate the mind on something. But that something, if we make it void, it is very difficult to concentrate our mind in that way.
That is also explained in the Bhagavad-gītā, in the Twelfth Chapter: kleśo 'dhikataras teṣām avyaktāsakta-cetasām (BG 12.5). Those who are trying to meditate on something impersonal and void, their trouble is greater than those who are meditating on the Supreme Person. This is explained. Why? Avyaktā hi gatir duḥkhaṁ dehavadbhir avāpyate (BG 12.5). We cannot concentrate our mind (on) something impersonal.
If you think of your friend, if you think of your father, mother or somebody whom you love, you can continue such thinking for hours together. But if you have no objective to fix up your mind, then it is very difficult. But people are being taught to concentrate on something void and impersonal.
So in reply to that mode of yoga, Kṛṣṇa is directly speaking here, mayy āsakta-manāḥ. If you try to concentrate your mind on the form of Kṛṣṇa, so beautiful . . . He's enjoying with Rādhārāṇī and His associates. Then, mayy āsakta-manāḥ pārtha yogam, if you practice this yoga, mad-āśrayaḥ, yuñjan mad-āśrayaḥ (BG 7.1) You have to practice this yoga, at the same time, you have to take shelter of Kṛṣṇa. Mad-āśrayaḥ. Āśrayaḥ means "under My protection." This is called surrender.
If you go to a friend in a difficult position and you surrender to your friend, "My dear friend, you are so great, so powerful, so influential. I am in this great danger. So I surrender unto you. You please give me protection . . ." So you can do that to Kṛṣṇa. Here in the material world, if you surrender to a person, however very big he may be, he may refuse. He may say: "Well, I am unable to give you protection."
That is the natural reply. If you are in danger and if you go even to your intimate friend, "Please give me protection," he will hesitate, because his power is very limited. He'll first of all think that, "If I give protection to this person, whether my interest will not be jeopardized?" He'll think like that, because his potency is limited.
But Kṛṣṇa is so nice that He's so powerful, He's so opulent . . . He declares in the Bhagavad-gītā, everyone, sarva-dharmān parityajya mām ekaṁ śaraṇaṁ vraja (BG 18.66): "You leave aside everything. You simply surrender unto Me." And what is the result? The result is ahaṁ tvāṁ sarva-pāpebhyo mokṣayiṣyāmi: "I shall get you released from all kinds of reaction of your sinful life."
This material world, our activities are all sinful activities. There is action and reaction. Whatever you are doing, there is action and reaction. Even there is good reaction, still it is sinful. Still it is sinful. Just like according to Vedic literature, pious activities, the result of pious activities . . . Janmaīśvarya-śruta-śrībhiḥ (SB 1.8.26). Suppose you are not acting anything sinful in this life, you are very pious in every respect. You are charitable, you are benevolent, everything is all right. But Bhagavad-gītā says that it is karma-bandhana. If you give in charity somebody, say, some amount of money, you'll get that money back four times, five times or ten times more in your next life. That is a fact. So Vaiṣṇava philosophy says that this is also sinful. Why sinful? Because you have to take your birth to receive that compound interest. That is sinful.