क्लेशोऽधिकतरस्तेषामव्यक्तासक्तचेतसाम्।
अव्यक्ता हि गतिर्दुःखं देहवद्भिरवाप्यते।।12.5।।
For those whose minds are attached to the Unmanifested, the struggle is greater; for the Goal, which is the Unmanifest, is attained with difficulty by the embodied ones.
Osho’s Commentary
Why is the path of the formless so difficult, Arjuna? Because the mind itself is a thing of form. The mind thinks in images, in concepts, in forms. To ask the mind to think of the formless is to ask it to commit suicide. The mind cannot grasp the unmanifest. It is like trying to hold the sky in your fist. The very nature of the mind is to define, to limit, to create boundaries. The formless has no boundaries. So when the mind tries to approach it, it feels a great terror, a vertigo, as if it is falling into an abyss. For the embodied soul, for the one who lives through the senses, the path of form is easier. The mind has something to hold onto—a beautiful face of Krishna, a song, a dance. Through this form, it can slowly, gently, dissolve itself in love. The path of the unmanifest is a sudden leap into the void. It requires a different kind of courage. It is a path of will, of tremendous effort. The path of form is a path of love, of effortless surrender. Both reach, but Krishna says to Arjuna, a man of the heart, that the path of the formless is full of pain.