BG 5.23

Before giving up this present body, if one is able to tolerate the urges of the material senses and check the force of desire and anger, he is well situated and is happy in this world.

5.23. He, whose pleasure, delight and again light are just within-O son of Prtha ! he attains the supreme Yoga, himself becoming the Brahman.

5.23 He who, before he leaves his body, learns to surmount the promptings of desire and anger is a saint and is happy.

5.23 Saknoti etc. It is not easy to accomplish this; [for], if this force of wrath and desire, hard to bear is endured till the last moment of the body, not for a moment alone-then is the total Bliss achievement.

5.23 When a man is able to withstand, i.e., to control the impulses of emotions like desire and anger by his longing for the experience of self, he is released 'here itself from the body,' i.e., even during the state when he is practising the means for release, he gains the capacity for experiencing the self. But he becomes blessed by the experience and gets immersed in the bliss of the self only after the fall of the body (at the end of his Prarabdha or operative Karma). [The implication is that in this system there is no Jivan-Mukti or complete liberation even when the body is alive. Only the state of Sthita-prajna or of 'one of steady wisdom' can be attained by an embodied Jiva.]

5.23 Yah saknoti, one who can, is able to; sodhum, withstand; iha eva, here itself, while alive; prak, before; sarira-vimoksanat, departing from the body, till death-. Death is put as a limit because the impulse of desire and anger is certanily inevitable for a living person. For this impulse has got infinite sources. One should not relax until his death. That is the idea. Kama, desire, is the hankering, thirst, with regard to a coveted object-of an earlier experience, and which is a source of pleasure-when it comes within the range of the senses, or is heard of or remembered. And krodha, anger, is that repulsion one has against what are adverse to oneself and are sources of sorrow, when they are seen, heard of or remembered. That impulse (veda) which has those desire and anger as its source (udbhava) is kama-krodha-udbhava-vegah. The impulse arising from desire is a kind of mental agitation, and has the signs of horripilation, joyful eyes, face, etc. The impulse of anger has the signs of trembling of body, perspiration, bitting of lips, red eyes, etc. He who is able to withstand that impulse arising from desire and anger, sah narah, that man; is yuktah, a yogi; and sukhi, is happy, in this world. What kind of a person, being established in Brahman, attains Brahman? The Lord says:

5.23 He who is able, even here, before he is released from the body, to bear the impulse generated by desire and wrath, he is a Yogin (competent for self-realisation); he is the happy man.

5.23 One who can withstand here itself-before departing from the body-the impulse arising from desire and anger, that man is a yogi; he is happy.