The Gita’s Simple Advice When You Want to Run Away
Riya Kumari | Mar 12, 2025, 20:24 IST
( Image credit : Times Life Bureau )
You know that feeling when your inbox is screaming, your love life is a disaster, and your last functioning brain cell is Googling "how to fake your own death and move to a remote island"? Yeah. Me too. Sometimes, life is just too much. The rent is high, the people are annoying, and responsibilities keep showing up like an ex who just doesn’t get the hint. So naturally, the best solution seems to be escape. Quit the job, leave the city, move to a cabin in the woods where your only concern is whether your WiFi can stream Netflix.
There comes a moment when the weight of it all—the expectations, the disappointments, the sheer unpredictability of life—makes you want to disappear. Not in a dramatic, running-into-the-mountains kind of way (though let’s be honest, that has its appeal), but in a quiet, calculated exit. Maybe quitting that job, leaving that relationship, abandoning that dream that’s not working out. A fresh start. A clean slate. It feels logical. If life is messy, why not leave the mess behind? If something feels unbearable, isn’t the smart thing to walk away? And yet—here’s the uncomfortable truth—the thing you want to run from will follow you. Because it was never just the situation. It was what the situation awakened in you. Which is exactly what the Bhagavad Gita tells us. Not in some abstract, spiritual riddle, but in a way that forces you to pause and reconsider everything you think you know about struggle, escape, and real peace.
1. Why You Want to Run
Let’s talk about Arjuna. He’s standing on a battlefield, looking at everything he’s up against—people he doesn’t want to fight, responsibilities he doesn’t want to carry, a future he didn’t ask for. And his first instinct? I don’t want to do this. I want out. And Krishna, his charioteer and the voice of wisdom, doesn’t comfort him with, “Yeah, I get it, this is too much, just leave.” Instead, he gives him a truth so piercing that it applies to every one of us: You cannot find peace by avoiding what unsettles you.
Arjuna thinks his problem is the war in front of him, but Krishna makes it clear—the real war is within. His fear, his doubt, his resistance to what life is asking of him. The battlefield is just the backdrop. And isn’t that always the case? We think our struggle is about the job, the relationship, the external circumstances. But it’s not. It’s about our discomfort with the unpredictability of life, our attachment to a version of reality that no longer exists, our fear of what will happen if we stay and face what is.
2. Escape vs. Liberation
The Gita doesn’t tell you to stay in situations that destroy you. It’s not asking you to endure suffering for the sake of it. What it does say is this: Leaving something isn’t the same as being free from it. You can walk away from a job and still carry the same frustration in the next one.
You can leave a relationship and still find yourself in the same patterns with someone new. You can move to a new city, but if your mind is restless, you won’t find peace there either. Running away changes your location. Liberation changes you. And that’s what Krishna is getting at: The real battle isn’t about where you are. It’s about what you refuse to face within yourself.
3. So What Do You Do Instead?
Krishna’s advice to Arjuna is sharp and direct: Act. Engage. Do what is yours to do, without attachment to the result. That’s it. Not “fight because you have to win.” Not “stay because leaving is weak.” Not “accept suffering as your fate.”
Just this: Show up fully, and let go of the idea that peace comes from controlling the outcome. Because that’s what makes us want to run in the first place, isn’t it? The exhaustion of trying to force life to go a certain way. The fear that if we stay, we’ll lose something—respect, stability, love, ourselves. But what if we lose more by leaving too soon?
4. When Leaving Is the Right Choice
Sometimes, leaving is necessary. There are battles that aren’t worth fighting, places that no longer hold life for us. But before you go, ask yourself: Am I leaving because it’s time, or because I don’t want to face what’s hard?
Is this decision coming from fear or from clarity?
Will I truly be free, or will this follow me wherever I go?
Because real peace isn’t about where you are. It’s about who you are wherever you go.
The Hard Truth Krishna Wants You to Know
Arjuna wanted out. Krishna didn’t let him. Not because he wanted him to suffer, but because he knew running wasn’t the answer. And the same is true for us. The urge to escape will come, again and again. But before you act on it, ask yourself—what are you really trying to leave behind? Because if it’s something within you, no plane ticket, no resignation letter, no new beginning will set you free. Only facing it will.
1. Why You Want to Run
Rock Climb
( Image credit : Pexels )
Let’s talk about Arjuna. He’s standing on a battlefield, looking at everything he’s up against—people he doesn’t want to fight, responsibilities he doesn’t want to carry, a future he didn’t ask for. And his first instinct? I don’t want to do this. I want out. And Krishna, his charioteer and the voice of wisdom, doesn’t comfort him with, “Yeah, I get it, this is too much, just leave.” Instead, he gives him a truth so piercing that it applies to every one of us: You cannot find peace by avoiding what unsettles you.
Arjuna thinks his problem is the war in front of him, but Krishna makes it clear—the real war is within. His fear, his doubt, his resistance to what life is asking of him. The battlefield is just the backdrop. And isn’t that always the case? We think our struggle is about the job, the relationship, the external circumstances. But it’s not. It’s about our discomfort with the unpredictability of life, our attachment to a version of reality that no longer exists, our fear of what will happen if we stay and face what is.
2. Escape vs. Liberation
Leave
( Image credit : Pexels )
The Gita doesn’t tell you to stay in situations that destroy you. It’s not asking you to endure suffering for the sake of it. What it does say is this: Leaving something isn’t the same as being free from it. You can walk away from a job and still carry the same frustration in the next one.
You can leave a relationship and still find yourself in the same patterns with someone new. You can move to a new city, but if your mind is restless, you won’t find peace there either. Running away changes your location. Liberation changes you. And that’s what Krishna is getting at: The real battle isn’t about where you are. It’s about what you refuse to face within yourself.
3. So What Do You Do Instead?
Outcome
( Image credit : Pexels )
Krishna’s advice to Arjuna is sharp and direct: Act. Engage. Do what is yours to do, without attachment to the result. That’s it. Not “fight because you have to win.” Not “stay because leaving is weak.” Not “accept suffering as your fate.”
Just this: Show up fully, and let go of the idea that peace comes from controlling the outcome. Because that’s what makes us want to run in the first place, isn’t it? The exhaustion of trying to force life to go a certain way. The fear that if we stay, we’ll lose something—respect, stability, love, ourselves. But what if we lose more by leaving too soon?
4. When Leaving Is the Right Choice
Nature
( Image credit : Pexels )
Sometimes, leaving is necessary. There are battles that aren’t worth fighting, places that no longer hold life for us. But before you go, ask yourself: Am I leaving because it’s time, or because I don’t want to face what’s hard?
Is this decision coming from fear or from clarity?
Will I truly be free, or will this follow me wherever I go?
Because real peace isn’t about where you are. It’s about who you are wherever you go.