How do one's brakes fail in the cycle of life?

 They fail when our senses are not controlled. When the mind throws up a proposition that we know is kinda iffy the intelligence can act as a brake. “Don’t do it, you will regret it.”

If the intelligence fails us then our brakes have failed us and off we go, or more usually, down we go. Once our life is headed downhill, things are only going to get worse unless we use some good intelligence as breaks, or unless we hit rock bottom.

So Krishna urges us to restrain the senses, control the senses, curb the senses, so many different ways of saying “put a brake on it”. How? With good, steady, spiritual intelligence. If we don’t maintain that then like poorly maintained brakes, it will fail us when we need it most.

One who restrains his senses, keeping them under full control, and fixes his consciousness upon Me, is known as a man of steady intelligence. Bg 2.61

As a strong wind sweeps away a boat on the water, even one of the roaming senses on which the mind focuses can carry away a man's intelligence. Bg 2.67

Therefore, O mighty-armed, one whose senses are restrained from their objects is certainly of steady intelligence. Bg 2.68

Thus knowing oneself to be transcendental to the material senses, mind and intelligence, O mighty-armed Arjuna, one should steady the mind by deliberate spiritual intelligence [Krishna consciousness] and thus—by spiritual strength—conquer this insatiable enemy known as lust. Bg 3.43

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