Restriction
These days, we have almost unlimited career options to pursue. Most of them can be accomplished by most people. This leads us to a very difficult situation - we don't know if we are doing what we are "meant" to do.
The biggest freedom we can have is accepting the fact that we don't need to know what the best occupation for us is. Yes, we need to do something to take care of the practical aspects of our lives, like food, mortgage, etc., but I don't think that's where most of us are struggling with. Most of us struggle within, wondering why we are doing what we are doing. And especially when we see someone else "succeeding" in the world, and if that someone else was seen as somehow inferior to us in the past, then we feel even worse about our own condition. What a pathetic conditioning of the mind!
To get away from this unnecessary pain, the only choice we can make is to fully accept our present situation. We can even restrict ourselves to whatever we are doing right now. If we don't like that, then we can change it, but it's best to stick with just one thing and not keep running after the "next" thing to do. Once we start doing whatever we do with devotion, with no complaining and with no thought about the results or the fruits of our action, then we have liberated ourselves from the grip of the ego. The work absorbs us totally and there is no room for useless thinking like comparison, competition, etc.,
This Awareness has arisen in me, so pain has reduced. Otherwise, I would have felt negative, and it would have even propelled me to take action to become "better" than others. This is the force that has run majority of my living years! It was absorbed unconsciously and the thought pattern is still strong. But now the light of Consciousness is shining on it.
So what do I do? Just restrict myself to what I am doing now and do it very well. I have to admit that what I am doing now is a relatively easy job than what I had to do to get my Master's degree. Now I do my job as a way to dissolve myself, not to enhance/empower the ego. I am alright to even "fail" in trying some ideas at job - just the act of doing something to make the work better is an end in itself. Results and fruits are secondary.
The biggest freedom we can have is accepting the fact that we don't need to know what the best occupation for us is. Yes, we need to do something to take care of the practical aspects of our lives, like food, mortgage, etc., but I don't think that's where most of us are struggling with. Most of us struggle within, wondering why we are doing what we are doing. And especially when we see someone else "succeeding" in the world, and if that someone else was seen as somehow inferior to us in the past, then we feel even worse about our own condition. What a pathetic conditioning of the mind!
To get away from this unnecessary pain, the only choice we can make is to fully accept our present situation. We can even restrict ourselves to whatever we are doing right now. If we don't like that, then we can change it, but it's best to stick with just one thing and not keep running after the "next" thing to do. Once we start doing whatever we do with devotion, with no complaining and with no thought about the results or the fruits of our action, then we have liberated ourselves from the grip of the ego. The work absorbs us totally and there is no room for useless thinking like comparison, competition, etc.,
This Awareness has arisen in me, so pain has reduced. Otherwise, I would have felt negative, and it would have even propelled me to take action to become "better" than others. This is the force that has run majority of my living years! It was absorbed unconsciously and the thought pattern is still strong. But now the light of Consciousness is shining on it.
So what do I do? Just restrict myself to what I am doing now and do it very well. I have to admit that what I am doing now is a relatively easy job than what I had to do to get my Master's degree. Now I do my job as a way to dissolve myself, not to enhance/empower the ego. I am alright to even "fail" in trying some ideas at job - just the act of doing something to make the work better is an end in itself. Results and fruits are secondary.
Comments
Post a Comment