Work and Reward.

July 12, 2005

Lord Krishna says in Gita to do one's duty or work without expecting the fruits or reward.It is ok as far as the Lord is concerned.But in the present age will anybody ,there may be exceptions,do a work without expecting any reward?It is difficult to answer as human nature being such it is ridiculous and obnoxious to expect such a great mind from an ordinary mortal.Agreed or not the fact can't be suppressed.Preachers are galore to advise that leaving everything to God will bring protection to the human being.But it is always a debatable point...When one embarks on a spiritual path one has to understand both aspects of leaving everything to God and expecting rewards for his work.Simply following the dictums of the sages won't enlighten anyone.There are innumerable instances in the Puranas that many renowned characters hv prayed for boons and in turn they offer sacrifices.Dasaratha conducted Putrakameshti Yaga for getting progeny.Ravana did penance to acquire lot of boons.Arjuna

prayed Siva to get the Pasupatastra.Viswamitra did tapas to get lot of powers so as to make him a Brahmarishy.All these are not going against the Teachings of Sri Krishna in Gita.Don't expect any rewards for what you hv done?

Coming to the present age people flock temples with prayers to reward them for the work done.How many go to temples with prayers to see Him only in everything and expecting no benefits or blessings in the work they hv undertaken?We do poojas and all such things not with the sole aim of leading us to Him but to help us in solving our problems in work or in matters that are purely mundane.If such things are not answered in our favour frustration comes.Frustrations increases with increasing urbanisation and modernisation.Frustration is the direct result when the work does not yield results.A further frustration arises when our success is not appreciated by our friends and particularly by our family members.If loneliness is physical,

frustration is psychological.Is there a cure for frustration or for loneliness?

There was a famous scientist who by dint of hard work earned a great name

but unfortunately struck by a strange disease he lost his mobility and speech but not his thinking.He spoke thru a computer which was specially designed to synthesize his voice.A lady knowing fully well his disabilities preferred to marry him and they got three children .Surely it was no easy task to be a wife of such an invalid,especially when he was a famous scientist.That lady deserves appreciation.

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The support she gave him physically is indescribable.It requires a big heart to put oneself thru ordeals and be in attendence on him all his waking hours.She

did it for years and decades.After all these trials and tribulations, she began to feel frustrated becoz she did all the work and the credit came to him.Fame came to him becoz of his findings as a scientist.However her frustration arose from the fact that her work was not rewarded.So eventually she decided to leave him and left.It is not rational to expect rewards for work not done by us.

Frustration comes by failure.For one who is serious,there is no failure that can't be rectified by learning and training.If one refuses to learn and meets with frustration,he can't consider himself rational.Patient learning converts any failure into success as we hv seen in the number of industrial giants or great people in any other field.Then there are people who expect results for talents they don't have.They too are frustrated.That is not frustration but failure to learn.Frustration also comes by comparing oneself with others whose talents are different and greater.That is not frustration but jealousy.That is not permissble.All work yields rewards.To expect reward that are not one's due is not right.Work has a personality.It never fails to reward one who takes interest in it.I goes further.When his attention is complete,the work returns to hm more than his due.In the livesof successful people we often hear 'I don't know anything .I simply worked.I did not know all these

things were ever possible.What happened baffles me.I don't know where they have come from'.The personality of work rewards a sincere worker who offers unselfish toil to it, a reward that is beyond the scope of that work.It comes from its infinity,which is its spirituality.

Now coming to the point of intrepreting the Teachings of Lord Krishna He also stresses the fact that He never means when He advocates that you shuld not expect any rewads for the work done.A pious prayer to Him for a selfish end may not be a sin,but it is not meritorious as a prayer offered for common weal.An action becomes sacred to the extent the ego gets obliterated.Partaking of food is an obligatory work.Cooking the daily food has therefore to go on as a matter of course.But one ought to think of and provide for the hungry and the needy as much as for oneself.He who is exclusive and self centred in the procurement of food and in the partaking of it, is a sinful man.What he eats is nothing but sin.Dasaratha prayed for progeny in his anxiety to hv a heir to the throne after him.That was a reasonable desire and there is nothing sinful in that.Ravana wanted boons for evil designs and so it is sinful.Viswamithra wanted to become powerful like Vasishta not for his own good

but to help the humanity though in the process he had many pitfalls as his aim firstly was to overcome Vasishta but subsequent events proved he acted as a benefactor and so he too cannot be termed as a sinner.Arjuna wanted Pasupathastra to defeat his enemies and without proper weapons it is difficult to win powerful enemies and circumstances forced him to obtain the same and hence he too can't be dubbed as a sinner.

Having come into this world if a man does not do what is expected of him,his advent amouts to nothing.As a drone he drags on a wretched existence.He is no asset but a burden and dead weight to the society.Instead of fulfilling,he frustrates the divine plan and purpose of Nature.Man ought to be a fulfilment and not a failure in life.Of course success or failure is subject to theory of Karma.But there is a speciality in the functioning of mind.When it impinges on the external world with the aid of senses or even without their aid,activities are on the increase.But when it revolves back on the Self its activities automatically vanish.The river is active until it reaches the ocean.On merging in it,its functioning is over.Likewise the functioning of the mind is over in its being resolved in Atman.So what Lord Krishna emphasises is that do your duty but without attachment of the fruits.Absence of attachment leads to the pacification of the mind.Work and rest go on side by

side.Calmness of mind is not for him who neglects duty.Rewards will automatically come uncalled for when the mind gets stilled by remembering Him in whatever work one performs and ultimately enlightenment will dawn that what one has done is not for any reward but a way of surrender to Him and the realisation slighting or allowing godly gifts go to waste ,amounts to slighting God Himself.So Krishna is absolutely right when He says that doing one's duty with detachment and as an offering to Him,fruits of action will come back to the devotee in the form of His Grace and awards and hence His emphasis on surrender to Him unconditionally.That will lead one to enlightenment and bliss.

Hare Krishna,

agraman

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