the duty is cast on you to make an effort

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Day by Day with Bhagavan________3-1-46 Afternoon (concluded)Mr. Joshi put five questions. I give below the questionsand Bhagavan's answers.Question 1: Should I go on asking `Who am I?' withoutanswering? Who asks whom? Which bhavana (attitude)should be in the mind at the time of enquiry? What is `I' theSelf or the ego?Answer: In the enquiry `Who am I?', `I' is the ego. Thequestion really means, what is the source or origin of thisego? You need not have any bhavana in the mind. All that isrequired is, you must give up the bhavana that you are thebody, of such and such a description, with such and such aname, etc. There is no need to have a bhavana about your realnature. It exists as it always does; it is real and no bhavana.Question 2: I cannot be always engaged in this enquiry,for I have got other work to do, and when I do such work Iforget this quest.Answer: When you do other work, do you cease to exist?You always exist, do you not?Question 3: Without the sense of doership — the sense`I am doing' — work cannot be done.Answer: It can be done. Work without attachment. Workwill go on even better than when you worked with the sensethat you were the doer.Question 4: I don't understand what work I should doand what not.Answer: Don't bother. What is destined as work to bedone by you in this life will be done by you, whether youlike it or not.Question 5: Why should I try to realise? I will emergefrom this state, as I wake up from a dream. We do not makean attempt to get out of a dream during sleep.Answer: In a dream, you have no inkling that it is a dreamand so you don't have the duty of trying to get out of it by youreffort. But in this life you have some intuition, by your sleepexperience, by reading and hearing, that this life is somethinglike a dream, and hence the duty is cast on you to make aneffort and get out of it. However, who wants you to realise theSelf, if you don't want it? If you prefer to be in the dream, stayas you are.With reference to question 4, Mrs. P. C. Desai quotingthe Bhagavad Gita asked Bhagavan, "If (as Arjuna was told)there is a certain work destined to be done by each and weshall eventually do it however much we do not wish to do itor refuse to do it, is there any free will?"Bhagavan said, "It is true that the work meant to bedone by us will be done by us. But it is open to us to be freefrom the joys or pains, pleasant or unpleasant consequencesof the work, by not identifying ourselves with the body orthat which does the work. If you realise your true natureand know that it is not you that does any work, you will beunaffected by the consequences of whatever work the bodymay be engaged in according to destiny or past karma ordivine plan, however you may call it. You are always freeand there is no limitation of that freedom."