Kartavya is your password to excellence

Kartavya is your password to excellence

The Bhagwad Gita glorifies karma, action. It says we cannot remain inactive even for a second. Everyone is helplessly driven to action. There are three kinds of action. Niyatam karma, obligatory duty, is the best quality of action. We all have duties – to our family, society, country, humanity and to ourselves. We know what we should do. But desire takes us away from our duties. We stray into kamya karma, desire-driven activity. The entire world is chasing after desire. When desires mount to unsustainable levels and they can no longer be fulfilled by legal and ethical methods, we cross the line and perform nishiddha karma, actions prohibited by our own conscience.

Action is fuelled by desire. A musician has a desire to sing, an artist the urge to paint and a businessman to do business. Desire springs from thought. And thought from vasana. Vasana is a deep-rooted interest, inherent leaning, innate passion for a thing. When you act merely because you desire it, you create more such desires in your system. And you are caught in the endless loop of vasana – thought – desire – action – and vasana again.

To break free from this cycle, you need to elevate yourself to kartavya, obligatory duty, the ability to do a thing because you ought to, whether you like it or not. This requires a shift in attitude – from claiming rights and privileges to appreciating the bounty you have been blessed with and developing gratitude for it. Then you look for opportunities to serve, contribute, add value to others. Your mind expands to accommodate the wellbeing of a larger cross-section of people. Kartavya purifies you of existing desires without adding more to your personality.

Desire-driven action agitates the mind. While acting, your mind wanders to the unproductive channels of worry over the past and anxiety for the future. Only the present is under your command. Focus on it and give it your best. Every action then becomes perfect. Success is yours. So, rise above desire. Find fulfilment in the action itself. You will be happy irrespective of the result.

Desire is the greatest obstruction that stands between you and the object of desire. When a corporate executive is obsessed with becoming the CEO, it does not happen. When he drops the desire and just does his job, he gets the position. So drop the fixation with desire. Focus on fulfilling your kartavya to the best of your ability, wholeheartedly. You will meet with serendipitous experiences. The result will be way beyond your imagination. When Albert Einstein was working on the Theory of Relativity, he had no clue he would get the Nobel Prize. While MK Gandhi was struggling for independence from the British, he did not imagine that he would be anointed Mahatma, father of the nation. He only did what had to be done.

As desires reduce, you become a towering personality. There is a meteoric rise in your spiritual level. You no longer want petty, insignificant worldly objects. You rise above name, fame, money, position and all that the world offers. But because you have gained merit, prosperity is showered on you. You become purified of desire. You attain Enlightenment.