Do you find deep meaning in your work?

[ranjana]

Just still the mind and the curtain raises and one finds it has always been there *The Garden of Eden*
Love & rgds

hi zenzero! yes i see now the answer is there already in my question, meditate! dont stop meditating no matter how busy... but this busy-body lifestyle full of grades and long hours, submerged in a sea where everyone has problems and complaints all the time... it just seems to make it so difficult to maintain awareness of the pure moment.... how do you keep your attention on that during long days full of mental activity?

 

[ranjana]

Ranjana, do you think the world's needs will go away when you are enlightened? What has given you that impression? Will the need of people to eat go away when you are enlightened? Even if all the world were enlightened, would the need of people to eat go away?

I think you are mistaking the word "need" for the word "problem". That is why you are thinking of "fixing" needs.

yes, i am putting the word problem in for the word need... i dont think people's needs will go away ever; a human body needs to eat, needs to sleep, needs oxygen, etc. but if everyone on earth lived with an acute awareness of what they needed and what they didnt, then many many 'problems' would seem to resolve themselves... so if we worked only to supply what we needed, then we would work a lot less.

in fact i do think that if i were to snap out of illusion and become 'enlightened' that i would still be able to provide for my needs and those who were dependent on me, but would not be bound into thinking that i as a person could fill the needs of the needy and that would make the world a better place.

If there were more enlightenment on earth, i think its fair to say there would be less illusionary thinking, and as a result less perceived problems.

 

[Sunstone]

yes, i am putting the word problem in for the word need... i dont think people's needs will go away ever; a human body needs to eat, needs to sleep, needs oxygen, etc. but if everyone on earth lived with an acute awareness of what they needed and what they didnt, then many many 'problems' would seem to resolve themselves... so if we worked only to supply what we needed, then we would work a lot less.

in fact i do think that if i were to snap out of illusion and become 'enlightened' that i would still be able to provide for my needs and those who were dependent on me, but would not be bound into thinking that i as a person could fill the needs of the needy and that would make the world a better place.

If there were more enlightenment on earth, i think its fair to say there would be less illusionary thinking, and as a result less perceived problems.

Sounds to me like you have found your life's work.

I see now that you have asked two questions in one. First, you have asked the relatively simple to answer (but arduous to realize) question of how to find personally meaningful work, work you can be passionate about, if you will. That has been the question I have been addressing.

Yet, in the second place, you have asked the far more difficult to answer question of how we can have an awareness of life as it really is while our minds are busy with work and perhaps distracted by that work. It is extremely difficult to do that, isn't it? And yet, it is perhaps much more important to do that than it is to immediately resolve the first question.

I agree with you, by the way, that if we were enlightened, we would only want what we really needed.

 

[ranjana]

Sounds to me like you have found your life's work.

:namaste i hope youre right! i suppose with that as the underlying current, any form of work is fine, as long as it suits me and doesnt sap all my energy away from recognizing the underlying current!

Yet, in the second place, you have asked the far more difficult to answer question of how we can have an awareness of life as it really is while our minds are busy with work and perhaps distracted by that work. It is extremely difficult to do that, isn't it? And yet, it is perhaps much more important to do that than it is to immediately resolve the first question.

YES! thank you for extracting the meaning! this is what i am asking. it IS difficult to do, and i appreciate the point about its importance.

So it is like a paradox to me, one the one hand, it is so difficult; attention gets buried in the mundane, ego gets louder, clarity seems to get clouded... its takes such a strength to remember that i am 'the knower', the awareness, not the mind/body/thoughts...

and yet it is so simple too... just meditate, just cut the identification with every return to the awareness of space, of which i am, of which there are no conditions or boundaries. hmmmm i say its easier said than done!!!

 

[zenzero]

Friend Zenzero,

hi zenzero! yes i see now the answer is there already in my question, meditate! dont stop meditating no matter how busy... but this busy-body lifestyle full of grades and long hours, submerged in a sea where everyone has problems and complaints all the time... it just seems to make it so difficult to maintain awareness of the pure moment.... how do you keep your attention on that during long days full of mental activity?

Thats a real time question.
Personally went to the best school and colleges and never took exams or grades seriously except the consciousness/awareness. Today though all my mates are big shots like VP at Intel, CEOs, MDs, etc. etc. in various companies in US, Autralia, UK, Nigeria, India etc. just barely make a living. BUT am a satisfied person as take this life as an opportunity to merge with the whole with minimum of lives hereafter.
Love & rgds

 

[ranjana]

thankyou, zenzero- my motivation for going back to school is so that i dont have to make a living as a labourer as i get older, and hopefully to have more opportunity for higher income without having to run a landscaping business, which i have no inclination to do.

i think i was getting confused, in thinking that because i am going back to school to become more professional in my general area, that this was going to make my work become more meaningful to me. i must admit the goal seems to be simply to work in greater comfort! I dont need to get caught up with assigning meaning in it other than that. Meaning exists irrelevant of our jobs! and i think i was experiencing that maybe even our jobs can occlude our perception of the deepest meaning!

Thank you for your strength and sharing it!

 

[Sunstone]

...attention gets buried in the mundane, ego gets louder, clarity seems to get clouded...

Some years ago, I was very involved in the business world, Ranjana, eventually owning and operating a tiny company that employed 13 people. I lost my ambition to succeed at business, however, when I saw how difficult -- even painful -- it was for me to reconcile the demands of the business world with the quiet, attentive, meditative life I needed.

You have put it so well: "attention gets buried in the mundane, ego gets louder, clarity seems to get clouded". I am not saying that everyone would find it as difficult as I did to reconcile those things, but only that for me it was in the end not worth the trouble.

It took, as you put it, "immense strength". And even though I was much younger back then, and had much more energy, the only thing that kept me going was my love for my employees. Out of love for them as individuals, I felt a duty to provide them with a decent and dignified work environment and a living wage. However, even that was not enough to motivate me in the end. I burnt out.

Now, without claiming I ever managed to completely, seemlessly reconcile the demands of business with my needs, I can recall one or two things that helped. First, was the realization that the ego is like a tool -- it has its proper uses. It is when we misuse it that it causes unnecessary disconnection and suffering. So, for instance, it is very hard -- I would say impossible -- to do one's accounting without involving the ego. You might try that sometime and see if I'm right. But the point is that in whatever work you do, I think you must pay very close attention to the ego and how to use it to further your work. It is not something to be fought or condemned, but something to be cautiously and appropriately used.

Second, I can recall something which might seem very insignificant at first, but which helped immensely. I would do my most important work at odd hours. For instance, there was a time when I would go to sleep at about 5 or 6 in the evening, wake up around 1 or 2 in the morning, be in the office by 3 or so. That allowed me to concentrate on the most important work and finish it before anyone else came into the office or called to distract me. By the time the day started for most people, I had most of my taxing work done and could better deal with the inane demands of the day. I would then leave work around 2 or 3 in the afternoon, having accomplished what needed to be done. The point is to look for little techiques like that one -- don't just focus on the big issues like how to deal with your ego. Instead, find the little things that can make big differences in how well you manage the big things.

It has been many years since I was heavily involved in the business world, and I have forgotten most of what I once knew about how to deal with it. I apologize for my poor memory. But I think the message you need to hear is that one can at least go pretty far in reconciling the business world to one's spiritual needs -- provided one has the energy, strength and motivation to do it. I hope I have recalled things well enough not to mislead you, but you will need to test these things for yourself and find if they work for you.

 

[Sunstone]

i think i was getting confused, in thinking that because i am going back to school to become more professional in my general area, that this was going to make my work become more meaningful to me. i must admit the goal seems to be simply to work in greater comfort! I dont need to get caught up with assigning meaning in it other than that. Meaning exists irrelevant of our jobs!

This is hugely insightful -- and liberating, I'll bet. Frubals!

 

[Jeremy Mason]

To me work is an extension of who I am. My ability to work with others in a proactive and friendly manner provides me with the respect and financial where with all I need to assist God through my example. By living life at work dynamically and resourcefully, I encourage and inspire others to do the same.

This feeling of accomplishment caries over after I get off work and I therefore continue my grateful service to God and others as Jesus did 2000 years ago.

The problem that I face from time to time is when others fail to up-hold the work load on my days off and dwindle the hard earn resources I stockpile in my work week. This slackers mantra is the cancer that when unabated, throws me off my rhythm and impacts my attitude and overall output.

Which bring me to my conclusion. Managers need to recognize these factors and with swift and deliberate resolve, coordinate and regulate work levels consistently. Without work load integrity, the good employees get discouraged at the slackers benefit which festers conflicts that strain morale and compromises product and the bottom line.

 

[9-10ths_Penguin]

thank you for your reply; the part i get 'caught' on, is that I cannot ever be satisfied if i try to satisfy the world. The world is one big story of loss and suffering, so to try and work towards fixing all its deficiencies from outside myself seems an impossible and illusory task.

It probably is, if you look at it that way. Personally, I try to focus on the things I can do rather than the things I can't.

I think the best expression of this is the Serenity Prayer attributed to Reinhold Niebuhr:

God, give us grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed, courage to change the things that should be changed, and the wisdom to distinguish the one from the other.

So i have concluded that the only place I can work on correcting a deficiency is within myself, within my vision, within my understanding. Basically my highest aspiration is to be free from illusion of a divisive mind, always seperating and judging, creating stories that do not serve at all.

Interesting. To what end, though?

How do people still maintain a higher consciousness while leading a very busy mundane life? Does anyone know what i mean by this?

Not completely, but is part of the answer to find a job that inspires passion in you?

 

[ranjana]

I
Interesting. To what end, though?

Similar to what Sunstone was pointing out above, not to 'kill the ego', because obviously ego keeps us alive and functioning as human beings, and is a tool that allows us to know what things are and learn how to use them. I just mean everything that an ego tells us beyond these types of things, things that make this better than that, her better than him, this person stupid, this person worthy of obsession, all the fault finding within and without, that serves no purpose. i call all this stuff 'stories' that without them, we could still be completely functioning in this world, and i think better off.

This is what im refferring to as the 'devisive mind'. I know mind should know the difference between stove and sink. But the story ends there and does not cause grief. When mind takes hold of our functioning and we start sufferring because of what other people are 'doing to us' or the circumstances we find ourselves in, then we cause ourselves grief.

Not completely, but is part of the answer to find a job that inspires passion in you?

I think that must be part of the puzzle... the job has to suit you. Otherwise you fight your nature every day you go to work, and it becomes more uncomfortable than it needs to be. So even better to find it interesting, that would be a wonderful thing. I just think most people do identify themselves with what they do... but without this work, this job, you would still be you, as perfect and meaningful as with it.

Im definitely thinking out loud, or whatever the equivalent to writing is. I started this thread quite confused but now i feel certain ways of looking at my question resonate with me, and i feel much easier about it!!