Is Your Job Quietly Stealing Your Life?
Questioner: My question is related to this 30th chapter, “No trophies, just play.” So here, like I read this: “Externally you might be defined by possessions or successes. Internally you must remain complete irrespective of the state of your body, mind, bank balance, or reputation.”
So my question is, even from yesterday’s session which I attended and which is relatable to this, that yesterday you asked us to be minding both the ways — *parmarthik tāl and vyavahārik tāl. So how to be in that state? Because for me, whenever I do something, I just flow into it and I want to be that way only, because I want to be free, like I don’t want to think about anything else.
Acharya Prashant: That has to be the background of all actions. That is something that has to be unconditionally remembered, like a silent cushive, that has to be remembered in a very passive way. Just as if they are clicking us, right? I’m there, the person next to me is there, but what remains constantly present is this (pointing to the books) in every single picture, though we never notice. The person standing here keeps changing but this remains continuously present, right? So this is the background that has to be present in all our pictures, and the pictures will keep changing.
At one moment you are a worker, another moment you are a competitor, third moment you are related to someone, fourth moment you are somebody. So the picture keeps changing. The person sitting here keeps changing — it could be a boss, it could be an actor, it could be a husband, it could be a mother, somebody. So all this is variable. But
Behind the variable is the invariable, the timeless. And that has to be remembered very silently, very passively, not in a loud way, not like a jap, not like somebody’s name, not like a worded statement, but just as the very ground of consciousness.
If I’m awake, there is something that I remember, and that must not be forgotten, that’s love. Getting it? And what is that? That is what is the parmarthik tāl. Crudely speaking, what does that background translate into in a crude way? “Who am I? I just woke up. What is this day for? Why must I spend my time in this versus that?”
Whereas the questions in the foreground are, “I have chosen this work. How to do it in the best possible way?” But the background question must always be, “Why at all must I be engaged in this?” And the camera that you have must never totally blur away the background.
We focus so much on what is in the foreground that the background is totally wished away, blurred and lost.
Questioner: Acharya Ji, when I start thinking about the background thing, then I don’t feel like what I’m doing.
Acharya Prashant: You don’t have to actively think about the background because the background is not really translatable into thought. It’s a very subtle, passive kind of presence. You don’t have to actively think about it, but you have to remember. It’s an objectless remembrance, you’re remembering, but nothing in particular.
Yes, I’m remembering. And somebody asks you — “What do you remember?” It should be impossible for you to answer. Remembering nothing in particular. So what are you thinking of? Nothing in particular. But yes, there is something that I always remember, something ineffable, Is it feeling too abstract? I don’t intend to make it mystical or something.
See, there are the minor issues, the micro things that we engage ourselves with, right? But along with them, parallelly, concurrently, the macro should remain present. Though obviously, in a functional way, you will focus on the micro, but in the background the sense of the macro, the larger thing, the foundations must never be lost. You must never get so obsessed with the thing at hand that you forget the bigger picture.
Questioner: Another question is: when I am even working here and I am in the IT job, for that I feel like I want to contribute more and more for spirituality, not just money my life-wise. But then I don’t have much time when I’m working in an IT job, and as well as I have to spend my money on getting things like laptop and all. Then again, after that, I would have a vehicle, then I will think of having a home, like that. How to get free of this?
Acharya Prashant: One has to work harder, that’s all. See, the system says, give me 8 hours or 10 hours or something, and for whatever reason, if you want to stay in the system, you’ll have to give the system its due. Right? But you’re saying there is some compulsion: I want to stay in the system, I have to stay in the system for n more years. Then you must work for 15 hours, 10 hours for the system and 5 hours outside the system. That’s probably the only way, because the system will not offer you free lunches.
If the system says, “Give me 10 hours for the salary that I give you,” the system will have 10 hours, it won’t spare you. Right? You still want liberation from the system, then be ready to work 15 hours, 10 for the system, the bare minimum that the system would agree with, and then 5 hours for your liberation.
Questioner: Yeah. So it means we have to mind about that balance.
Acharya Prashant: No balance. No balance at all. You’ll have to work like a mad person, like a lover, like one with no sense of time, like one in a desperate peril.
Questioner: Yeah, that’s what I want to be. I don’t want to keep anything behind when I do certain work. That’s what my first question was, I just like to be that way. But that is why I was confused yesterday, how to be in that balance? That won’t be a free state.
Acharya Prashant: No, it won’t be a free state. And you’ll have to cut down on whatever leisure you give to yourself. That’s all. 10 hours the system takes away, 3-4 hours commuting and daily chores, 6-7 hours of sleep. See where you can steal time from. That’s your sadhana.
Questioner: All right. Thank you. Thank you very much.
