Love’s labour can never be lost : 3.

3.
Work without inspiration becomes `labour’. Labour is tiring and painful. The result of labour is never fulfilling. A labourer always complains that he has not got his just result. All selfish work eventually becomes labour where `more pay and less work’ becomes the policy. Most of our work these days has become mere labour: children labour through school; mothers find work at home tedious; fathers find their field of work unsatisfying and often jump into the rat race, all of which breeds countless worries and numerous tensions.

Love transforms work into `inspiration’, with efficiency as its result. And efficiency in work naturally brings about success, no matter what one’s field of pursuit. Not only is there a sense of achievement and satisfaction, but also an extreme sense of joy. Unlike all other forms of action which are fulfilled only in their results, inspired activity is a fulfilment in itself. In other words, the desired joy is gained not upon completion of the action, not afterwards, not in the distant future, but in the very action itself, as one works, there and then.

Swami Chinmayananda
To be continued  ...