Swami
Vivekananda's
pronouncements on
the Yoga of Work
pronouncements on
the Yoga of Work
In this age special stress should be laid on Karma Yoga.
By work alone men may get to where Buddha got largely by meditation or Christ by prayer.
Doing work is not religion, but work done rightly leads to freedom.
We have to work, for it is the only way to get out of maya.
Buddha is the ideal karma yogi, acting entirely without motive.
What our attitude toward work must be, to make it yoga:
Ordinary mankind, driven everywhere by false desires, what do they know of work? He works who is not propelled by his own desires, by any selfishness whatsoever... He works who has nothing to gain from work. Who enjoys the picture, the seller or the seer?
If you want to help a man, never think what that person's attitude toward you should be.
Those who want to help mankind must take their own pleasure and pain, name and fame, and all sorts of interests and make a bundle of them and throw them into the sea, and then come to the Lord.
Perfect sincerity, holiness, gigantic intellect, and an all-conquering will. Let only a handful of men work with these and the whole world will be revolutionized.
But if we are to renounce the fruits (of work), what inducement is there, to work?
(Reply): One must learn, sooner or later, that one cannot get salvation if one does not try to seek the salvation of his brothers.
You work best when you work for others.
"Out of the fulness of the heart, the mouth speaketh" -- and out of the fulness of the heart the hand works, too.
There is no engine which can pull against the human heart.
Feel, my children, feel: feel for the poor, the ignorant, the downtrodden; feel till the heart stops and the brain reels and you think you will go mad.
In this battlefield of ours, the dust of mistakes must be raised. Those who are so thin-skinned that they cannot bear the dust, let them get out of the ranks.
Constant defeat -- let that not unnerve thee.
He who is the servant of all is their true master.
Know for certain that he who will work will be the crown on my head!
You may be astonished to hear that as practical Vedantins the Americans are better than we are.
What our conception of ourselves must be, to make it yoga.
The great thing is to have faith in oneself. You cannot believe in God until you believe in yourself.
Animals can do charitable work... see the bees, the ants, dogs; men can be masters of themselves.
You have yourself manufactured your body, bit by bit... Nobody eats for you... All the responsibility for good or evil is on you.
Say, it is my nature, never say it is my duty.
All the work you do is subjective, it is done for your own benefit. God has not fallen into a ditch, for you and me to help him out.
Try not to know that you work.
The true man is he who is strong as strength itself yet has a woman's heart.
Whether or not you know it, through all hands you work, through all feet you move....
Ways we must work, to make it yoga.
Every ounce of muscle in excess of what is beyond the needs of one's physical work is that much less of brain. Do not exercise too hard; it is injurious.
The best work is done by alternate repose and work.
The ideal man is he who, in the midst of the greatest silence and solitude finds the intensest activity and in the midst of the intensest activity finds the silence and solitude of the desert.
Standing on Market Street, waiting for the car, with all the rush going on around you, are you in meditation -- calm and peaceful?
Three things are necessary: purity, patience and perseverance. And there is a fourth, even more important: love.
Condemn none; if you can stretch out a helping hand, so much the better.
If you want to reform John Doe, go and live with him.
Don't try to reform him. If you have any of the divine fire, he will catch it.
Vedanta only preaches the principles, and the method it leaves to you.
A time comes when one understands that to serve a man even in the smallest way is far greater than millions of meditations.
Please everyone without being a hypocrite and without being a coward.
Wisdom consists in carrying on the work cleverly keeping all in good humor.
Many feel, but only a few can express. It is the power of expressing one's love and appreciation and sympathy for others that enables one person to succeed better in spreading the idea than others.
Our teacher and Lord was so original, and each one of us will have to be original or nothing.
Even the greatest fool can accomplish a task if it be after his heart. But the intelligent man is he who can convert every work into one that suits his taste.
Get rid of the fundamental superstition that we are obliged to act through the body. We are not.
You will be able to work for the good of the world when you know for a fact that this work is all illusion.
Be bold and face the truth! Be one with it
Let visions cease,
The conception of those we work with which we must have, to make it yoga.
Have faith in man (If he is pursuing the false, it is because he cannot get the true. Put it in front of him and let him judge, he must see.)
If you do good at all, you do it to yourself; feel that the receiver is the higher one. You serve the other because you are lower than he, not because he is low and you are high. Give as the rose gives perfume.
A man should not be judged by the nature of his duties.
When you serve a jiva the idea that he is a jiva, it is daya, not prema, but when you serve him with the idea that he is the Self, it is prema..
It is very difficult to superimpose divinity, but one is sure to succeed by repeated efforts; God is in every man whether man knows it or not; your loving devotion is bound to call up the divinity in him.
Do not pity anyone; look on all as your equal.
It is our privilege to be allowed to be charitable, for only so can we grow. The poor man suffers that we may be helped; let the giver kneel down and give thanks, let the receiver stand up and permit.
Do not create illusion by "helping" anyone.
Help another because you are in him and he is in you.
Learn to feel yourself in others' bodies.
The individual's life is in the life of the whole.
Love makes no distinction between man and man, between white and black, between brahmin and pariah, nor even between a man and a woman. Love makes the whole universe one's own home.
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