How to enjoy your work?

On a certain day, three men were working in one place. Another man came by and asked the first man, “What are you doing here?” The man looked up and said, “Are you blind? Can’t you see I’m cutting stone?” This person moved on to the next man and asked, “What are you doing here?” That man looked up and said, “Something to fill my belly. So I come here and do whatever they ask me to do. I just have to fill my belly, that’s all.” He went to the third man and asked, “What are you doing here?” That man stood up in great joy and said, “I’m building a beautiful temple here!” All of them were doing the same thing, but their experience of what they were doing was worlds apart.

Every human being, every moment of his life could be doing whatever he is doing in any one of these three contexts – and that will determine the quality of his life, not what he is actually doing. How simple or complex an activity is doesn’t change the quality of your life. With what context you do it changes the quality of your life.

They all are doing same thing yet their state of mind is different. People may not have choice in the varieties of work they can do but everyone has a choice in life to do their work in either of these three states of mind. Wouldn't it be better if you just start doing things in pleasant state of mind rather than whining about it!

So next time you hate your office work, or your studies, you can remember this simple thing. Changing the context can make your life a lot easier.

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Stress elimination

I recall my attempt to talk on the topic "deepen your root and broaden your vision" where I was talking about why we should learn new things but without leaving our religion and culture.

During the event, I was asked about the slogan of Art of living, where it is said stress free and violence free society is the goal. I could not prove by example that stress could be eliminated. Frankly speaking, at that time I didn't even know meaning of stress but i could tell through my experience that after I started meditating, I had eliminated my stress. But putting experience into speech is a tough job.

Today let's start with the defination of stress. Stress is the difference between reality and your expectation. For example, i have a ticket of a movie of 9 am and i am stuck in traffic jam at the distance of 15 minute by vehicle, I will have 2 options: I can have stress, I can feel bad about the portion I will miss, I can curse traffic system, politicians, government, regret for not leaving early and so on.

Or I can say to myself, ok anyhow some portion is going to be missed so instead of being stressed, i will go and watch the show and then again i will see the missed part online or maybe i don't want to go today, i will buy another ticket and watch the whole movie in the hall.

So stress is a choice and not a phenomenon, and i wonder why do people choose this disease causing thing. We all know stress causes heart disease, asthma and even cancer. For reference you can see the video on the RHS :P

Ok now let's see how just by changing the thinking perception can change the effect of stress, and is it just illusion of stress elimination or is it really possible? 

Do you know a chemical named Oxytocin. It is a chemical released when we hug or kiss loved ones. And surprisingly it is released as a cause of stress! But this chemical has all the positive effects in our body.

So who is the villain in stress! Our villain is named as adrenaline. This hormone is produced in stress, when we fear something. Our day to day life stress is releasing this hormone and this hormone shows symptoms like faster beating of heart and other effects which may eventually cause diseases that sound extremely dangerous. So the trick of stress elimination is letting our body produce oxytocin instead of adrenaline. The thing I am saying is not complete as there are various other factors associated with stress, but I can pretty much say that the stress we have been knowing and think as unavoidable can actually be eliminated. That feeling we don't like can be eliminated and diseases can be avoided.

Oxytocin sometimes is also called bonding hormone and it is also said to be released when we help others. So helping others can also reduce the stress we know. Please watch this beautiful video below to know more in this regard.

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