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Gita Lesson - 0808: Prescribed Duties

Bhagavad Gita
Unit - 08
Lesson - 0808: Prescribed and Non-Prescribed Duties
By Raja Subramaniyan

We should stick to our chosen profession/ prescribed duties and life style. All our actions could be classified into two groups.

Group A: Actions arising out of our prescribed duties.

Group B: Actions arising out of our desires.

We should do actions in Group A to the best of our abilities. We should not compromise on doing such actions because we want to do Group B actions.

Example: The prescribed duty of a college student is to study well. Even if he is not able to achieve great results in his prescribed duties, he should not branch out to do business or politics in which he may be performing extremely well.

Thus, the question is not how well we can do a job but whether it is our prescribed duty or not. We should do our prescribed duty to the best of our abilities so that we can progress in our spiritual path.

Teaching 46: Poor performance of prescribed duties is better than good performance of non-prescribed duties

We need to do our prescribed duties with proper attitude as described in the earlier lessons.

We need to reduce actions that are done because we like to do them. This is a difficult proposal to start with. Since our accumulated preferences influence our thoughts, we will be forced to yield to the pressure of our desire.

We can overcome such desire only by following the suggestions given by Lord Krishna in the subsequent verses.

Chapter 3: Karma Yoga [Verse: 35]

3.35 It is far better to discharge one's prescribed duties, even though they may not be perfect, than attempting non-prescribed duties. Even death in one's own duty is better. It is harmful to pursue non-prescribed duties.

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