Dedication

Some people have so much merit that they are free to choose a job to suit their taste. Many others have little merit, and have few choices of occupation, and are very glad to have any work at all. If such a person does not love their job and keeps hoping to find another, neglecting the present work, and nothing else turns up, they end up with neither job.

The moral view here is this: love the work you are doing, and do not wait to do the work you love.

People will say, I only like doing this kind of work and not that kind. If I could do the work I like, I would be happier and more productive. If I am forced to do work I hate, I feel miserable and cannot get much done. True, everyone says so, but not everyone has the good fortune to do work they like.

The problem is that we find ourselves in circumstances where we must do things we do not like, and we cannot get out. Either we do them cheerfully and productively, or we are unemployed, and the work we like never comes to us.

The point is that even if we do not like it, we must make ourselves like it. Morality lies here, wisdom lies here, and strength of will lies here. Think that heaven and earth have given us this work, that life has sent us this work, and we are grateful and treat it with respect, never taking it lightly. A mind that does not dare to take any work lightly is a moral mind.

We think: I do not like this job, but many others who would like it cannot get it. If I betray this work, I deny the feelings of all those other people. I still have to respect what other people like. Respecting what others like is also morality.

If we give ourselves devotedly to the work we have, so as to be more productive, our merit will grow. With more merit, we may gain the chance to choose among other jobs. Forcing our minds to love the work we are doing is itself a moral act.

Our grandparents would pick up a fallen grain of rice rather than waste it, so to not value a whole job is a serious wrong. So whatever work comes to us, we cherish and respect it, and we do it very devotedly and productively.

Even when we have no job, we must also make merit by doing what no one else does: picking up trash, filling potholes, clearing litter from canals, visiting lonely elderly people, caring for someone who is ill on a friend's behalf, helping build a neighbor's house, all unpaid. Such volunteer work is not easy, yet if we do it cheerfully and eagerly, then once we have a job we will be very devoted and will not keep looking over the fence.

Make the mind love the work you do, and happiness will come to you.