How to resolve the conflict between choosing opportunities in work vs choosing peace?

Taken from a purely psychological standpoint, which according to me is a much more saner view, we have to look at the words “opportunities”, “worldly things”, “ego” and “peace/equanimity”. These words show a tension between two opposing desires. So on one hand there is peace/equanimity and on the other hand is the triad of ego, worldly things, opportunities. Condensing this further we see that the mind is in conflict between two opposing pulls – the desire to expand and invite complexity vs the desire to contract and remain simple. The moment one is faced with two opposing desires, one is faced with the dilemma to choose. “To be or not to be, that is the question”, William Shakespeare puts the perennial dilemma of man in this pithy statement

So the question can be understood now as a problem of choice, of choosing between two opposing thoughts, paths, viewpoints, ideologies. Let’s look at the dynamics of choosing, of taking a choice between two opposing thoughts. Firstly, we can observe that till there is thought, there is always going to be duality because thoughts functions in duality, always creating a pair of opposites: good and bad, right and wrong, true and false. The opposites are not independent of each other. One cannot talk of good – in thought – independent of bad. The good is defined by the bad. Similarly, one cannot talk of truth – in thought – independent of false. The second thing we note is that the definitions of these terms are context dependent. What is good in one context becomes bad in another context or culture. So there is no absolute stance or reality which these words denote. And this is a key insight. How do we give a meaning or reality to these words?

The meaning and reality of all words is given by an overarching goal we have fixed in our life. Most, or almost everyone, does not do it consciously. As noted above, the goal is fixed unconsciously by the culture and society we live in. But let’s say one has freed oneself from culture and fixed one’s aim as freedom from suffering. So when we have a standpoint as freedom from suffering, then we are faced with a choice between two actions: one which seems to lead to suffering and one which seems to lead to freedom. It is from this standpoint that I see the questioner asking this question.

So let’s come to the one who has fixed the goal – the thinker. The thinker has fixed a goal of freedom, and now is the faced with the task of choosing between two thoughts which seem to be opposite. If he chooses the thought of taking up opportunities, he seems to be loosing out on his freedom which he gets in peace. But if he chooses not to talk up an opportunity, he seems to be again loosing out on his freedom to work and live life energetically. Both ways there seems to be a compromise on freedom, hence also the confusion.

So, the question is whether exerting choice ever gives you freedom. We all feel that the basic freedom of man is the freedom to choose. But choice is born from conflict. Which conflict? The conflict between the thinker and the thought. If there was only thought and no thinker, would there be a choice or just an observation of thought without choice, and therefore without conflict.

From where does the thinker arise? Is the thinker different from thought? This is the ultimate question we have to ask. If one has followed me up till here, one would have realized that the thinker arises out of a “predetermined aim”. In this case, the aim of the thinker is freedom. Now one cannot have an aim of freedom till one does not have a predetermined notion of freedom. So in this case, the questioner has some notion of what freedom is. If the notion is very strong, then there would be no possibility of questioning and inquiry. But in this case, the questioner does seem to have a question, so the notion is weak and the questioner perhaps is willing to look into the notion of freedom that he/she may be holding. The notion of freedom stored in memory creates the thinker. In this question there seems to be a slight hint of a notion that freedom means freedom from work, because work strengthens the ego.

If one observes very carefully, the thinker does not exist before thought. The thinker arises after thought. First one has a thought of seeing some opportunity of work, and then the thinker arises in response to the thought, from memory. It juxtaposes the notion of freedom (no work or less work) as an opposite to the thought of opportunity in work. Both are thoughts. It is just that thought has divided itself into the thinker and the thought and given a superior position to the thinker. The thinker then becomes the controller and chooser of thoughts. This thinker we call the ego. And the ego is not strengthened by work. It is actually strengthened by the whole process of creating a goal and choosing between thoughts to move towards the goal.

If one has read me till this point, which I would consider a rare occurrence, then one would have come to at least intellectually understand that the main problem of choice cannot be resolved by taking choice. The act of choice is not an act of freedom but an act of conflict. It is the ego which chooses. And till there is a division being created as the thinker and thought, one is constantly being trapped in the conflict of choice. What’s the way out?

Is it possible to observe without the observer? Is it possible to understand this whole mechanism of thinker and thought, and how the thinker is created, and how the thinker then gets into the dilemma of choosing? If one does so, then one begins merely observing thought without choice. In the passive, choiceless observation of thought, the “right action” will arise spontaneously. The “right” is not right in the sense of thought. It is not right by any social, religious, ethical, or for that matter, any construct of thought. It is right because the ground from which the action arises is not the ground of thought and it’s resultant duality. An action from choiceless observation arises from an intelligence beyond thought. Only such an action which is free from thought brings about total freedom and transformation of man.

Image from – dribble.com