Love in the Workplace?

In this blog, Sadhguru discusses love and inclusion for every aspect of life. 

Whatever the nature of your work, you are probably spending more time at work than you are with your family. You’re spending eight to 10 hours a day with people you work with, but someone you are married to or someone you gave birth to, it’s generally a lot less.

So the people you work with and the kind of relationships you hold with them are extremely important because you spend a larger part of your life with them. Most people have the mindset, “This is work, that is life.” That means a large part of your life is not life. The best part of your day, when you are awake and alive, is spent with people you work with. And when you come back home in the evening, you may be just half a human being, you are already done — that’s when you are with your family.

So why is work not life? Why is it looked at as just a way to earn something, as a means towards something? The moment we look at work as a means toward something, slowly our mind concludes that this is not something we are supposed to enjoy; this is just something we are supposed to be done with. We only look to see when it’s time to leave. And we look forward not to the week — but to the weekend.

So do not divide your life into “work” and “life.” It’s just life. Every waking moment of your life is just life. Can one moment be less important or more important than the other? A moment you spend with coworkers is as much a moment — in terms of life — as one that you would spend with your dearest ones. But one grades their experiences. With one set of people, experiences are important, but with another set they are unimportant. So, the same level of attention and focus is not given. This definitely determines the nature and results that one reaps out of a situation. Having a wonderful time with family and a miserable time at the office will not last very long; the misery of the office will infect the home situation for sure.

When someone is not so important to you, in a million ways, that person will make your life difficult. People are quite ingenious about these things. When you look at somebody, when you are in touch with somebody, if within yourself you do not hold that person as truly important to you, that person will come up with a million problems in your life. They don’t have to have a particular reason, they will find one.

People have chosen to spend a certain amount of time at the workplace, according to what their needs are. So once you have decided to be there, it’s all life. That moment is as important as any other moment, so throw yourself into it with as much zest, involvement and inclusion as you would with your dearest ones. Then you won’t have to ask, “Why do people get so upset with me?” This question comes up at home or at work. For different people it happens in different places, and for some people it happens everywhere.

Wherever there is no inclusion from your side, people become troublesome. Don’t try to manage them, don’t try to administer them. People don’t like it. When you realize somebody is managing you very efficiently, do you like it? Nobody likes to be managed, but everybody longs to be included. Inclusion doesn’t mean you have to go and hug everybody on the street. It’s just the way you are, that’s all.

Inclusion is a certain way of being, nothing particular to do as such. It is not a policy or a philosophy; it is simply the way all life in existence is happening. The very life process that you live — whether in terms of breath, chemistry, energy or even at the atomic level — is an inclusive process. One has issues of inclusion only in thought and emotion.

If I get into a taxi for a 10-minute ride, by the time I get out the driver will be sharing his whole life with me because he sees inclusion in the way he is approached. So why treat him as just another person we use to get somewhere? Treat him as yourself, treat him as you would the dearest person in your life. Why not? Does it cost you anything? Is there an issue of scarcity? Your love, your joy, your inclusiveness will only be lost if you do not use them.

So if your relationships have to be good, just see how to make yourself like a flower so that nobody can dislike you. If you become pleasant in mind, body, emotion and energy — if you make these four dimensions of you pleasant — relationships will not be a problem wherever you go. And isn’t that what you are seeking in life? To become pleasant? Living in a pleasant atmosphere is what a relationship is about. Relationships are like growing flowers in your garden; you have to tend to it. If you want to know the pleasantness of flowers, a certain tending is needed. If you want to know the joy of wonderful relationships in your life, they also need tending.

So should your life be pleasant every moment? Or just those few hours you spend with somebody that you love? Spending every moment with someone that you love is not possible, but having a loving relationship with all that you come in touch with, animate and inanimate, is a possibility. If you can lovingly look upon your home, why is it not possible to look upon your workplace in the same manner? If you behold everything lovingly, your life will become pleasant. Love and inclusion is not something you do, it’s what you become.

Click Here to read this article on Huffington Post