PLO: Enjoying Work is the second part of Venerable Thich Thanh Nghiem’s 108 Adages Of Wisdom

ENJOYING WORK

1. Be busy without being disorganized, and weary without being dispirited.
2. Be busy but happy, and tired but joyful.
3. It’s fine to be busy: just don’t let it get on your nerves.
4. Work swiftly, but don’t tense up; relax your body and mind and never tighten up.
5. Work swiftly in an orderly fashion; never compete with time in a nervous flurry.
6. Don’t measure success and gain by wealth and rank: to benefit ourselves and others as best we can is all that matters.
7. To take on tough tasks, one must prepare to tough out complaints, and to be in charge is to be in for criticism. Yet complaints help foster compassion and patience, and criticism often holds golden advice.
8. Stay at ease under all circumstances, and give whenever conditions allow.
9. The tripartite formula for success is: go with the causes and conditions, seize them as they come, and create them when they don’t.
10. Grasp opportune conditions when they come, create them when there are none, and ere conditions ripen, never force a thing to be done.
11. All the ups and downs of life are nourishing experiences for our growth.
12. Deal with matters with wisdom, and care for people with compassion.
13. Rectify deviations with wisdom; accommodate others with compassion.
14. The deeper our compassion, the greater our wisdom and the fewer our vexations.
15. Simply deal with matters with wisdom and treat people with compassion, without worrying about personal gain or loss. Then we’ll never be plagued by vexations.
16. To let the circumstances dictate one’s state of mind is human; to let the mind dictate the circumstances is sage.
17. A big duck cuts a big wake; a small duck cuts a small wake. Big or small, each duck will paddle its own way to the other shore—but only if it paddles.
18. If the mountain won’t move, build a road around it. If the road won’t turn, change your path. If you are unable to even change your path, just transform your mind.
19. Diligence doesn’t mean stretching beyond our limits. It means displaying unremitting persistence.
20. A passing boat leaves no trace upon the waters; a bird’s flight leaves no trace in the sky. When fleeting success, failure, gain, or loss leaves no trace upon the heart, the great wisdom of liberation has been achieved. 21. To be accommodating to others is to be accommodating to ourselves.
21. Who is willing to be openly exploited is noble-minded; who is insulted and insidiously exploited is dim-witted.
22. Pressure usually stems from caring too much about externals and other people’s opinion.
23. Offer your service with a heart of gratitude, as if repaying a kindness, then you won’t feel weary or tired.
24. Always feel gratitude in your heart, and give unstintingly of your wealth, physical strength, mental effort, and wisdom.