By: BK Usha
Source: The Daily Guardian https://epaper.thedailyguardian.com/view/2414/the-daily-guardian-chandigarh/15
Dated: May 10th, 2025
In real life and on the internet, we are often advised to be passionate about whatever we do, in order to achieve the desired results. Passion helps — it provides us energy, drive, and resilience. Those who are deeply passionate about a task often push through obstacles that others might quit at. But passion is not the only path to achievement.
Wisdom, discipline, and a sense of duty — all of these can lead to good outcomes even without intense emotion. Many people achieve their goals through steady, consistent effort rather than bursts of inspiration. So, while passion can be a powerful engine for attaining success, it is not strictly necessary.
Actually, when passion is not accompanied by wisdom, it can burn out or lead to recklessness and ego-driven goals. There are several well-known examples of people’s intense dedication to their craft leading them to great achievements, but ultimately, their unrelenting passion turned out to be their undoing. Their inability, or unwillingness, to balance passion with caution or self-care resulted in personal suffering and, in some cases, premature death.
In today’s world, the perils of unchecked passion can be seen most commonly in the field of sports, where the drive for victory sometimes takes the form of vehemence, impulsiveness, and aggression.
Wisdom alone may also not be enough to realise our dreams. In the absence of passion, it can turn passive, or lack motivation. It is when the two are together that they create a kind of purposeful fire — energy guided by insight. That is when people become both effective and ethical.
In the Bhagavad Gita, Shri Krishna encourages the Pandava prince Arjuna to fight with full energy and fulfil his duty, but without ego or personal desire. That is passionate detachment. The Gita emphasizes equanimity — staying balanced in success and failure, not clinging to results, and doing one's duty without selfish attachment.
Passion is not about getting things done by hook or by crook in a desperate attempt to win at any cost. That is imprudence. It is really about caring for the task and engaging with it fully and responsibly. Similarly, equanimity is not indifference, but a calm inner balance while fully engaged in action, without craving success or fearing failure. It is like being in love with the effort, while at the same time not needing a specific outcome to validate our exertions. This is done not by suppressing emotion, but by cultivating a still centre amidst the storm. It is the hallmark of spiritual maturity.
BK Usha is a Rajyoga teacher
at the Brahma Kumaris headquarters in Abu Road, Rajasthan.
