What will you do with your life? Don’t you want to find out if it is possible to live in this world richly, fully, happily, creatively, without the destructive drive of ambition and competition? Don’t you want to know how to live so that your life will not destroy another or cast a shadow across their path? We think this is a utopian dream which can never be brought about in fact, but I am not talking about utopia; that would be nonsense. Can you and I, who are ordinary people, live creatively in this world without the drive of ambition which shows itself in various ways as the desire for power and position? You will find the right answer when you love what you are doing. If you are an engineer merely because you must earn a livelihood, or because your father or society expects it of you, that is a form of compulsion; and compulsion in any form creates contradiction and conflict. Whereas if you really love to be an engineer or a scientist, or if you can plant a tree, paint a picture, or write a poem, not to gain recognition but just because you love to do it, then you will find that you never compete with another. I think this is the real key: to love what you do. From the book What Are You Doing With Your Life? by J. Krishnamurti
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