Duty uncontaminated by desire leads to inner peacefulness and increased effectiveness.

Work hard in the world, Arjuna, but for work's sake only. You have every right to work but you should not crave the fruits of it. Although no one may deny you the outcomes of your efforts, you can, through determination, refuse to be attached to or affected by the results, whether favorable or unfavorable.

The central points of issue, Arjuna, are desire and lack of inner peace. Desire for the fruits of one's actions brings worry about possible failure - the quivering mind I mentioned. When you are preoccupied with end results you pull yourself from the present into an imagined, usually fearful future. Then your anxiety robs your energy and, making matters worse, you lapse into inaction and laziness.

One does not accomplish great ends in some by-and-by future, O Warrior. Only in the present can you hammer out real achievement. The worried mind tends to veer from the only real goal - realizing the Atma, uniting with Divinity, the True Self Within.

The ideal, Arjuna, is to be intensely active and at the same time have no selfish motives, not thoughts of personal gains or loss. Duty uncontaminated by desire leads to inner peacefulness and increased effectiveness. This is the secret art of living a life of real achievement!

Krishna to Arjuna in the Bhagavad Gita, A Walkthrough for Westerners.