The Adverse Effects of Attachment

How can we begin practising Karm Yog until remembering God while performing worldly duties becomes natural?

JKP Literature

19 Sep 2026 — 4 min read

A mother’s distress while caring for her child evokes how attachment can disturb judgment during the performance of duty.

📍 Where You Are in the Inquiry

We have established that the mind and intellect can be fully involved in worldly actions while attachment remains elsewhere. A father whose son is seriously ill may drive through traffic, speak to a doctor, arrange treatment, and obtain medicine while his attachment remains centered on his son.

But this raises an important objection.

Perhaps such detachment is possible for many activities, but what about our most important responsibilities? Can we really perform our duties toward our children, parents, or spouse properly without attachment to them? Wouldn't duty without attachment become little more than forced labor?

But does attachment actually help us perform our duties better?

When Attachment Interferes With What Is Best

Consider a baby suffering from stomach pain because he has already consumed too much milk.

The baby cries. His mother loves him and cannot bear to hear him crying, so she gives him more milk. But instead of helping the child, the additional milk worsens his condition.

Her problem is not a lack of concern for her child. It is precisely her attachment that prevents her from doing what the child's condition requires.

A nurse would respond differently. She would give the child the correct quantity of milk at the proper time, regardless of how much he cried or protested.

The nurse's detachment does not make her incapable of caring for the child. On the contrary, because she is not swayed by attachment, she can perform the duty according to what is actually needed.

In this case, attachment has not improved the performance of duty. It has interfered with it.

A Judge Must Be Free From Both Love and Hate

The same principle becomes even clearer in a courtroom.

A judge can give an impartial judgment only when detached from both parties. If the judge loves one of them, he will be partial. If he hates one of them, he will be unjust.

Neither love nor hate helps the judge perform the duty correctly.

The action is performed best when the mind is free from both.

Attachment Disturbs the Balance of the Mind

This principle is not confined to mothers, nurses, or judges. We can observe it in our own experience.

When we are attached to someone, seeing, hearing, or touching that person gives us happiness. The mind is affected by that happiness and no longer remains balanced.

Other states such as anger, jealousy, and greed disturb it in the same way.

When the mind is disturbed in this way, some discrepancy enters the work itself. Our judgment, reactions, and actions become irregular.

This overturns the original objection. We assumed that attachment was necessary for performing important duties properly. Yet attachment itself can prevent us from seeing clearly and doing what the situation actually requires.

Work is performed properly when the mind is free from both love and hate.

Where This Inquiry Leads

Detachment does not mean neglecting our responsibilities.

The mother and nurse illustrate almost the opposite. The attached mother sincerely wants to help her child, yet her attachment leads her to do something harmful. The detached nurse can respond according to what the child's condition actually requires.

Likewise, a judge's responsibility is not fulfilled by loving or hating either party, but by remaining impartial enough to judge correctly.

Attachment, therefore, is not what enables proper performance of worldly duty. It can actually interfere with it.

But if our love is not to be centered on the people and things of the world, where should it be centered? And what then becomes of all our worldly responsibilities?

Go Deeper

Continue the Inquiry

(Part 4 of 6 — Karm Yog — Living the Path)

We began by asking whether constant remembrance of God could coexist with worldly action. We have now seen that the mind and intellect can perform those actions without worldly attachment—and that attachment can actually interfere with the proper performance of duty.

This clears the way for the positive principle of Karm Yog. If worldly responsibilities are still to be performed, but our love is not to remain centered in the world, where should that love be placed?