Tasmād asaktaḥ . . . tasmād asaktaḥ satatam. Asakta: "Don't be attached." Kāryaṁ karma samācara: "Do your duty as duty, as you are duty bound. But don't be attached to that work. Because you should always know that your real work is self-realization." Asakto hy ācaran karma param āpnoti puruṣaḥ: "And if you practice like that, then the same perfection of life you will attain." Don't be attached to your work. Don't be attached—unattached.
nirbandhaḥ kṛṣṇa-sambandhe yuktaṁ vairāgyam ucyate. Anāsaktasya viṣayān yathārham upayuñjataḥ (Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu 1.2.255). The same advice is given in several places, that "Work, but do not work with attachment. Just to make the best use of a bad bargain, that's all. You go on working like that."
- tasmād asaktaḥ satataṁ
- kāryaṁ karma samācara
- asakto hy ācaran karma
- param āpnoti puruṣaḥ
- (BG 3.19)
And if you continue your work unattached like that, then the result will be that you will also reach that perfectional stage of life, as Śukadeva Gosvāmī.
- karmaṇaiva hi saṁsiddhim
- āsthitā janakādayaḥ
- loka-saṅgraham evāpi
- sampaśyan kartum arhasi
- (BG 3.20)
So you haven't got to give up your work, your duty. Go on doing your duty, but make your point that, "My life's main business is self-realization." You give more importance to that point of life, not to the point of that, "I shall earn more and enjoy life." No. That should be given up. That is called nonattachment. So if we go on working in nonattachment and culture our self-realization, then gradually we shall come to the perfectional point.