An example story about Karma and Karma Yoga.
Once when Ramana Maharshi was going up the hill, a foreign pilgrim came and saluted him. Like, Swami yesterday you spoke about Karma and Karmayoga in the lecture. He asked what it meant. Then Maharishi said come up the hill with me and you will know. Well the pilgrims were climbing the hill with them. He had gone about half-three-quarters of the way. Then a grandmother had come to the forest to pick firewood. Grandma is old and has no strength in her body. So, without cutting or breaking the logs, she chose the dry pieces of small purale-like logs and put them all together, adding the small pieces of rope that she had brought on arrival and tied them into a knot to make a load of wood.
She was trying hard to keep that wooden load on her head. She kept it on her head half way up and then put it down again. Ramana Maharshi and the pilgrims who were standing at a distance kept watching. She struggled like this and kept it on her head. It was difficult for the grandmother to climb the hill alone, in such a case, climbing the hill with a load of wood on her head was a very difficult task, but the Maharshi, who were watching the grandmother climbing the hill with difficulty, shouted to the grandmother and stopped her saying, "Stop for a minute, mother." He went closer and took out a long piece of wood from the load of wood she was carrying and gave it to her grandmother, "Look, mother will turn this wood into a crutch and the mountain will become a little lighter." Grandma saw the wood lying on the floor as she said, then she felt light. She happily smiled and said to the Maharshi, "Yes, Hill will be easier to climb" and moved on.
Maharishi said to the pilgrims, now you have the meaning of Karma, Karmayoga. But he said he did not understand me. Maharishi told them that grandmother has to carry wood for life which is karmic and inevitable. But I removed the burden of that karmic stick and made a crutch for her. So she did karma without any difficulty. He said that carrying a log is karma, but taking a log out of the burden of that log and making it a crutch and doing karma with joy is karmayoga. Karma cannot be avoided. He said that instead of thinking that it is difficult, alas, it is difficult, if you do karma using it as a crutch, that is karma yoga.
He who performs his karmas and worships properly, the soul is more stable.
