There are three energies of the Supreme Lord: the internal energy (para-sakti), the marginal energy, and the external energy. The living entities belong to the marginal energy because they can come under the influence of either the internal or external energy of the Lord. By nature they also belong to the para-sakti, but when they come under the control of the material energy they are known as ksetra-jna-sakti, knowers of the material field. In other words, the direct, internal energy of God is spiritual (para), and the living entities have this same nature (para), but in contact with the material energy (ksetra), the living entity accepts a material body as his self and is thus forced to act, manipulating the five senses.

The Yamadutas say that everyone with a material body must work. An ant and an elephant both have to work. The ant requires only a grain of sugar for his sustenance, whereas the elephant requires three hundred kilograms of food daily, but both must work for it. Foolish people say that the Vaisnavas do not work, but the Vaisnavas work for Krsna twenty-four hours a day. They are not idle do-nothings. While we are in this material world, we have to work, but we work for Krsna. That is not really work, or karma: it is dharma, practical religion. Unless one works for Krsna, all his labor is adharma, irreligious sense gratification.