Desire is a great power

|| योग: कर्मसु कौशलम् ||

Mananeeya Ekanthji says :
The entire growth of man, one way or the other, completely depends on desires. But the desires which end in pleasures are the cause of all grief and joy in life.  It is these desires which mould and shape the personality of man.
Eknathji was very fond of giving examples of train. Here to elucidate how desire is a prime mover, he uses the simili of railway engine. He says :
We find that when a train moves, all the wheels of the carriages start rotating. But they are moved by the prime-mover to which the first motion is given by the engine. So also the desire is the Prime-mover of the entire human activity.
Now Eknathji places how desires work in animals and then to a country like Israel. Here he opens up the world in front of them. Though the work is to be done for Bharat Mata, we should learn from other nations too. Here, he toes the line with Swami Vivekananda in suggesting whatever is best from West should be learned and adapted. He says :
In lower animals and insects, we find tremendous effort being made by them to satisfy their very crude and primary desire, e.g. physical hunger. Desire can work wonders. As Israel needs food and aspires to be self-sufficient in it, it has made efforts to cultivate the crops even in deserts.

Human beings are in the grip of desires. Desire by itself is not bad at all. It is only when it takes an adverse turn that it becomes a vice. Otherwise it is as sublime as God Himself. In the Bhagavad Gita, Lord Krishna declares desire as one of the distinguished manifestations of His own Self. "Dharmaviruddhobhuteshu Kamosmi Bharatarshabha." Bhagavad Gita VII.11, "O Best of Bharatas, in the beings, I am the Kama "the desire" which is consistent with social order." This desire has a most significant role to play in human life and it is a great power.