Swami Ram Swarup Yogacharya believes that one should strive to discover the real and eternal happiness over the sensuous joy of the transient world.
In today’s world, people have generally become materialistic and hanker after wealth. They don’t hesitate in using unfair means to achieve their end. To them, this is their ultimate happiness, the ultimate fulfilment of existence. But in the absence of the Vedic knowledge, they don’t realise that by doing so they are living in a fool’s paradise. Our pious land has been the land of rishi-munis, Rajrishis, who were learned of the Vedas and the yoga philosophy.
The Indian philosophy based on Vedic culture, provides us with real happiness. It preaches that the soul is alive, infinite and immortal matter, which resides within the human body. Why not then strive to discover the real and eternal happiness, rather than spending one’s earthly days in sensuous joy of this transient world?
In the Bhagwad Gita, Lord Krishna has beautifully described the relationship between the body and the soul. In the thirteenth chapter, he says that our body is kshetra (the field) of the jeevatma (the soul). The jeevatma governs the body through five senses and the mind. Senses are prone to indulgence thereby causing harm to the enjoyer. Therefore, control over senses is the most important. We can achieve this by adopting the preachings of the Vedas and thereby daily practice of the Ashtang Yog philosophy while discharging all moral duties.
The soul is the alive matter whereas the human body is non-alive. The soul is indestructible, immortal, unborn and eternal whereas the body is destructible and mortal. Based on the previous lives’ pious deeds, God has blessed us with the human body to destroy sorrows of old age sufferings, diseases, painful cycle of birth and death by way of worship, practice of yog philosophy and so on, under the guidance of the learned of the Vedas. This is only the way to destroy every effect of our previous as well as present lives’ deeds, sorrows, illusions and thereby attain final liberation. We must remember that the said facility has not been awarded by God to other living-beings.
Physical beauty has a passing phase as has been described by our saints and scholars; the real beauty lies in jeevatma, the soul. Let me illustrate this truth in the following anecdote.
Once there lived a king named Janak. One day, he had a dream in which he found himself as a beggar, roaming around in search of food. Atlast, he saw a piece of bread lying on the ground, and picked it up to eat. No sooner did he have a bite of it, a kite swooped and took the bread away. The king was so famished that he fell unconscious.
When the dream broke, the king found himself quite upset, unable to comprehend whether he was a king or still a beggar. He called the wise people of his kingdom to answer his query but none could satisfy him. Finally, he called the greatest intellectual of the time—saint Ashtavakra which literally translates to one who has eight deformities in one’s body.
When the saint entered the king’s court, all the wise men laughed at the sight of his body. The saint enquired who these people were, to which the king informed him that they were the wise men of his kingdom. The saint disgustedly told the king that they were simply cobblers and not the wise as suggested otherwise since they were learned only with the knowledge of the outer body and not the enlightened soul that resides within the body. The king requested him to answer his question to which the saint explained that he was neither a king nor a beggar but a sublime soul devoid of all kinds of worldly dirt. The response left the king relieved and satisfied.
Ashtavakra’s story is a lesson to us that we should perform our duties as desired by the Lord and not to run after illusions ruled by our senses. To be permanently happy we will have to realise the inner beauty and not the physical one.
One can enjoy unfading beauty only if one acquires the perception of the real and the unreal. Once we attain that knowledge, we can reach the highest pinnacle of spiritual glory. This is the stage when one can enjoy its true and eternal character. Here, no desire is left behind except serving God’s creation and loving His people without expecting any reward or appreciation. This is the final stage of our earthly existence and once we reach that stage we attain salvation, which is the main motto of human life.
(The author is the chief editor of Ved Ishvareeya vani, a bi-annual magazine)