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Table of Contents
Inner FulFillment
- Understanding the difference between success and fulfillment
- The illusion of external achievements
- Breaking free from digital distractions
- The role of spiritual practice in happiness
- Aligning skills with inner energies
- How detachment fosters personal growth
- Building a life of effortless mastery
The Illusion of Duality: How Perception Shapes Existence
We humans take life for granted. When a child is born, it beholds the vast manifestation of the universe around it. As the child starts maturing, it is restricted to a very limited view of the universe. Everything around, the child recognizes, as either belonging to him or to someone else. Duality is ingrained into the living entity’s view and understanding.
A living entity is driven by his strong body-mind identification. It is this limitation that creates stumbling blocks within the “existence” process. Life becomes crippled by self-defined systems, which gives one a distorted view of existence. This distortion is the very basis of duality. The dualities such as good and evil, day and night, light and darkness also generate gray-shades of the combination of these antipodes making the life-process extremely subjective and complex.
The Endless Search: Why Maturity Fails to Bring Fulfillment
As one grows up maturing from an infant; to a child; to an adolescent; to youth; to a mature adult; towards old-age, nothing seems to get enriched during the process, because throughout life we base our understanding on our past experiences that are shaped by the humongous subjectivity of life, thereby rendering our experience useless.
Although the human-living entity recognizes the pains and pleasures of ordinary life, one is rarely humbled by the existence process itself. Although one may grow in skills and survival, one is seen to be rarely appreciative of life, as a great process.
One usually “matures” with the complaining attitude. This complaining attitude is what shapes the world around oneself. Although one may not be vocal about it, one’s life and habits reflect this feature of deep dissatisfaction consistently hitting its mark. Strange isn’t it? Does this mean that life is a bore, absolutely worthless? It seems to be a drag, isn’t it? We have everything and yet, we crib and cringe all the time. Why is it that man is never satisfied and keeps looking around just as a hyena is on the lookout for carcasses?
Unveiling the Truth: How Vedic Wisdom Demystifies Life
The answers are not evident and it is not easy to put a finger on one particular cause. However, for one who pulls back a little and simply looks at his/her life, the answers shall emerge, as clear as broad day-light. Vedic scriptures have the answers to this if at all one is serious enough and cares to get answers to the hard problem of life.
The Vedic scriptures are not just edicts or “laws”. They are also not commandments that one has to follow and “get somewhere”. It is not limited to cast, culture, creed, or gender. It is simply universal by its very nature. If one were to drop biases and begin to understand the Vedic Scriptures with the help of spiritually evolved beings, one would wonder how such a simple Truth was blatantly ignored.
It was right in front and we simply did not care for the Truth staring at us. Vedic Scriptures are universal and talk of the Universal Truth just as Gravitation is a universal physical law of planet Earth.
The Vedic Texts belong to the human race and help demystify the living process.
The Vedic Scriptures: The Manual for Life
When we go out to the market and buy an appliance, say a home-theater, the first thing that we shall do is to get back home and refer to the user manual. We shall also seek the demonstration of a trained professional who is well versed with the functioning of the appliance. This person is also equipped with the detailing of some functionalities that are written in brief in the user manual. He explains them to us.
If, for a simple appliance, there is so much support needed, then is it possible that the extremely complex body-mind-life-mechanism can exist without a manual and a life-expert? The Vedic scripture is that manual and the various enlightened beings that grace the earth, are those experts. Life, according to Vedic Scriptures, is meant for graduating to the destination of the Supreme.
This body is to be used for the service of the Supreme. The body, mind, and consciousness have to be cleansed so that this higher vision is attained. Sanatana Dharma, the eternal law, is realized under the guidance of Enlightened Masters.
The Vedic Scriptures are the instructions and the Enlightened Masters demonstrate the Vedic Scriptures through their alignment to the Scriptures and practically explain and live the life that the Scriptures reveal where friction with the forces of Nature are at the bear minimum, smoothening life through and through, enabling effortless living.
Understanding the True Purpose of Life
It is important that individuals realize the true purpose of life and graduate to the eternal domain, beyond birth and death. The human body is awarded by the Supreme for this sole purpose. Ambling in various man-created philosophies, just manufacture loads of confusion and engagement that only strengthen the ego, in its various forms. Some forms of ego also masquerade as humility, the ego in its most dangerous forms. These are all the tricks that the mind creates.
This mind created confusion in lay man’s language is known as a cult. Other than confusion and ignorance, cults have no place in the order of existence. If man were to understand the true purpose of life, he would never waste life thus, which has been earned by him through many endeavors, passing through 8.4 million life forms.
So what is the basis of Life? Is there one basic rule from where we can begin this journey cutting short all unneeded philosophies and get straight to the point? The answer to this doubt is a big Yes. The Sanatana Scriptures try to cater to the many unillumined minds in various ways, but the Buddha comes straight to the point.
The Root of Suffering and the Path to Clarity
“Desire is the cause for suffering”, the Buddha declares with unabashed clarity. This defines the fundamentals of the life-process in a nutshell. Seekers follow this path and get to the Truth, by toning down desires at the onset of intelligence, through various practices, starting with Yamas and Niyamas allowing them to handle the very core of life.
When desires are cut down, the mess caused by the thought-process also gets sorted out. When thoughts diminish, there is clarity, there emerges vision; there emerges right perspective. Unless perspective and perception is enhanced, man is bound to swim and waggle in the filthy puddle of consumeristic living.
7/8 Questions from Sanatana Dharma
The scores generated in this Quiz may or may not be absolute. There may be right or wrong answers to each Question. A percentage towards 100 indicates that you are more aligned to the overall subject matter.
The Lost Ideals and the Path to Transformation
Modern society seems to be galloping in a different direction altogether. The base work of leading a prolific life has already been done by spiritual stalwarts like The Buddha, Bhagavatpad Adi Shankaracharya, Sri Ramanujacharya, Sri Ramakrishna Paramahamsa, Swami Vivekananda and so many more.
Yet, man does not bother to look in their direction. He is happy to lead a consumerist lifestyle and prefers to wallow in the shallow waters of greed and grief. When thoughts are full and there is no space in the mental realm, only filth regurgitates, thereby poisoning thought, word and deed at all levels of one’s consciousness.
The ideals that have been set by enlightened ones are generally not looked into, when one is hijacked by unholy intentions and desires. This has created a mighty rift in the very fabric of society. Many people may find these statements relevant and yet are not able to decide the starting point from where transformation becomes possible, atleast at a personal level.
Breaking Free from the Illusion of Endless Wants
When desires mount, wants become a need. There is no end to these wants that masquerade as needs. What was a luxury yesterday, has become a pressing need today. As the wise say, it is better to make a small start. We get influenced by our surroundings, by the media and by the many avenues that modern digitization has made possible. We are hounded by a barrage of influences. Man is driven by the outside; his inner being is unable to cope with this bombardment.
Naturally he is weak and cannot take decisions to support a lifestyle that is for his ultimate good. Naturally there is a steady deterioration in his value system, given that the world outside is purely driven by the unnecessary evil of profit and ambition. Under such circumstances, it is vital to come to terms with what is happening with oneself, as a starting point.
Reclaiming Self-Will in a World of Distractions
When man is being influenced by the outside, his self-will starts decaying. His purity gets challenged. His life energies get vitiated. If someone were to get to this point at least, reversal is a big possibility. What is important is to be able to cut oneself off from the external, once in a while and observe one’s happiness quotient.
People often take vacations and immerse themselves in sense-enjoyment, on an outing to some place. It should be understood that these vacations are also a perpetration, an infiltration by advertisers, who woe us; get us to burn a great part of our hard earnings.
Such vacations end up being an escape throttle, like a drug, that helps one experience an induced euphoria for a wee period. Once we get back to the routine of the daily work grind, we are back into drudgery, feeling more depressed. This, one has to realize, through self-evaluation.
Breaking Free from Digital Sedation and the Path to True Success
When we separate ourselves from matter once a while, slowly the desires start getting curtailed. Today, we watch television or surf the net , as if it were a compulsory aspect of life. This has to be curtailed.
If we keep certain days, whereby we do not surf the net or watch television, we will be on our way towards curtailing unnecessary spending. When we are off the internet and television, we are protecting ourselves from ad-bombardment, to reveal the least, on which we unconsciously act and make unnecessary purchases.
If instead, we take a night-walk or meditate and intersperse that into our daily routine, there shall be phenomenal curtailing of our wants. We need to follow no other action-plan to get this going. When we keep ourselves off the digital equipment which includes our mobile phones and hand-held devices, we shall slowly but certainly return to our natural state.
The more we adopt these healthy practices, the more our inner faculties get awakened, which is currently drugged into sedation by the digital artillery that has held us captive. But then the obvious question a typical consumer under the influence of digital media high with the fever of attainments may quip “But what about my Success in Life. Can I still be Successful?”. Lets answer this pertinent question too.
What we do not understand in hindsight is that the question is flawed. The obvious question can be “ What about fulfillment” and not “What about Success?”. AT our very core we are seeking fulfillment but we are so far away from our core that we feel “Success means fulfillment”, which is obviously not true.
Understanding the Difference Between Success and Fulfillment
People confuse Success with fulfillment. Success is always in one direction, outwards while fulfillment is more subjective, vast and soulful in nature. Success is always driven by goals and ambitions. It is an out and out worldly journey. I have never heard anybody saying, “I am successful in spirituality.” Such a statement is absurd.
It is important to understand that fulfillment is always inward and so is spirituality, Thus there exists a direct connection between fulfillment and spirituality. Of course the context of fulfillment here does not include material needs or achievement of any goal. Fulfillment here, refers to contentment and growing satisfaction.
Success on the other-hand is heavily objective and goal driven. It also stands for a fragmented view of the whole, in parts and attaining the parts. This skewed view usually or wholly defines the worldly aspect of life. When desires and wants translate themselves as short and long-term objectives, success comes into play. Success has its own beauty, although skin-deep.
The Illusion of Success and the Pursuit of Fulfillment
When somebody desires sex and gets it, the moment of getting satisfied through the sexual act, can be considered as “success”. Right after that moment of “eureka”, many times, dissatisfaction starts growing. Even guilt seeps in. After the “getting” of success, even depression seeps in for a while. Then one buckles oneself up and starts preparing for the next peak, for the next success trip. When preparation meets failure, it goes without saying that stress and depression have to seep in. After success there is a release of a chemical called dopamine, that gets released into the bodily system.
Unfortunately, the feel good factor is caused by the “external event”. The chemical dopamine is thus caused by an external event. This goes to show that success and dopamine are handled by an external event which itself is dependent on a host of factors over which one has no direct control.
This means that our system is managed by a set of factors which are totally beyond our control. These factors manage us and cause happiness and sorrow within us. Thus we transform into puppets which external conditions or people can manipulate. Our dependence on success for “feeling” happy makes us habituated to the process of succeeding.
This habit is induced into us by chemicals such as dopamine, as they get released into our system, as we respond to a successful event. Moreover, the more we depend on external situations for our happiness and euphoria, the more stress and depression attack us. The very acts of finding fulfillment earns us discontentment and ill-health. Spirituality on the other hand attempts to fix this very problem.
The Shift from External Success to Inner Fulfillment
The reason why our ancient seers advise us to take charge of our lives, is to reduce our dependence on factors which are beyond our control. None can control what happens outside the body. The process of Yoga and Pranayama are more towards taking control of the inner world.
The more we detach ourselves from the spirit of competition and success, the more we shall be successful in aligning our body towards inner-fulfillment. Our competitive spirit and the desire to succeed has caused a lot of disharmony within our system. The more man chases wealth, name and fame in the external world, the more he shall neglect his bodily needs.
The more one becomes unconscious of the bodily needs, the more his health shall suffer. Unfortunately the alignment to outwardly success is “seen” but the damage that the attitude of worldly success brings in, is foolishly ignored.
When a person attains wisdom through applied intelligence, he shall automatically stop chasing worldly success.
The Power of Inner Fulfillment Over Worldly Success
When one focuses on one’s inner energies, the fundamental energy of being human; is sufficient to bless one, with deep inner fulfillment which even the whole wealth of the world or success in worldly endeavors is unable to procure.
Inner fulfillment is the benediction of a spiritual life. When one commits oneself to spiritual discipline at an early age, nurturing inner talents shall become very easy. The alignment of the inner spirit with skills becomes automatic, it becomes one’s second nature. When spirituality becomes an act of sustained practice, talents and skills are sharpened to such an extent that one gets beyond all competition.
Mastering Life Through Spiritual Fulfillment
One, need not then compete for a place in the world outside. The spiritual practice shall itself build a cocoon, a world around the practitioner, where there is no competition, no stress, to say the least. Inner fulfillment becomes a way of life.
Both the logical and creative aspects of the individual blossoms. Opportunities are created from within. When the inner force of spirituality takes over, one starts gaining the position of a master. Such a person does not need to bend down to worldly rules.
Opportunities are created automatically, as if magically. Almost all control comes into the hands of the spiritual practitioner as if he were to hold a magic wand in his hands. As time flows, newer vistas open up from within.
Course correction with change, all happen at the right times. The life of a committed spiritual practitioner is a life of fulfillment and grace. No one can challenge the “success” of the spiritual practitioner. This success is fundamentally about creating one’s own space and performing in that space.
The Path to Inner Fulfillment and True Mastery
Like minded people are pulled into that space and whatever is needed for one’s upkeep and flowering is managed by the auric field around the spiritual practitioner. The only qualification to enable fulfillment is to completely withdraw oneself from outward dependence on the world. Only when the inner energies are struck through spiritual practice, the outer sphere aligns with the inner energy field of the practitioner and a life of inner fulfillment manifests.
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