We cling to life ardently but fail to hold it for more than a moment as the present slides into the past and the future is born out of its womb to last but a fleeting moment as well. Yet, such is our clouded consciousness with no clarity of comprehension that we drift ever in the delusive dream of a seeming permanence till the death of a dear one temporarily shakes us out of our reverie and we are brought to our senses for the while before the stream of sensory impressions casts it shadow on our temporary awakening to the unreality of life and carries us away once more into the delusive state of forgetfulness of our real nature. This ebb and flow of consciousness goes on and we are carried by the resolution of our karma (actions) from life to life in a ceaseless current of desire. We are buffeted by the four winds of desire and our thirst for life never allows us respite from this unending cycle of life and re-life. We enjoy the pleasures of life, taste its sweet fruit, then suffer the pain as well that comes inevitably in its wake and our life is embittered. Through this alternating cyclical experience of pleasure and pain comes the realisation that this sensory life cannot be the be-all and end-all of existence but that there must be a deeper hidden cause to it all that seeks external expression thus. And thus begins the search for the truth behind phenomena, the quest of the seeking soul. A restlessness seizes the seeker that allows him no repose till he has found freedom from the bondage of sensory life. The desire for objects is replaced by the desire for the ultimate objective of life, freedom from limitation, freedom from sorrow, freedom from ignorance.
But freedom is not achieved in a day and the awakening to the higher aspiration is merely the beginning of the process of disenchantment which must end in freedom in the fullness of time. For this the aspirant needs tremendous enthusiasm to break free of his material bonds and the guidance of a spiritual preceptor who is a seer of mantra (rishi). Then begins austerity, hard practice of spiritual precepts in line with the philosophical principles underlying them. The Bhagavad Geeta enunciates practice and renunciation as the twin principles to follow in the spiritual life if one is intent on reaching perfection. The Guru gives the mantra and shows breathing and meditative techniques which must be ardently adhered to along with supreme devotion to the Guru who must be regarded by the disciple as none other God-incarnate. Then with tremendous energy, earnestness and unbroken chastity he must pursue the sadhana (spiritual practice). Through the highs and the lows of the spiritual current the aspirant will then be carried closer and closer to the spiritual ideal of freedom but will never quite reach it till the grace of the enlightened one removes the last barriers and the aspirant abruptly is released unto freedom. The scales are off his eyes and he witnesses himself as the eternal God who he, in his ignorance, had all along worshipped, never quite realising that it was his own inmost Self that he had thus paid homage to all along. His individuality gone, his infinitude opens up, limitless, free. The Guru, the Ishta (the Chosen Ideal) and the aspirant have become one indivisible, conscious, infinite entity and phenomena like the Trinity of observer, observed and observation have disappeared into this nothingness that has engulfed all. The void has consumed the whole and exists in Self-consciousness, alone through eternity without hope or chance of replication except in a recurrence of primordial ignorance through the inscrutable power of Maya. Hari Om Tat Sat!
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