You are already that which you seek - Chapter 3

Everything tends to change or gravitate towards its own inherent nature. The restlessness and agitation one feels when one is sick is the body expressing its frustration at not being in its true nature of good health and wanting to move towards its inherent nature immediately. We abhor illness because being healthy is our inherent nature and we can never get sick of being healthy. It is for this very reason that we are never burdened by being happy. One can never have enough of happiness because it is one’s inherent nature. Just as a block of ice placed in room temperature melts slowly and continues to do so till it has reached its most natural state, water, we keep tirelessly pursuing external entities (objects, people and situations) so we can remain in our most natural state of everlasting happiness or ananda swaroopa (आनन्द स्वरूप).

We seek to create things that are indestructible and permanent because our inherent nature is indestructible and permanent. Even when inflicted with an illness fraught with terrible pain and suffering it is difficult to let go and one battles to stay alive so one can remain in one’s most natural state of existence or sat swaroopa (सत् स्वरूप).

We aspire to know things and dislike being identified as someone who doesn’t know so we can remain in our natural state of consciousness or chit swaroopa (चित् स्वरूप). We are never tired of being happy, never burdened by being alive even while we endure suffering, never happy being ignorant and we seek infinite happiness, existence and consciousness because limitlessness is our true nature.

If our inherent nature is limitless happiness, existence and consciousness why are we unhappy for relatively longer periods of our lives than we are happy, why are we fearful of death and why are we ignorant? What is it that is keeping us bound to unhappiness, impermanence and ignorance?

4.       Moksha purushartha (मोक्ष पुरुषार्थ) – Mumukshu (मुमुक्षु) is a spiritual seeker who takes up as the goal of his life the attainment of freedom from this bondage. A mumukshu (मुमुक्षु) becomes a jignasu (जिज्ञासु) when he understands the source of this bondage and becomes committed to the pursuit of knowledge that will remove the bondage. Of the 4 purusharthas, moksha purushartha (मोक्ष पुरुषार्थ) is called the parama purushartha (परम पुरुषार्थ) because once this goal is attained no other goal remains to be attained. Moksha purushartha (मोक्ष पुरुषार्थ) is also called Shreyas (श्रेयस्).

The attainment of moksha (मोक्ष) or the freedom from bondage are figurative expressions because in reality one is never really bound and is already what one is seeking to be and this is the best kept secret because it is that secret which remains a secret even after being revealed.