Hindu Article-The spiritual quest

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The spiritual quest

CHENNAI: The spiritual quest, which every individual undertakes

whether consciously or unconsciously, is the urge to know his

essential nature. Man generally identifies himself with his body-mind-

intellect personality without knowing his true nature, which is

divine. It is this wrong identification, which is the root of his

sorrows. Reality is that which exists eternally and if this criterion

is applied to man one can see that the physical body, thoughts and

emotions keep changing all the time and hence the human personality

that is obvious to experience fails this test.

It is the instinctive awareness that there is an everlasting aspect

to one's personality that drives every individual to discover his

true nature. It is very subtle and it is the Self (Atman), which the

Upanishad declares, "You are that!"

In her discourse, Sunanda said if human existence had to have a

meaning one should realise his spiritual nature and he would not rest

content till then. All other living beings have to go along the path

destined for them, whereas, man has a wide variety of choices and the

ability to know his nature. There is a sense of incompleteness man

feels within which makes him pursue different goals to find

fulfilment in life. But one will find that as soon as one desire is

fulfilled another springs up in its place. What he seeks is the Self

and he has to discover it. If an individual does not attend to this

call within he has to undergo the shocks of life. Hence it becomes

imperative that this quest must be undertaken on a war footing.

The example of a compressed spring coil best illustrates the human

predicament. When a spring coil is compressed to half its length one

can feel the pressure on one's palm. One can find that there is less

and less pressure as it is released slowly and nothing at all when it

returns to its original state. Similarly, every person's mind is

stressed by desires. The mind always wanders related to the desires

that drive the individual to fulfil them. Why is the human mind

restless? It is so because the person is not poised in the Self and

hence not in his original state. Hence the constant urge to get back

to it. All the stresses that one faces in life are a sign of the urge

to return to one's spiritual nature.

 

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