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Jeeva Yatra

Path to Joyful Living - Part-1
[Based on Jeeva Yatra of Gnananda Bharathi]
By Raja Subramaniyan

Introduction
1. Journey (Life)
2. Destination (Goal in life)
3. Ultimate Destination (Joyful Living)
4. Immediate Destination (Knowledge)
5. Travel Agent (This book)
6. Map (Holy Scripture)
7. Tour Guide (Your teacher)
8. Path (Your pursuits in life)
9. Field (The world)
10. Chariot (Your body)
11. Horses (Your five sense)
12. Rein (Your mind)
13. Charioteer (Your intelligence)
14. Traveler (YOU)

Preparation
15. Requirements for the journey
16. Preparation for the journey

Journey
17. Summary Steps of the journey
18. Reaching the destination

1. The Journey (Life)

When you wake up one day, you find yourself in the lower berth in a moving train. There are many fellow passengers and you wish them, "good morning". It is strange that you do not remember who you are or where you are going. Since everyone around you seem to be normal, you do not want to alarm them by asking them the question 'who am I'.

May be there will be some clue. You check your bag and find a bundle of currency. You do not know whether to feel happy or not. This currency bundle will solve the problem of survival, but the problem of where to go still remains.

There should be a ticket showing the destination. There is one. It shows when and where you bought the ticket and the destination. Great! However, there is no name on it. Atleast, now you know the destination! Your happiness is short lived because you find many more tickets inside the bag. You seem to be a buying ticket everyday and there are countless tickets.

The current ticket shows that you are going to reach the destination in few hours time. The train stops in a station. You get down and get some breakfast. Thanks to the currency notes. You wonder if you should discontinue the journey, but you get into the train and decide to continue the travel until the destination showed in your ticket.

A casual conversation with the fellow passengers reveals that you are not alone. None of the co-passengers around you seems to know who they are. They seem to enjoy the travel without worrying about the 'unnecessary' details. One thing is common in all of them. They all want to get back home and they are sure that this current journey will take them home! You are not so sure.

Finally the destination has come. You get off the train, bid farewell to the fellow passengers and walk out of the station. You sincerely hope that you will recognize it to be your hometown. No. It is yet another strange place. You do not know where to go and what to do. After spending the rest of the day in that place, you decide to continue to travel. You buy another ticket, get into the train and find a berth to sleep.

Next morning when you get up you have no idea who you are. There is absolutely no idea what happened on the previous day. Yet another day follows in the same pattern.

The scenario is the same with respect to our lives. None of us knows our identity. We have no idea when we began the journey. We go on traveling without any end in sight. Nevertheless, everyone wants reach home and that is the reason for traveling. It is time to review the direction, do a course correction, if required, and not to keep traveling blindly.

2. The destination (Goal in life)

You do not know your destination. However, the generic definition of the word 'destination' is known. It is that place, on reaching, which you do not travel any further.

Your own home may not be the destination, if you are not going to be contented over there. In other words, the destination could be defined as a status of complete contentment (or happiness or fulfillment). When you feel that there is nothing more to do and no need to go anywhere else, then you have reached your destination.

That destination is called Joyful Living.

However, most of your fellow travelers are not intelligent enough to find out their ultimate destination. Instead of saying, 'I want happiness' beyond which there is no need to travel, every one names different places as their destination. After reaching that destination, they will spend some time and effort and then realize they are not happy. They will continue their journey with a new destination, hoping they will get contentment over there. Thus, the travel never ends.

Similarly, in life everyone has varied goals. One wants to qualify as a doctor, another wants a job as a sales manager, yet another wants to build a house. There seems to be no end to the variety of goals. On analysis, we find out there is only one goal, which is common to all of them, which is contentment/ happiness.
Everyone wants to earn money in order to spend it and gain contentment. They assume that the contentment will come by acquiring name, fame, money, wealth, power, position or people.

Presence/ Absence Logic (P/A Logic) says sweetness is the nature of sugar and it can never be separated from sugar.

We can apply this logic to name, fame, money, wealth, position or people and prove that there is no happiness or contentment in them. Everyone is primarily interested only in contentment and not in name, fame etc.

Example: A girl loves her neighbor very dearly and wants to marry him.

This statement cannot be true. She wants to be happy and she assumes that by marrying him, she will be happy. If it is shown to her that she will not get happiness from him, then she will not want to marry him.

Thus, everyone is highly selfish and the only objective is to be happy and contented. No one really cares for name, fame, money, wealth, power, position or people if he or she cannot get happiness from them.

Example: I love my son.

The word 'my' is more important than the word 'son'. If he runs away with my enemy's daughter, he is no longer my son and I do not love him anymore!

3. The Ultimate Destination (Joyful Living)

Everyone wants to reach the ultimate destination. Wanting to marry a person is the immediate but temporary destination. The ultimate destination is to gain contentment.

There are two types of contentment. One is temporary and another is eternal. Everyone is interested in eternal contentment.

Example: If a music performance is good, we want it to last forever so that we could be happy forever.

However, that does not happen. (Moreover, if it should happen, we will know that the music performance cannot give ever-lasting happiness.)

Our expectation of ever-lasting happiness or eternal contentment is not wrong. However, we do not understand its meaning completely.

'Eternal' means that which lasts forever. 'Temporary' means that which comes and goes. Therefore, what comes cannot last forever. In order to be 'eternal', it has to be present all the time. Happiness has to be the nature of money/ name/ fame etc. We know it is not.

Example: Hot water in a pot kept on the stove.

Hotness is the nature of fire and therefore it is eternal in fire. Hotness is temporary, in the case of the pot and water. It is present in them due to a certain condition (the pot being on the fire) and if that condition is changed the hotness will go.
Similarly, if our happiness comes to us due to some condition, it will go after sometime when the condition is no longer true.

Example: A businessperson is happy because he got lots of profit.

When there is a huge loss, the happiness will be replaced by great sorrow. If he wants eternal happiness, it cannot come from business. The fact is it cannot come from anything/ anybody. In short, it cannot come. One can gain eternal happiness or contentment only through, thorough understanding.

Once such eternal contentment is realized, one has reached the ultimate destination. Without this basic understanding, everyone is living life chasing temporary destinations. It is like buying a ticket for the next destination hoping that they will find contentment there. The whole life is wasted in such a mindless travel and finally one may realize that he has gone nowhere.

This can be verified from most of the retired people. They will have a great sense of disappointment that they could not get a peaceful, happy and content life inspite of working hard throughout their productive life.

Everyone is looking for undisturbed peace, everlasting security and non-diminishing happiness. In short, everyone wants Joyful Living. Nevertheless, they do not know this nor do they know the right path that will take them there.

4. The Immediate Destination (Knowledge)

If we decide to go to New Delhi by train, our immediate destination is the railway station. Our immediate focus is to reach the station on time to board the train. We do not worry whether the train will reach New Delhi on time or what sort of company we will have in the train.

From the time, we get up in the morning; we do all our daily chores like brushing our teeth and drinking coffee with the underlying compulsive thought that we should reach the station on time. If we are running late, we might skip our breakfast. The most important task is to reach the station.

Similarly, our ultimate destination is eternal contentment. For reaching this ultimate destination, our immediate destination is to gain knowledge. Knowledge here means, Self-Knowledge. We need to know about our real identity, who we are and why we are traveling and what is our destination.

To reach New Delhi, there may be many immediate destinations. One can fly or go by road or train. However, for eternal contentment, there is only one immediate destination, namely, knowledge.

May be we are sure about our ultimate destination, namely eternal contentment. We may not be equally sure about the immediate destination. However, as and when we understand that knowledge alone will lead to eternal contentment, we will be in a hurry to gain the knowledge. Just as we do all our daily chores, keeping in mind that we have to reach the station on time, we will do all the work necessary for gaining knowledge.

There may be many ways to reach the railway station. One can use a taxi, public transport or ask a friend to drop us. Similarly, to reach the immediate destination of knowledge, there are many ways. One can do whatever work one likes and pursue whatever goals in life with proper attitude.

One can gain this proper attitude by understanding these preliminary lessons detailed in this book.

Once we board the train there is a sigh of relief. We get a satisfaction as if we have reached our ultimate destination. Similarly, once we meet a correct travel agent, who will guide us to the knowledge, our job is done.

When we board the right train, we are sure of reaching the ultimate destination. However, we should not get off the train half-way-through. Similarly, if we do not drop out half-way-through the process of gaining knowledge, we will gain Joyful Living

The train journey to New Delhi will take many hours. Similarly, gaining the knowledge will take many years. It is just like gaining knowledge on any other subjects like Math or Physics. If we have flair for the subject and if we do hard work, then may be we will be able to complete the course in couple of years.

5. The Travel Agent (This book)

You do not know who you are and where you are going. You cannot take any help from your fellow passengers since they also do not have any clue. All of them are trying hard to reach the destination, without any idea about where they are going! Therefore, you need the assistance of a Travel Agent, who will give you an idea of who you are and then recommend you a Map and a Tour Guide.

The Map is the Holy Scriptures and the Tour Guide is your personal religious teacher.

The only source, which describes the path to eternal contentment, is the Holy Scripture. Science and technology can never take you to this destination, which is proved by 2000 years of history. The advancements in economics and science have brought about more fear, anxiety and disillusionment.

Since you know that you want eternal happiness, you can take the help of the Map. Most of your fellow travelers have not matured enough to find out that their ultimate destination is Joyful Living. They are still enjoying the travel to their immediate destination. Only when they get tired of their travel, they will think of opening the Map.

The Holy Scriptures reveal the path to Joyful Living. However, one cannot read the Map without the assistance of a Tour Guide. Your guide is one who has reached the destination. Therefore, there is nothing more for him to do. He may not have the desire to guide you. Therefore, it is your duty to look for a teacher, trust him, serve him and ask for his guidance.

As long as one thinks that the current journey will lead to the final destination, the Travel Agent, Map and the Tour Guide will be of no use. In general, people do not have time to listen to new ideas. They are sure that one day, they will stumble upon the destination. This is not going to happen. Even if they pass through their own home, they will not recognize it and therefore, the travel will never end.

People, who chase material wealth for gaining the everlasting happiness, will find that they are nowhere near the destination. Therefore, they will start working harder than ever before.

Example: A person who lost his key is busy searching for it and has no time to listen to the neighbor who keeps saying 'I have got your key'. Only when the person is tired and about to give up, will he have time to listen to the neighbor who was saying 'stop searching' all the time.

Only when one gets tired of travel, will they turn towards the Travel Agent who will point out the Map and the Tour Guide. To avoid such unnecessary trouble, one should take off sometime from ones busy schedules and explore the possibility of finding alternative paths to the destination.

6. The Map (Holy Scripture)

The Holy Scriptures are the only authority that shows us the path to the ultimate destination. They are not written by any human being but given by God. Just like a User Manual that comes along with a new product, the Holy Scriptures is part of the creation. All facts dealing with the creation, like the nature of the world and of living beings and inert objects are explained in detail in the Holy Scriptures.

The contents of the Holy Scriptures are to be trusted until one understands the logic behind it. The simple rule is; if one cannot understand the logic of the statements in the Holy Scriptures they are to be blindly followed.

Fortunately, we have many Tour Guides who are experts in explaining the contents of the Holy Scriptures. Therefore, the need for blindly following the scriptures will arise only if we are not intelligent enough to understand them.

Holy Scriptures state that the eternal contentment is the goal of all the living beings. There are no exceptions to this rule.

Example: Some one says, "My goal in life is different from yours"

This is a statement made out of ignorance. Every living being has just one goal, which is eternal contentment. It is not possible for anyone to have any other goal.

In addition to showing the destination, the Map also details all the steps that are to be completed in order to reach the destination. There is only one path to the ultimate destination of eternal contentment. There is no choice for the traveler.

Thus, both the destination and the path are fixed and unalterable for all human beings. However, most human beings know neither the destination nor the path leading to it since they are not exposed to the scriptures. As a result, all of them are traveling eternally. The destination is partly clear to them. They want eternal contentment but they assume that their immediate goals will get them that.

Example: A person is waiting in a bus stand for a long time. The nearby shopkeeper took pity and asked him which bus, he is waiting for. He replied that he is new to that place and does not know the bus number. Shopkeeper then asked him where he wants to go (the destination). He replied, "I am not sure. I know where I want to go. However, I am told there is no direct bus to that place. So I have to go to some place from where I can get a bus to my destination!" Shopkeeper replied "OK. It is easy then, any bus will go to some place"

Therefore, the whole life becomes an eternal search. The Shopkeeper is your Travel Agent, who wishes to help you. Normally we do not take such voluntary offer for assistance.

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