The basic nature of the soul is freedom. Each soul is complete in itself -Perfect , Alone and Serene. Ashtavakra Samhita is the testimony of this.
We will commence our journey of knowing ourselves with Ashtavakra Samhita – a dialogue between Ashtavakra and his disciple, King Janaka. When Ashtavakra was still in his mother’s womb, he listened to the Vedas recited by his father and grasped everything but he criticized the pronunciation of his father, Kahor. Kahor was furious and cursed his son that he would be born with eight parts of his body deformed. That’s why he was named Ashtavakra, which means ‘eight curved’. Although later he managed to regain the respect of his father at king Janak’s court and was released from the curse, , but he was known by this name in the annals of Indian philosophy.
The pearls of wisdom shared in
this book illuminates our soul .
We are neither the body nor the mind.
We are not attached to any person, place, or thing in this universe . We don’t possess anything . We don’t give up anything . The most exceptional example of non-attachment is the bond between a mother and her newborn baby. The baby is the whole world for the mother- both share a deep bonding .But at night, when the mother goes in deep sleep, she forgets the whole world and even her baby for sometime. This shows that attachment is the creation of mind but surprisingly , even the mind disappears and loses it’s identity in deep sleep ,When the mind is shut down, we don’t have any conscious experience.
Everymoment We make persistent efforts to add virtues to our lives or get rid of bad things which tarnishes our image . Ashtavakra says , We are already pure and perfect by nature, So , it is needless to put in efforts to improvise ourselves but in this whole process we are making ourselves impure.
What is within us is independent of the body and mind.
Practice of Non-attachment is not all required because it’s already present within us. We are only the observers, not the doers. So how can we be involved in any deed of the mind and body ?
Whatever we experience in our lives,every bit of it is in our consciousness. We are one with the Universe. The Universe is within us. We all are interconnected at the energy level. Love is not directed at one person; love is infinite.
Ashtavakra says, “I am infinite ocean of Consciousness . In me all the beings come up like little waves in an infinite ocean. They play with each other, fight with each other, and merge back into me again”. Ashtavakra further says to Janaka, “Brahman is the ocean in which the universe shines. Everything that we see around us—love and hatred, suffering and peace, success and failure—is an illusion. Nothing is real. Only existence is true, and that is what we truly are.
- THOU ART INFINITE
You as an Atman is serene in every situation-pain and pleasure, hope and despair, life and death. Serenity is not the quality of mind. It’s the nature of the Self. Whenever your body will be in pain, your mind will definitely experience that pain, but beyond that, there will be serenity. No doubt, ups and downs, are integral part of life, but in the background there is eternal bliss.
The body will get old and degenerate, and after death, it’s form will be changed, but that infinite ocean of awareness will continue its journey unabated- serenity in life and serenity in death. In this way, individuality is dissolved into infinity.
By DR. Rupa Oberoi 🙴 Ayushi Gupta
References:
1.AshtavakraSamhita by Swami Nityaswarupananda
2.Lecture of Swami Saravapriyananda on Ashtavakra Samhita {Santa Barbara Vedanta Temple,2017}
Leave a Reply