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Therefore, endeavour first to become Free. That is to say, as a preliminary to successful living, cultivate Faith in the Atma as the core of your personality and then learn and practice the discipline necessary to reach down to that core. With that qualification acquired, you can engage fully in worldly activities, following the Dharma prescribed for their regulation. Then you become a moral individual, a Dharma purusha. Those who hold the physical objective world as the all of life and the body as the Self, lead but wasted lives, as meaningless as making God into stone. Making the stone into God is the holier, more wholesome task. So, too, seeing the Atmadharma in every single act of yours transforms it into an act of worship, elevates it and removes its binding characteristic. If the duties of worldly life are done with no regard to genuine Sathyadharma, it is as unholy as treating God as stone. The Acharadharma pursued apart from Sathyadharma and Sathyadharma divorced from Acharadharma are both barren of results. They are both inextricably intertwined, and should be treated as such. The senior officer needs the work of the junior official as much as the junior official needs the help of the senior officer. Who then is the bound, who, the free? Both are bound to their desire to be happy and comfortable. Until the fundamental secret of the Atma is recognised, the outer state of bondage will persist. When that is done, the burden of slavery to the senses and to the objective world will be diminished. Then, the code of behaviour towards the objective world will be merged with the code towards the inner Divinity and so, the urges will all be co-operating harmoniously. The Vedantha, the Adhyatmic Sastras, Dharma - all invite man to live
and act as Bhagavan, and not as bondsman. Then, all acts become Dharmakarma
and not Kamyakarma (acts done with intent to gain the fruits thereof).
The shackles of bondage cannot be avoided by a mere change of the type
of activity. They can be avoided only by changing the point of view from
the Deha to the Deva, from the Created to the Creator. The moral qualities
also will be rendered stronger, thereby. Some persons hold the opinion
that being employed is bondage, while sitting at home without any specific
work is freedom! This is a sign of want of intelligence. When employed
in a job, one has to obey the superior officer. But, can one escape the
demands and compulsions of relations even while at home? Well, even when
one is amidst friends only, can he avoid the necessity of acting according
to their fancy? Can one be free at least from the need to take care of
one's own body and cater to one's own comfort? How then can man feel free,
while in the cage of bondage? All life is a prison, whatever the difference
between one type of sentence and another. It is so, as long as the attitude
of identifying the Self with the body is there. |