That is why once Sankara said, "the egoism based on the body is what is meant by Naraka or Hell". Egoism of this kind is just another form of the contra-Divine attitude. Who can remove all the thorns and pebbles from the face of the earth? The only way to avoid them is to move about with footwear. So too, with the Vedanthadarsana or Philosophy of Vedantha. With the vision fixed on Sathya or the Reality, with full faith in the Brahmam which is your own essential nature, you can by-pass the need to transform the external world to suit your ideal of happiness and Sathyadharma can be attained. He who tramples down egoism and declares with conviction thus: "I am not the bondsman of this body, which is the repository of all types of servitude; the body is my bondsman. I am the master and the manipulator of everything, I am the embodiment of freedom", is already liberated. All codes of duties must help in this process of the destruction of the ego; they should not foster it and make it grow wild. That is the road to freedom. If a person, finding life with the son miserable, goes to the daughter and lives in her house, that is not winning freedom! That's only a way of feeding the ego. This search for sensual happiness cannot be elevated into "Dharma".

After all, what is a home for? For the enjoyment of the bliss derived from the contemplation of the Lord, for getting the opportunity to meditate on the Lord undisturbed. All the rest can be ignored, but not these. The True Dharma of the individual is to taste the bliss of merging with the Absolute, and attain true Liberation. A person who has reached that stage can never be bound, even if he is put in the grimmest of prisons; on the other hand, for a person who is the slave of the body, even a blade of grass can become an instrument of death. The true Dharma is to be immersed in the Atmic Bliss, the Inner Vision, the steady faith in the identity of one's real nature with the Absolute, and the realisation that all is Brahmam; these four are the authentic Dharma. In this physical existence as particular individuals, these four are named for the convenience of practice (but yet saturated with the Inner Dharma of Atmic Reality) Sathya, Santham, Prema and Ahimsa, so that particularised individuals who are only personifications of that Absolute can follow them in daily life. The mode of pursuit of Dharma, now as in the past, is to adhere to these high principles in every act and thought. The Sathya, Santham, Ahimsa and Prema of today are but the Unintermittent immersion in the Atma, the Vision fixed on the Inner Truth, the Contemplation of One's Real Nature and the Knowledge that all is Brahmam, the one and the only. These, the Fundamental and the Derived, must be co-ordinated and harmonised. Then only can it be termed Atmadharma.