You are now seated comfortably and this page is in front of you. These few hours can be your private time to look within. Who am I? Where am I? What is my purpose in life? What should I do to achieve that purpose? All of us may be in different fields of work—students, lawyers, doctors, engineers, teachers, journalists, architects, chartered accountants or spiritual guides. It does not matter in which area we work in. At the end, it all boils down to who we really are.
We may be in our jobs for different reasons, but why do we do it? Each one of us will arrive at the same answer—happiness. A student studies for happiness, strives hard for a rank for happiness, finds admission in a college for happiness, joins a company to work in for happiness, gets married for happiness, begets children or postpones childbirth for happiness, retires for happiness and travels for happiness.
Is happiness right here, around the corner or has it to be achieved after a process of effort? We end up postponing happiness because we think it should be achieved in future.
What is the use of being happy? Why should I pursue happiness or realise my happy state of being? If this is a question in your mind, then may it be known that once the source of happiness is discovered within you, all your thoughts, words and actions begin to spring from happiness. You no longer will do something, say something or think and plan something to get happiness. You will be your natural happy self always and there is hence an explosion of creativity springing from the blissful state of being. Else life is a chore to work for happiness, tolerate insults and put up with many problems hoping for an elusive happiness.
How do I realise it? There are many paths shown to us by the masters and yoga is one of them. When I turn, twist, stretch and contract my body in different postures, the hormones of happiness are squeezed from the glands and released. When I breathe in and out deeply in a rhythmic manner with the right knowledge of the flow of air within, my lungs expand, oxygen flow is increased and I get to experience the happy state of being within. When I go into the rapture of a song, listen to music, see a beautiful scenery, taste good food, smell divine fragrance or touch and feel objects with my skin, then I experience happiness.
When my intellect is moving on the path of progress shown to me by the masters who walked the way, I find happiness from my thoughts. Ultimately, when I strike at the root of my own self through meditation, I realise that the state of my being is naturally happy.
Brahmacharini Sharanya Chaitanya
(www.sharanyachaitanya.blogspot.in)