Bliss is a milestone in your spiritual journey that takes you towards nirvana, Yogacharya SURAKSHIT GOSWAMI tells PRITI AGRAWAL
– Bhagwad Gita, 5:21
Association between sense organs and mind produces feelings of sukha or dukha, joy or sorrow. Both sensations disappear when the mind is completely concentrated and blended within the soul and Supreme. This is moksha or liberation, and yes, we can attain this state of absolute detachment through nullification.
Most of us remain stuck between sukha and dukha, limited to our senses. Su is related to what our indriyas or sense organs like and du is what our indriyas do not like. Kha is related to 11 indriyas including five jnanendriya, five karmendriya and one subconscious mind. Each one of us has su as well as du and these coexist with each other; they are two sides of the same coin. Winning and losing, yin and yang, shadow and light, profit and loss, heat and cold — one can’t exist without the other.
No one can escape suffering. Happiness too comes at a price. You might buy a new gadget or car, but you know that one day it will outlive its usefulness. This is the rule of life — you know the happiness you feel today will one day be destroyed, but right now, you don’t want to think that way. If joy and sorrow are temporary phenomena, what then is the true state of our soul? There is another kind of happiness, akshaya sukha — eternal or parama sukha, happiness that escapes decay. With eternal bliss, we’re one with God. Once you achieve this, no external object, or feeling of happiness or sorrow will affect you. Beyond the reach of your senses, this is ananda or supreme bliss. To attain this state, we need to get liberated from worldly desires and ego. External happiness comes through your indriyas, but akshaya sukha is churned through nishkama karma yoga, bhakti yoga, dhyana yoga and other spiritual practices. True eternal happiness is like the spontaneous ‘wow’ feeling which comes when you purchase your first new car or mobile. But there is a huge difference between happiness and bliss — the wow feeling is eternal with bliss, but with happiness, it comes and goes.
Ananda is a comfort zone in our spiritual journey. Bliss is not the ultimate goal of liberation for a jivatman. But bliss is the milestone on the way to liberation and shows us the right path. Our problem is that we get stuck with bliss because we enjoy the state and can’t move further up. The Gita says, “One who experiences internal happiness with mind immersed in Self, and who sees the Self within as well; such a one perfecting the science of uniting individual consciousness with ultimate Consciousness, spiritually realising the ultimate Truth attains liberation of the ultimate Truth.” (5:24).
Atman has five koshas — annamaya, pranamaya, manomaya, vijnanamaya and anandamaya. The last kosha, anandamaya kosha, is very close to atman. It has qualities of soul and this is confusing because we begin to believe that it is the ultimate stage of Self. But this is not true, because it is still a kosha. If we get stuck with anandamaya kosha, then it also becomes a block that will prevent us from reaching the ultimate Self. At this stage, you can either slip back to the previous state or you can choose to move forward. For instance, Sage Vishwamitra who was meditating, and was at a blissful state, was distracted by the apsara, Menaka.
When you get into the ananda stage, you start thinking that you have reached the stage of enlightenment and there is no need for a guru. The ego still exists and in this state, you believe you can reach nirvana yourself. But, if we can remove the ego, we become one with Brahmn. This is advaita or nondual experience of all as ‘One’. A guru or your inner voice as guru can remove your ego to take you beyond this state. Guru is our true consciousness which is nirakara or egoless Parabrahmn.
Ramakrishna Paramhansa also got stuck in this blissful stage and started enjoying the image of Goddess Kali during meditation and felt really blissful. But his guru asked him to kill the image of the goddess so that he could free himself from this stage of ananda and obtain enlightenment.
A sakar guru might show you the path to nirvana, but eventually, you have to walk on it guided by nirakar guru or your inner voice. That inner guru is your vivek khyati or true wisdom; it will finally take you from bliss to nirvana.
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