The Ultimate Happiness

 The Ultimate Happiness

By | Nikhil Pattani

This article was published on On the dot ezine 

https://onthedot.world/the-ultimate-happiness/

My previous article was about Law of Diminishing Happiness, let’s take a glance before we continue our journey to the Path of Ultimate Happiness. We discussed about happiness that would be temporary, when we try to find them in our existing material sickness, possessions or try to accumulate more and more. For instance, buying a property, taking a luxurious trip or amass gold, silver and precious stones not limited to happiness of having a Happy Family, spouse, children, good neighbours, education, business excellent jobs, hefty salary, embracing healthy life, maintaining healthy body, luxuries, expectations from relationships or working on any material achievements like marriage, children, proud of class, and everything we thrive for and slog our entire life, are all sources of temporary happiness.

The happiness derived from all the above is deemed to last until you lose the satisfaction level from it. This is where the same gradually converts into a reason of inexplicable levels of unhappiness and desolation.

Here is another instance to understand happiness more clearly and perfectly.

A spouse or girlfriend/ boyfriend, you choose from a crowd of millions or billions and you spend a great time dating and then get married. After few years, either you lose interest in your spouse or your spouse loses interest in you. He/she becomes the reason for never-ending qualms about the relationship, that in turn transpires to squabbles and quarrels.

Education of hardship and proud, that made you a doctor, but when you see a businessman earning rapidly, yields a sentimental fight within ourselves, leaving our mind filled with gloom.

The birth of a son gives you enormous joy, but after some years when he does not live up to your standards or expectations, it gives you unhappiness, irrespective of how much boldly you show your acceptance or condone his behaviour and actions and how the world perceives of him.

A fancy car is your happiness till it does not start giving you trouble and even if it does not, the car companies keep on launching new models for their own profit, this definitely kills your happiness with contemplations what you have vs what the new model with high performance has to offer and this poses another challenge or urges you to get a new vehicle or model which you believe, will meet your expectations, exceed your status par excellence and/or meet societal acceptance of your status. The same can be applied to mobile phones and many more such examples that money matters, relationships etc., gets factored into.

Dear Readers, do you agree that this happiness would not stay for life and ultimately becomes a reason for sorrow and wretchedness at the end?

So, what is permanent happiness? Is there any way we can reach that level of happiness? How much will it cost and where is this available ? Is it only meant for the rich or any poor or middle class people can attain them? Is there any assurance that this happiness will never diminish?

These are some obvious questions you may have in your mind right now. Well let’s get into knowing the everlasting happiness, The Shashwat Sukh (Permanent Happiness).

Let us take a dip into most auspicious ocean of happiness.

There is an absolute divine space specially carved out for the soul, which are permanently happy. The soul lives like a bright & calm light, just like a flame from an earthen lamp. The illuminated flame is lively and keeps burning without any fuel, this light cannot be described in simple terms, unless it is experienced ourselves. The area of such light is infinite. Here on this planet, you need a body to experience anything and everything, but in the other distinct splendid dwelling, I am referring to, the amazing fact is that no body of any type or any kind is needed. When there is no body, there won’t be any pain of becoming sick or dying. Since there is no body, you do not have to nourish anything to keep its state sustainable. As there is no body, you don’t have any organs like eyes, nose, ear and skin to attract any sense, smell, noise or touch, just like an array of a bright and calm light. Your function there is to see and to know, remaining calm untouched by any sadness and sorrow. You are the source of all the knowledge beyond your imagination. Many scholars and enlightened souls identify this place as Shivpur, Moksh, Siddhashila and many more such names. This are the place of Paramanand- The Ultimate Happiness and Paramsukh- The Ultimate Bliss.

Moksha or Nirvana, we have heard this many times in our life. This is a state where the soul completely disassociates with the bondages of life and death; and all the karmas whether good or bad. It is a complete state of liberation.

The liberated soul is placed at Siddhashila, the ones with infinite faith, infinite knowledge, infinite perception and perfection.

The soul is cladded with infinite layers of Karma whether good or bad, the soul itself is a testament of knowledge and liberation, but only because it is covered with the layers of Karma, the Liberation remains curbed. As soon as those layers disengages from the soul, the soul enters a stage of ultimate liberation or the Shivpad state. All the faiths under Hinduism follow religious path to reach this ultimate state of Nirvana or Mukti however I found the explanation has a better clarity and understanding in the religion of Jainism.

Jainism and the Holy Tirthankaras have shown a path to liberation through Ratnatrayi; i.e., Three jewels and they are listed below:

Samyak Darshan

Samyak Gyan 

Samyak Charitra

1. Samyak Darshan: The right perception

Right perception means to have right belief, not limited to any Idol worship or following any scriptures or books. It basically speaks about understanding that every soul is liberated, unless the soul is covered with layers of Karma. Everything you see, the chain of events that happen with any living being, is just the outcome of their Karma. One day, even this soul will attain Nirvana or Moksh, so it is worth noting that every living being is a soul fighting for liberation and hence equality prevails within all the living beings and organisms. This evokes non-violence at the helm of any living beings present in this planet.

2. Samyak Gyan: The right knowledge

Once the perception is set right, we need the right knowledge at every step, just like a guide or a mentor. The real test of right knowledge is in the ability to help us know what is good for us or what will build more karmas. The clairvoyance of such knowledge comes from the right faculties of the soul, which cannot be wrong. These faculties are known as “Keval Gyani”

3. Samyak Chaaritra: The right conduct

Once the perception set right, the goal is set along with the right course of knowledge to move step by step onto the path of Liberationy. This ‘moving on’ is nothing but the right conduct. It is about practicing what is absolutely right, revealed by the right faculties known as Tirthankaras or Jinas, or Keval Gyanis.

The three jewels briefed above are interconnected, they always work in tandem in a synchronised way.

So now we know what is permanent and temporary happiness are. You have to decide, what is important for your soul and not for the body which will eventually be cremated here on this earth and at the same time the soul reaches out to the next birth with a new body to shred more karmas accumulated from its previous birth. We tend to only worry about our body and things associated with us in this life, questioning who has seen the afterlife. My dear friends, when we see different people with different sufferings, we definitely say “as you sow so shall you reap”. Here, sure the seeds were sown in the past many lives they are ripening in this birth, leaving us with no clue why this incident or event happens with us when we did nothing wrong or great.

All that we discussed, so far is just a micro drop from the ocean to achieve the Ultimate Goal of Liberation. It may sound very difficult and unachievable yet, if you start exploring and your research on permanent happiness you are bound to find an easy pathway towards the ultimate liberation for yourself.

 *The writer is a Real Estate Expert with more than 27 Years of work experience. A Jain by religion, he is an Artist by heart. With his vivid experience in diverse fields Nikhil steers to provide professional real estate, religious, philosophical guidance which is not only fruitful but helps spreading positivity.*

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