Every individual in the univrse wants happiness. He wants to be happy with his family and kith and kin. But happiness has eluded him from time immemorial! There is none in the world who can say that he is perfectly happy. Life is not a bed of roses nor is it a bed of thorns. Man's existence alternates between happiness and misery, joy and sorrow, sunshine and storm, good and evil, right and wrong,light and darkness etc. It is the arrangement of the Providence. you cannot understand the significance of one without the other! Happiness cannot be enjoyed without sorrow. It is only then one can realize what happiness is! It is the same with other qualities.
Man by nature is ' ananda swarupa' embodiment of happiness. He is expected to be happy always. when we meet a person we enquire whether he is happy. But we never ask him whether he is sad or miserable.That is because we expect every one to be happy and cheerful. What is this happiness? How can we define it? It is a state of mind when the person is totally satisfied in attaining some thing that he intensely desires.The child is happy with the doll and ball. The boy is happy with his games and studies. Man is happy with his wife and children. In later life people are happy with retirement and relaxation. According to the different stages of man the objects that give him happiness change. The ball and other objects are no more the source of happiness for ever to the changing life of man.
Do these words, enjoyment, pleasure, gladness and a few others, express the sense of real happiness? Not at all. They are sensory perceptions felt by the sensory organs. These perceptions do not survive for long.They are transient. A cup of good coffee satisfies you. You are happy. A picture is dear to you. you enjoy. A dish is very nice and tasty. You are glad. You are pleased with some good sight and its impressions. But these feelings and impressions do not live long and just vanish after some time. You cannot call them as real happiness. They are trivial pleasures and experiences mistaken for real happiness!
Adi Sankara describes in one of his famous sthothras that man transcends all the mundane experiences and sufferings in life. He defines what Man is. He calls him "chdananda rupa sivoham sivoham" Man cannot identify himself with his body. the real "I " is not the body. It is the Atma or soul enshrined in every creature in the universe. It is in the body and not in the body. It is the silent witness to what all happens inside the body. It is unaffected by what th body suffers, enjoys, or experiences. It is Existence, Awareness, and Bliss concretised! Unfortunately man confuses the Atma with the body. He is enveloped with maya or illusion Material, transient, and changing pleasures cannot be called happiness. Real Happiness is that which exists for ever and does not change at every moment.
Real Happiness that lifts man to regions of fulfilment is called Bliss or Ananda! It is the supreme state of ethereal happiness that man is expected to experience and enjoy! It is the ideal goal and purpose for which man is created! But most of us fritter away our time and energy in pursuit of trivial and transient pleasures. in short, man has to realize himself and feel that He is 'ananda' himself, the indestructible atma, always in Bliss!
In Taittiriyopanishad, Bhrugu, son of Varuna is directed to research and understand what Brahman is! He performs tapas and finds out that annam (food), prana, manas, and vijnana or knowledge do not correspond to Brahman! It is Ananda or Bliss alone which can be called the Brahman. " anando brahmethi vyajanath." Dedicated and sincere effort shall lead man to realize his self and enjoy the eternal Bliss or Ananda! This Bliss is real Happiness, not others! it is this Bliss that our sages and seers realized in abundance!
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