Everyone is seeking, even if we are unaware of it.

Every day we are seeking. Seeking is a fire of the soul—the un-dying ember in our heart that keeps us alive.

Seeking becomes a game we play with ourselves. It is inside all of us. We do it everyday.

We are all looking for fulfillment, joy and purpose.

Most adults grapple with this in their lives as the first experience of identity crisis which usually starts around puberty. Something inside of us does not want to be mediocre, we want to be different. So we experiment with different things. We can be any age and experience an identity crisis we don’t have to be a teenager or middle aged.

Never before have there been so many people on the planet asking such deep questions like, “What is the purpose of life,” Who am I” and “Why do I exist?”

According to the Vedas, man is blinded by his own ignorance and his concern with the externalities of the world. We are caught, bound and enthralled by karma. Our ultimate quest, the final evolutionary frontier, is within our own self. They go on to say we came from Source, live in Source and are evolving into oneness with Source.

We are, in truth, the Truth we seek.

We are immortal souls waiting, striving and seeking to unite with Paramatma the Supreme or Cosmic Soul.

Most of us do not even know who we are. As far as we know ourselves—we are a collaboration of thoughts, beliefs, and societal conditioning.

Unfortunately, most of us seek outside of ourselves. We seek to finding the perfect relationship, career, materialism, worldly success, how many zeros we can add to our bank balance, etc.

Before we know it, it becomes a competition for us. We set self obtainable goals, then we feel gratification for maybe five minutes and we are onto the next quest. Then we feel empty again inside. It’s kind of like eating Chinese food, a few hours later we are hungry again.

It’s as if we are a dry, thirsty cactus in the desert, waiting for the clouds to shower us with much-needed rain.

Some of us even fall into the trap of seeking our “soul mates.” But the truth is that our own soul is our mate. We are really seeking our true self. The one which is already illuminated. We are swayam prakash (self illuminated) and nothing more is needed.

According to an old Hindu legend:

There was once a time when all human beings were gods, but they abused their divinity so much that Brahma, the chief God, decided to take it away from them and hide it where it could never be found.

Where to hide their divinity was the question? So Brahma called the council of the gods to help him decide. “Let’s bury it deep in the earth,” said the gods, but Brahma answered, “No, that will not do because humans will dig into the earth and find it” then the gods said, “Let’s sink it in the deepest ocean,” but Brahma said, “No, not there, for they will learn to dive into the ocean and will find it.” Then the gods said, “let’s take it to the top of the highest mountain and hide it there” but once again Brahma replied, “No, that will not do either, because they will eventually climb every mountain and once again take up their divinity.” Then the gods gave up and said, “We do not know where to hide it, because it seems that there is no place on earth or in the sea that human beings will not eventually reach.”

Brahma thought for a long time and then said, “Here is what we will do. We will hide their divinity deep in the center of their own being, for humans will never think to look for it there.”

All the gods agreed that this was the perfect hiding place, and the deed was done. And since that time humans have been going up and down the earth, digging, diving, climbing, and exploring—searching for something already with in themselves.

(Author unknown) 

Seeking should be the first priority to re-organize ourselves. We already are perfect, whole and complete. If we do this it can change the very cognition we have about ourselves, life, God, and the world.

Once we have the cognitive shift that true fulfillment is what we are seeking then we automatically become aligned to the reality which is Advaita, oneness.

If we are struggling it means our seeking is not intense enough, we just need to increase it that is all. If we are feeling dead inside it means we have not come in contact with our Source yet. Keep seeking. Seeking is the only thing that can infuse life into our system.

Seeking is the basic requirement for enlightenment.

When one masters seeking—one becomes self-realized. Seeking leads us to ultimately our true nature which is pure consciousness.

Author: Sarvasmarana Ma Nithya

Editor: Renée Picard

Image: David Marcu/Unsplash