What is the true meaning of Life? Life is liberation from ignorance and finding enlightenment, to be able to transcend our mind and the myth we have grown up with. What are we humans working for? We learn and we earn, only for others to burn what we earn. We don’t realize that what we are working for has no meaning. We are working but there is no purpose and before we realize it, our life escapes us.

In Spirituality, we develop a purpose. We find out, ‘Who am I and why am I here?’ Spirituality is the science of the spirit. It makes us realize that life has a purpose and while it must be lived with optimism, work must be done following the ‘ABC Principle’ – A – Accept life without protest as it is the result of our Prarabdha Karma or past actions. B – do our best in whatever we do. In that way, our Agami Karma or present actions are positive. Then C – surrender in Consciousness, in thoughtlessness where thoughts come one after another and don’t disturb our peace. Therefore, when work is done as Karma Yoga and when we start working as a Divine Instrument, our life becomes Divine. This is Spirituality. Spirituality is realizing the simple truth that I am not this body, mind, and ego but the Divine Soul. As long as we live by our ego, then our Mind and Ego, ME will create Karma – good or bad – and we will return to this earth in a rebirth.

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If we want to balance work and life through spirituality, the only way to do that is to remove the ‘balance’ itself. There is no need to balance but we need to devote and dedicate our life to SIP – the Supreme Immortal Power we call God. Yes, we have to do our work. Yes, we have to live our life but we have to live it with Spiritual Realization. We must live life with the Enlightenment of the Truth that ‘nothing is mine, I come alone and I go alone and nobody is mine.’

Our ego makes us believe that success is happiness. People are trying hard to work, live and achieve pleasure but we can’t achieve happiness rather, we have to learn the art of being happy. This is Spirituality – evolving from achievement to contentment and fulfilment and then finally, to Enlightenment.

Spirituality leads to Liberation from the triple suffering of the body, mind, and ego that can be experienced as the pain of the body, misery of the mind, and agony of the ego. A Spiritual person need not balance life and work. Our work becomes our life and our life gets dedicated to working as a Divine Instrument. This is being Spiritually enlightened. This is evolving beyond body, mind, and ego and living as a Divine Soul.

Hence, Spiritual life is where work and life blend in the Realization that I am the Divine spirit, I am the Soul. SOUL is a Spark Of Unique Life. When we realize that we are the Soul, life becomes a celebration and work becomes a matter of complete surrender to the Supreme Divine and one starts living as an instrument of the Supreme Power that we call God. As a Divine Instrument, we seek nothing because we know that desires are the cause of disappointments and misery. We transcend the Mind and Ego, ME, and we live in a state of Consciousness. Spirituality is thus realizing that this world is a show, we are actors, we come and we go!

We must transcend Karma. Normally, people work and live trying to create good Karma but they don’t realize the simple truth that creating good Karma also means that they have to return to the earth to reap the rewards of their Karma and undergo the suffering of the world. Spirituality liberates us from Karma because we can’t be free from the action but can be free in action. When whatever we do, is not done by us but the Divine did through us, we experience oneness with the Divine. We don’t own Karma anymore. We don’t perform any action. Everything is done by the Divine and we become Karma Yogi. We are always connected with the Divine through Karma Yoga. When we live as a Karma Yogi, our life ceases to have a separate identity because we transcend our ME, the Mind, and Ego. We become nothing and thus we become everything. When the wave becomes an ocean, then there is no difference between the wave and the ocean.

With Spirituality, when we become one with the Divine, then there is no need to balance work and life. When we balance, we are going in two opposite directions but when we blend, we live as a Divine Soul. We move towards the ultimate destination of Realization of the Truth, Liberation from all suffering, and ultimately, Unification with the Divine. Work and life then become only a matter of Purification and Illumination.

Are we going to continue to exist just like that till we die or are we going to find out, ‘Who am I and why am I here?’ We need to be liberated from ignorance and become enlightened with the truth. This is our life’s ultimate goal – to realize that we are the Divine Soul. Only then, will we be able to blend our life and work and live as a Spiritual Soul.

(AiR – Atman in Ravi, is a Spiritual leader and Founder of AiR Institute of Realization and AiRCenter of Enlightenment)