THE MISERABLE FERRIS WHEEL GAME

The nature of the spirit soul is Sat-Cit-Ananda i.e. the soul is eternal, full of knowledge and full of bliss. In contrast, the body is temporary and full of ignorance and suffering. Because of this incompatibility between the two, the soul, who is meant to be happy in an eternal blissful atmosphere, is never happy in this temporary miserable body. The soul has to repeatedly ex­perience birth, old age, disease and death in different bodies.

Hence Shankaracarya has sung:

punar api jananam punar api maranam,

punar api janani jatare sayanam

iha samsare bahu dustare kripaya pare pahi murare

"O Murari, Lord Krishna, I am repeatedly tossed in the waves of birth and death. I am forced to be born again and again and forced to die again and again. In this way I have been occupying the wombs of millions of mothers. Please kindly shower your merciful glance upon me and deliver me from this ocean of nescience."

In this way, the soul sometimes is damned to occupy a dog's body or blessed to get a human body, depending on his past de­sires and activities. This cycle of birth and death is like a Ferris  wheel where sometimes you are at the top and sometimes at the bottom. Similarly the soul keeps on taking one body after another until he becomes completely purified and becomes a surrendered devotee of God.

Excerpt from 

ART OF MIND CONTROL

Compiled By Radheshyam Das M. Tech. (IIT)

Director, BACE Pune.

THE MISERABLE FERRIS WHEEL GAME