Swami Tejomayananda

What is it that makes a baby a source of joy for all?  The answer is simple but profound — a baby is free of desires. Of course it has biological needs like hunger and thirst but, otherwise, a baby has no desires. Its eyes reflect its state of freedom from desires. There is only one other being whose eyes reflect total desirelessness — the Man of Realisation.
Man begins his life without desire (as an infant) and spiritual evolution culminates, again in freedom from desire (in the Man of Realisation). But somewhere in between, somehow, desire crops up and the struggles begin. We keep working to achieve “success without stress” and often end up with “stress without success”!
We hear about so many kinds of management nowadays, such as, time management, stress management — it goes on and on. Every now and then, new aspects are brought under the purview of management. But few realise that all these areas, though individually useful, are only limited aspects of life. Without a holistic vision, mere study of the limited aspects is insufficient. What we need to focus on primarily is life management and work towards gaining a total vision of life. There are many who have achieved a lot in life and are successful in specific walks of life, but they lack a sense of fulfilment in life as a whole.
Riches do not guarantee happiness. There is nothing wrong in being rich, but if one is at the same time discontented or unfulfilled, then the very purpose of those riches seems defeated. So clearly, our main focus should be on life management. With that larger understanding in the background, our efforts to work on any particular aspect will be more meaningful and fruitful.
Though the state of desirelessness is the most desirable, desires do come up in all of us, often uninvited, and every negative emotion — jealousy, anger, stress and so on — finds for its parent, desire alone. Hence the first aspect of life management is desire management.
Desire per se is not a cause of bondage. But when it increases in quantity and decreases in quality to unmanageable levels, it destroys man. Now, how do we go about managing our desires? The scriptures have divided man’s life into four stages and at each stage have prescribed different rules to be followed:

Student Life (Brahmacharya Ashram): The foundation for this stage is discipline. Without discipline, neither is study possible, nor a successful life. Hence discipline in acquiring knowledge prepares you for discipline in living that knowledge later.

Householder’s Life (Grihastha Ashram): The cornerstone of this stage is the spirit of service. Our view of service is limited, or distorted — we think only of “acts” of service, not the “spirit” of service. Service is not an “act” but an “attitude”. We can serve even with a loving look or a consoling pat. The readiness to serve at all times, just for the joy of giving, should be the hallmark of a grihastha. Once you serve as best as you can, you come to deserve the best.

Spiritual life (Vanaprastha Ashram): This signifies retirement from worldly things but recommitment to more and deeper spiritual pursuit. Self-inquiry is the foundation of vanaprastha ashrama in an atmosphere of tapas — austerity.

Renunciation (Sannyasa Ashram): Sannyasa is not just a change of the colour of one’s clothes, it is the renunciation of all one’s likes, dislikes, desires and ego. One can be totally free of desires only when one is full within. Complete freedom from desire adorns a sannyasi only because of his/her constant abidance in the self. His/her is a life of total renunciation, other than the bare needs for survival.

It has been noted that if each stage is lived by its founding principle, desire management will be spontaneous. One will move through discipline, spirit of service and self-inquiry, to abidance in the self, transcending desire to reach desirelessness.
Thus, starting from a baby’s desireless to the same exalted state as a Man of Realisation, one traverses these various stages. The circle must be completed —then life would not only be managed, but it would reach its culmination in total fulfilment.

— Swami Tejomayananda, head of Chinmaya Mission Worldwide, is an orator, poet, singer, composer and storyteller. To find out more about Chinmaya Mission and Swamiji, visit
www.chinmayamission.com.
© Central Chinmaya Mission Trust.