The Only Life-Question You Should Ask Yourself!

Watching a man, and a bird surf, made me question life.

I had to get away, get far far away from it all: work stress, relationship ups-and-downs, family problems, health scares. I couldn’t take it anymore. It wasn’t escapism; I needed to unwind, de-stress, stop the cacophony of voices in my head, and feel like a person again.

For some people, getting away means going to the beach, mountains, forests, or for some, it means going halfway across the world to a retreat in Bali. I found my little haven at a meditation retreat in the small, sleepy surfing town of Encinitas in California.

The radiant beauty, tranquillity and pithy spiritual vibrations of the Self- Realization Fellowship — Encinitas Retreat managed to do what mindfulness routines, binge-watching Netflix, hours of Zumba and grooving to the music couldn’t do in months. They made me forget my problems almost instantly.

The Encinitas Meditation Gardens which are a tourist hotspot, are resplendent with lush trees, smiling flowers, buoyant waterfalls and delightful koi ponds with several fish swimming around in them.

The many benches overlooking the vast Pacific find visitors meditating, or watching nature’s beautiful panoramas unfold before their eyes. Some seem to be rendered poetic in the presence of such fathomless beauty and are seen scribbling away in their notebooks, and some become engrossed in deep contemplations.

It’s hard to remain stressed in such environs; I slowly felt my anxiety melt away and a semblance of sanity return.

As my stay progressed, I sought solitude, more and more. One such day found me sitting on a bench watching the ocean. It was a chilly day, and the sun seemed to be engaged in a game of hide and seek with the earth. All I could hear was the sound of the waves breaking against the shore below the bluffs. The mighty roar drowned all other ambient sounds save the chirping of the birds overhead.

The sounds in nature tend to have a profound effect on human consciousness. The roar of the ocean, the downpour of the rain, the wild howling of the winds in the mountains, the soft rustling of leaves. They all re-iterate the existence of a higher power that our small human intellect cannot comprehend. It is as if that power is reaching out to us and asking us to come find it.

As I was lost in my reverie, I noticed a few surfers down by the ocean below the bluffs. One particular man who was in the thick of things caught my eye. I admired his courage and tenacity in suffering those cold November waters for hours, to catch that one perfect wave to ride on.

I bet that the experience made him feel like he could fly on the surface of the waters, conquer the ocean, and maybe get a little bit closer to feeling free and all-powerful.

I pondered about the prodigiously complex human brain that invented the concept of surfing and mastered the art and science behind it.

Engrossed in my musings, I saw a bird fly in and merely sit on the ocean waters, motionless. With each wave, the bird undulated up and down, riding the wave as effortlessly as if it were second nature to him.

Watching how easily the bird could surf as opposed to the man, I had a sudden epiphany, “ That bird is designed to surf on the ocean waters. He has all the equipment, in-built! Man doesn’t have the equipment in-built. He needs to apply intellect, will-power, and resources to learn surfing. And even then, he can never do it as smoothly as the bird.”

It got me thinking, “What is in-built in man? What does he come equipped with? What is he designed to do that no other living being is?”

What is man’s purpose in life? The answer came flooding like the waves to me!

“ …you realize that all along there was something tremendous within you, and you did not know it. ”

— Paramahansa Yogananda (Father of Yoga in the West)

Yoga taught us that we humans are the only living species with a body that is equipped with the seven spinal chakras. The chakras help man transcend the limited world of the five senses and reach super-consciousness. Super-consciousness is the state in which man becomes aware of his real nature as the soul and its oneness with God. This superconscious state can be attained through a deep state of meditation (samadhi). That is what man is perfectly designed for. Meditating! And achieving the state of superconsciousness is his purpose in life!

But man was also given free will to pursue anything he wants. And so, man tries to conquer nature, tame the tides, climb mountains, raft dangerous rivers, invent new things to experience life in different ways, in hopes of feeling a sense of achievement, a sense of completeness.

And in doing so, he tries to go after everything other than what he is designed for, that which is innate in him. His hedonistic nihilism so blinds him; he never realizes his real purpose in life. Call it nirvana, enlightenment, self-realization, following your bliss, or give it any other new-age moniker, the end goal remains the same across the spectrum of religions, faiths, or persuasions we follow. The end goal of man is to know himself and to know God. And if you reflect inside of yourself, you’ll know this to be true.

Most of us are accustomed to looking outside of ourselves for fulfillment. We are living in a world that conditions us to believe that outer attainments can give us what we want. Yet again and again our experiences show us that nothing external can completely fulfill the deep longing within for “something more.” Most of the time, however, we find ourselves striving toward that which always seems to lie just beyond our reach. We are caught up in doing rather than being, in action rather than awareness. It is hard for us to picture a state of complete calmness and repose in which thoughts and feelings cease to dance in perpetual motion. Yet it is through such a state of quietude that we can touch a level of joy and understanding impossible to achieve otherwise.

- Paramahansa Yogananda in “The Yoga Of Jesus — Understanding the Hidden Teachings of the Gospels” (affiliate link).

Have you ever asked yourself this question, “What is man’s purpose in life?”. If you haven’t, you must. It is the only question that matters in life. Every other superficial pursuit you embark on is just noise that keeps you from your real goal.

I don’t teach yoga or meditation, but if you are interested in learning about the path of yoga and meditation, I’d recommend starting here.

Quit worrying and learn to make good decisions with this decision-making cheat sheet.