Is Happiness Not Also A Condition

By krishnasmercy on May 1, 2024 • ( 0 )

“All glory and success to Shrila Narada Muni because he glorifies the activities of the Personality of Godhead, and so doing he himself takes pleasure and also enlivens all the distressed souls of the universe.” (Shrimad Bhagavatam, 1.6.38)

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अहो देवर्षिर्धन्योऽयं यत्कीर्तिं शार्ङ्गधन्वन:
गायन्माद्यन्निदं तन्‍त्र्या रमयत्यातुरं जगत्

aho devarṣir dhanyo ’yaṁ
yat-kīrtiṁ śārṅgadhanvanaḥ
gāyan mādyann idaṁ tantryā
ramayaty āturaṁ jagat

“Can we further discuss this concept of fake or illusory happiness? I came across that teaching recently while skimming the pages of Vishnu Purana. Prahlada Maharaja makes an eye-opening case to his classmates in the gurukula, during the reign of the Daitya leader named Hiranyakashipu. His Divine Grace A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada makes a similar argument, that even if we think we are happy, we are only kidding ourselves.

“The justification for the argument is reasonable. The knowers of the truth say that the happiness with which we are familiar is based on conditions. For instance, if we are suffering through terror, the elimination of the threat results in happiness. We feel great in the aftermath, but is that really something to be thankful for? Would it not have been better to never face the threat to begin with?

“The same concept applies to practically every situation in the grand tapestry that is the complete life experience. We celebrate graduation from primary education, but why did we have to suffer so much in the classroom? We take joy in two people getting married, but there will also be misery in the future. I am thrilled to land a new job, which pays a higher salary, but why was I stuck at the previous place for so long?

“The logic makes sense to me. I understand how an intelligent person sees this happiness as inferior, falling under duality. The question I have is about happiness itself. Is that not also a condition? Is that not also based on a paired opposite, which is called distress? Are we not advised to tolerate happiness and distress, in the manner of the changing of seasons?”

मात्रा-स्पर्शास् तु कौन्तेय
शीतोष्ण-सुख-दुःख-दाः
आगमापायिनो ऽनित्यास्
तांस् तितिक्षस्व भारत

mātrā-sparśās tu kaunteya
śītoṣṇa-sukha-duḥkha-dāḥ
āgamāpāyino ‘nityās
tāṁs titikṣasva bhārata

“O son of Kunti, the nonpermanent appearance of happiness and distress, and their disappearance in due course, are like the appearance and disappearance of winter and summer seasons. They arise from sense perception, O scion of Bharata, and one must learn to tolerate them without being disturbed.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 2.14)

To begin, we acknowledge the validity to the categorization, which applies to material living itself. That living begins at birth and ends at death, except the cycle can repeat. For as long as the cosmic manifestation remains. Beyond and into the next cycle, after the passage of an entire kalpa, there is the potential to be caught up in the same sequence.

भूत-ग्रामः स एवायं
भूत्वा भूत्वा प्रलीयते
रात्र्य्-आगमे ऽवशः पार्थ
प्रभवत्य् अहर्-आगमे

bhūta-grāmaḥ sa evāyaṁ
bhūtvā bhūtvā pralīyate
rātry-āgame ‘vaśaḥ pārtha
prabhavaty ahar-āgame

“Again and again the day comes, and this host of beings is active; and again the night falls, O Partha, and they are helplessly dissolved.” (Lord Krishna, Bhagavad-gita, 8.19)

If there is a pest infestation in the home and we call a professional service to run an inspection, their work does not end with the final report. They point out the various vulnerabilities, the places in which we might have trouble with varieties of pests. They will also provide a solution. In other words, there is a way out of the misery.

If we consider the temporary nature of happiness and distress, how they are based on conditions, to be a pest, then someone like Prahlada Maharaja is informing us for our benefit. It is not simply to criticize or to put someone down. There is a solution. There is a kind of living that is not based on conditions.

The happiness in that case is not a condition. It is the constitutional way. It is impossible to describe, since our only points of reference, based on the current hard-drive of memory, relate to conditions. The Sanskrit word ananda may better describe the condition of bliss in the state of liberation, but one has to experience it to believe it.

One way to know that there is ananda not tied to conditions is to study behavior, to see how a person responds to various situations. We have the case of Narada Muni, who is known as a travelling preacher. He constantly glorifies the Supreme Personality of Godhead, who is never impacted by duality. This is one of the distinctions in comparison. We are blissful by nature, in our constitutional position, but we have vulnerability to delusion, whereas God the person is never vulnerable.

Narada Muni has the blessing to constantly glorify, no matter the time or the circumstance. This activity is itself blissful. There is also variety within the transcendental life experience of Narada. He goes from place to place. He meets different people. He counsels based on the knowledge of the receiver and also what short-term objectives need to be reached.

The happiness Narada experiences is not based on conditions. It is not one of the conditions in duality. This is because the service will continue. He will always get to see the Supreme Lord through his glorification. He is never separated from transcendence. Narada is living liberation; he is not trying to attain it.

We can always judge the impact of illusion or the material energy by studying the aftermath. If we suffer from a temporary bout of sadness, from pain and suffering, do we continue in transcendence? Do we maintain a spiritual vision? Do we deviate from the principles we know are beneficial to the individual as spirit soul? If we are steady in our connection with Bhagavan, it means that the happiness experienced will not be a condition; it will be our very existence.