Full and Complete Happiness
The pursuit of happiness is the primary driving force and the sole purpose of human existence. In and through all our endeavors, we are all looking for one and only one thing—full and complete happiness. We try to look for happiness by fulfilling our desires in the form of possessions, relationships, and experiences. We attempt to get what we like and avoid what we dislike.
However, by repeated experience and some reflection, we discover that the happiness we get by satisfying our desires is not completely fulfilling and lasting because every object, relation, and situation is subject to constant change. And in the meanwhile, our tastes change too. In addition, every satisfied desire, though momentarily gratifying, leaves our mind evermore dissatisfied, pining for something else, till that something else also meets the same fate. We also come to realize that everlasting happiness cannot be derived from objects that are inherently finite and impermanent.
Is there something which is complete and full—which includes everything and excludes nothing—attaining which there is nothing left here to attain? Essentially, it is like saying that full and complete happiness is possible when one has everything in the universe. Is it possible? Yes, declares Vedānta boldly. Vedānta explains that true happiness resides in the infinite alone. There is no happiness in the finite: yo vai bhūmā tat sukham na alpe sukham asti यो वै भूमा तत् सुखम् न अल्पे सुखम् अस्ति (Chāndogya Upaniṣad 7.23.1).
It is our common experience that whenever we feel sorrowful we are missing something. All unhappiness involves some sense of gnawing limitation. It is in the limitless alone that there is full and complete happiness.
Vedānta calls this limitlessness as Brahman.
Five corollaries follow from the foregoing analysis:
- Knowingly or unknowingly, we are all seeking freedom from limitations.
- Ultimately, we are all trying to attain to fullness or Brahman. Attaining this alone can put an end to our ever-seeking mind.
- This fullness is not something that can be “created” since that which is created will always be limited and subject to the vagaries of time. Muṇḍaka Upaniṣad 1.2.12 uses the expression nāsty akṛtaḥ kṛtena (नास्त्य् अकृतः कृतेन): The uncreated cannot be gained through action.
- Full and complete happiness is that which is uncaused and free from any sense of limitation and dependence whatsoever.
- This fullness must be our very nature. For anything external to us will only create more dependence and limitation.
Happiness is not a place we go to; it is a place we come from.
Happiness is our very nature!
Another bold declaration that Vedānta makes is that happiness is our very nature. This belies our experience and seems counter-intuitive at first. In order to understand it properly, we have to carefully analyze our familiar experience. Generally, we believe that happiness arises from attaining the objects of our desire. Our tacit assumption is that happiness resides in the desired object. On close examination we realize that there is no such object which accords invariable happiness to everyone all the time. There is no cause-and-effect relationship between any object and happiness. If it were so, the same object will be a source of happiness for everyone, which is obviously not the case at all.
Then why do we feel happiness when a desire is fulfilled? The sages explain it in this manner: When our mind sets itself upon a desire, it feels restless and agitated. When we gain the desired object, our mind feels calm and peaceful, albeit momentarily. Thus, happiness does not spring from the attainment of the desired object per se, but from the pacification of the desiring mind or wanting mind. A non-desiring mind is the happy mind.
Now we come to the most important conclusion—Happiness is that calm, desire-free state of our mind when it abides in the Self and savors its innate fullness of being.
It may also be noted that when Arjuna asked Śrī Kṛṣṇa to describe the marks of sthitaprajña—one who is steadfast in the wisdom of the Self—in the second chapter of the Bhagavad Gītā (2.54 -55)—Śrī Kṛṣṇa, starts the description of sthitaprajña as follows: prajahāti yadā kāmān sarvān…manogatān: ‘having thoroughly casted off all the desires obtaining in the mind…and satisfied in the Self through the joy of the Self, such a person is called steadfast in wisdom.’
In book two (Ananda Vallī), anuvāka eight of Taittirīya Upaniṣad, a wisdom text dealing with Self-knowledge, we come across a most detailed analysis, mīmāṁsā, of different levels of bliss, ānanda, experienced by various species. It starts with the worldly happiness of humans and concludes with the infinite bliss of Brahman, brahmānanda.
The Upaniṣad asks us to imagine a young person learned in sacred lore, steadfast in heart, endowed with supreme health, strength, and courage; possessor of the wealth of the entire earth and ruler of the whole earth—if someone should ever possess all these gifts, then the bliss of that person would represent, let’s say, one unit of human happiness or bliss. The Upaniṣad obviously wants to pack all that a human being can ever yearn for here on earth in terms of the unencumbered enjoyment of worldly pleasures.
The Upaniṣad continues to describe levels of higher bliss, increasing it by a factor of x 100 at every successive level, in describing the bliss of celestial beings—divine gandharvas, pitṛs (manes), various devas (gods), Indra (lord of devas), bṛhaspati, prajāpati, and finally the bliss of Brahma, brahmānanda. Calculated thus, one unit of the bliss of Brahman, brahmānanda, is equal to 10 power 20 (1020) times of all the viṣayānanda, bliss from all the objects in the world enjoyed by a human being!
In essence, the Upaniṣad wants to highlight the fact that the same bliss, brahmānanda, is also enjoyed by the seer who knows the Self, as revealed by the Vedas (śrotriya), and who is not tormented by desire (akāmahataḥ).
In his illuminating commentary on Taittirīya Upaniṣad, Swami Dayananda, a contemporary teacher par excellence of Vedānta, illumines a very vital point: “It is clear that akāmahatatvam [desirelessness] is necessary for the increase in ānanda….To the extent a person is able to grow out of the desire for objects, to that extent he is happy.”[1]
The seer who is not stricken by desire enjoys limitless ānanda [bliss]. His ānanda is not “produced,” janya ānanda—it is svarūpānanda….ānanda of the essential nature of the ātmā [Self]….It is svābhāvika [natural]….[not dependent on any special mental mode, vṛttiviśeṣa]. Svarūpānanda…is ānanda which is paripūrnaḥ; it is the wholeness, the limitlessness, of the ātmā [Self]….Once a person knows that is his svarūpa, he is free.’[2]
One who has attained the spiritual bliss of Brahman (brahmānanda) possesses and surpasses all other levels of happiness: Brahmavit āpnoti param: Taittirīya Upaniṣad (II.i.1). Brahmānanda is ātmānanda knowing which one crosses over sorrow, once and for all: तरति शॊकं आत्म वित्: tarati śokaṁ ātma vit: The knower of the Self overcomes sorrow (Chāndogya Upaniṣad 7.1.3).
This is the full and complete happiness. That you are: Tat Tvam Asi: तत्त्वम्असि (Chāndogya Upaniṣad 6.8.7).
We have come full circle: Know yourself and be fulfilled.
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[1] See: Taittiriya Upanisad by Swami Dayananda Saraswati (Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania: Arsha Vidya Gurukulum, 2005), [transcribed and edited by John Warne], pp. 320-350.
[2] Ibid., 328, 333.
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