The Inadequate Life

“A human being sees himself as a deficient person. His constant, compulsive pursuits make his sense of inadequacy evident.” So begins the book titled “Introduction To Vedanta - Understanding the fundamental problem” by Swami Dayananda. Our constant pursuit of wealth and pleasure almost inevitably ends up in a sense of emptiness - the rock keeps rolling back down like the curse of Sisyphus.

The Fundamental Error & The Solution

• There is a perpetual sense of inadequacy in all of us that vanishes only very momentarily under some circumstances.

• No external pursuit of wealth & pleasure is going to make one feel adequate completely and permanently. One’s day to day experience is the evidence for this.

• This sense of inadequacy to start with is because of the ignorance that we are and have always been fully adequate. (this is a big leap) Ignorance blurs our view and stops us from seeing this, thus leading to the fundamental error.

• One needs the right means of knowledge to remove this ignorance.

• Vedanta is that knowledge.

More in posts to come.