Happiness is a matter of practice. Everyone is seeking happiness, yet what is the path? How do we find it?
The ancient process for attaining happiness is called, bhakti-yoga, (bhakti means devotional and yoga means ‘connection.’ I equate this “yoga connection happiness” to the apparent romance of Jane Austen’s novels, (which I will get to a bit later). Indeed, it is the most natural thing for the soul to love, and therefore this Bhakti-yoga is something natural for us. Devotion comes naturally for the pure soul. Yet whom do we love and why? Naturally, we are attracted to a friend with a loving heart. Now, let’s consider our source.
Logically, if our source was just an impersonal glowing ‘radiance,’ it would be strange if it had a desire to love or create anything. And what to speak of creating this world full of personal beings, who seek loving connections with partners, children, friends and even strangers. If God was impersonal, we’d be stuck there also, as far as having a loving divine connection. This primal, deep connection to a personal, loving source is why we seek friendship and love, yet, in this world, we often experience disappointment. Why is this?
The first problem is, we ‘identify’ with these bodies, which are really just temporary vehicles for consciousness. We also get entangled in urges such as lust and selfishness, by misidentifying as the body, and fall under the influence of different ‘modes’ (goodness, passion or ignorance). In reality, we are actually spiritual beings “dba” doing business as humans. The modes act on us when we “identify” with the body. When we begin to practice Bhakti-yoga, we discover (uncover) our real self, which is very beautiful and intelligent, as we are coming from a Source that is unlimited beauty, the reservoir of knowledge and happiness. This is called self-knowledge or self realization.
Let’s take a look at love through Jane Austen’s idea of ‘pure’ romance. Her novels, set in a ‘moral’ universe, teach us that in relationships where selfishness prevails, the “happily ever after” never happens. Only loving friendships offer a satisfactory experience. This was understood long ago by the philosopher Aristotle, who categorized three types of relationship motivated by utility, pleasure or ‘pure’ friendship. With ‘utility,’ one person is being more or less, used, a non-reciprocal relationship. Takers do not make good friends, or lovers. A pleasure-based (mostly selfish) relationship is over as soon as one or both parties is, to put it bluntly, not satisfied with what they are getting out of it. They may want more effort from their partner than they are willing to give. The highest relationships are those in which both parties care about each other and have mutual respect. There’s give and take. They stay together through tough times, tolerate each other’s faults and are willing to grow and improve themselves. It takes work yet why not struggle to improve yourself? Being a jerk doesn’t make for a better life (although some think that they can go on forever this way), burning their relationships to the ground and still be happy. No consequences, right? Very unrealistic.
Jane’s novels are wondrous because they profoundly illustrate forms of reciprocal love, in the mode of pure friendship which is why they are generally considered to be the most romantic ever written. Therefore it’s odd when scholars call attention to her ‘anti-romantic’ stance. What does this mean? Well, her heroines never fall victim to irrational or wishful thinking. Lizzy Bennett is able to be cool headed, even when Mr. Wickham more or less dumps her for an heiress with a small fortune. She doesn’t fall hopelessly in love before she understands whether a man is a worthy partner (or not). Same with Eleanor Dashwood in Sense and Sensibility. They all demonstrate a very basic self-control where matters of the head (and heart) are concerned. Most importantly, Jane Austen makes chastity elegant. Even if we are not bothered by loose morals, somehow we still feel badly for those characters who ruin their lives by engaging in sex based solely on physical gratification. Especially Jane had something to say when love (or rather lust), is so often introduced as “love at first sight.” Showing the great differences between pure love as opposed with lust, is what Jane does so profoundly.
Jane encourages us to use our intelligence and to love, intelligently. Again, heroines are careful when they find themselves getting that ‘crush’ on a guy. I find it nice too, that they usually get good advice (often just in time!) from a wise friend or an aunt or a cousin. When the love endorphins kick in, we can fall victim to that semi-mindless state which causes us to stop thinking and then it’s all downhill. So when we rush into relationships, ignoring all the signs that the person has no intention of reciprocating, what can we expect but unhappiness? Stupid love is not romance and, “But I love him/her” is not a compelling argument. Rather, it’s more like irrational, wishful thinking. Somehow people get themselves into relationships that are, my teacher says, sort of like climbing into one of those machines that grinds up tree branches. Many only realize their mistake after they’re married with several kids, and not many options for escape. It’s better to be a realist, face up to the possibility that you are falling for the wrong person, and get the heck outta Dodge before you tie the knot.
The character of a person takes time to understand, so resist the urge to risk everything before you really know what you are investing in. Jane’s heroines feel those strong feelings of attraction, yet what keeps them out of the power of the wrong guy has to do with philosophy. Also reality checks with wise friends. Whatever it takes to gain perspective and support the checking of emotions. Gotta love the realism! Jane’s villainous ‘cads’ often seem like perfect gentlemen–at first. In P&P, the heroine, Lizzy, finally realizes that she mistook the real “bad guy” for the good one. “There certainly was some mismanagement…one has all the goodness and the other has all the appearance of it.”
Think about how a relationship works and that when you are dealing with the Supreme, the source of everything, what else, but live, do we really have to offer? One of the most famous verses in the Gita is-
“Engage your mind always in thinking of Me, offer obeisances and worship Me. Being completely absorbed in Me, surely you will come to Me”(9.34).
Jane teaches this principle of pure love in her novels and Bhagavad-gita promotes this devotional love as the simplest and best way to reconnect to our source. Once we ‘plug into’ that source it becomes easy to love others and to discover ourselves. Win-win situation!
Jane Austen Yoga 