Whatever I have shared in this book is not something theoretical. It is my own personal experience, my quest, my discovery, and my realization. The first 15 years of my life made me live as a child who was very religious and who devoutly believed in God. From the time I was 16 years till I turned 40, my life was full of achievement, success, wealth and there was no time to even think about the Soul. When I was 40, I shut down my business to do what I love—humanitarian, inspirational, and spiritual work. For 6 years, I lived a life of fulfilment—enjoying peace beyond the pleasure I experienced till then. In my 46th year, my Spiritual Master and mentor, my Guru—J.P. Vaswani, whom we fondly called Dada, provoked me to go on a quest, a search for the truth. Personally, I was seeking happiness and I believed that I had transformed my life from achievement to fulfillment that came from contentment. My mentor's provocation made me go further to seek the ultimate peak of happiness which was devoid of suffering, a peak I called Enlightenment.
I left everything and set out on my quest, my Talaash. My quest essentially focused on these nine questions:
In quest for answers to these questions, I left the world and went into a retreat alone into the mountains. I was determined to find the truth and the answers to the questions that I set out in quest for, since I wanted to understand birth, death, God, heaven, Karma, rebirth, purpose, Enlightenment and the Soul. I knew nothing about this, apart from what the world mumbles. I carried with me not just all the scriptures of all the possible religions that I could lay my hands on, I also carried books of philosophers and authors of theology and spirituality that opened my mind to all possibilities. My quest lasted for 2 years. It started in 2012 when I was 46. On the 31st of August, 2014, I experienced my spiritual moment of 'Aha!' By then, I had many perspectives on the questions I was trying to decode. But on this day, it seemed that I had solved the spiritual jigsaw puzzle of my life. All the pieces of my search came together. I realized the truth about the Soul.
My realization made me transcend my body, my mind, and ego. Till then, I believed that I was Ravi Melwani, a successful businessman who had achieved many things in life. My realization impelled me to change my name. I was not Ravi— Ravi was just my name. I was AiR, Atman in Ravi. I realized that I was not the body that I wore. I was the Soul who was empowering the body. I instantly gave up whatever I was doing after realizing the truth about life. From 1st September 2014, there was a metamorphosis in my life and I started living as the Divine Soul.
My realization came after 48 years of ignorance and I am grateful both to my Guru, Dada and the Divine, without whose grace I would have continued to wander in ignorance. We are all Divine Souls embodied in this body- mind complex and we suffer due to our ignorance.
The realization of the truth liberated me from the triple suffering of the body, mind, and ego. For over 5 years now, I have lived blissfully as an embodied Soul, conscious of the truth that I am not the one I thought I was for 48 years. As far as my Soul is concerned, it seemed like it was born on 1st September 2014, although all along, it was the very cause of my existence. Since then, I have had only one goal – to live as the Soul and to be ultimately liberated and unite with the Divine. I have been blessed with a mission to do nothing else in life, other than to help people realize the truth. My Soul's journey has been a blissful one. Living as a Jivanmukta doesn't excuse me from the onslaught of the craving of the senses of the body. Like anybody else, my eyes see; I hear, smell, taste, and touch. All these create thoughts and feelings, but I have realized that as the Soul, the instrument of liberation is my intellect. I use my intellect to control my mind from producing distracting thoughts, just as I use it to discriminate and choose to do what is right.
Till I was 48 years old, I was a slave to my body senses. I was very passionate, and my life was full of obsessions. When I realized I was the Divine Soul, I used my power of discrimination to live a life of detachment and dispassion, renouncing all those things that would take me back to live as Ravi, not AiR. The reason I changed my name was to become conscious of who I truly was. I was AiR, Atman in Ravi – the Soul. I was not what I appeared to be or the one my Identity card identified me as. Though my passport and bank accounts continue to have my birth name, that is not the truth of who I actually am as per my spiritual realization.
My Soul's journey continues to enjoy bliss and peace. It is very different to live as a Soul, not a body-mind that we normally think ourselves to be. Living with detachment and renunciation doesn't reduce our bliss. Rather we enjoy peace and happiness, unknown to the common man. We become free from disappointments and defeats, from petty annoyances like hurts and heartbreaks. A realized Soul lives without fear, worry, stress, and anxiety. I started enjoying a blissful existence as the Soul, like I never did before. How did I live as the Soul? After crossing the 4 doors of discrimination, dispassion, discipline, and desire for liberation, my life as a Divine Soul led me on to live in a state of Yoga.
What is the true meaning of Yoga? Yoga means Union. To live in Yoga means to live as the Divine Soul that is united with the Universal Supreme Soul. Every moment of my life, I try to be in Yoga. It may be Dhyana Yoga – a union through meditation, Bhakti Yoga, union through devotion, Gyana Yoga, union through education and wisdom or Karma Yoga, union through action. Whatever I do, whether I remain still in silence, I pray, or I do anything, I try not to lose my Divine connection. This is easiest to understand when we compare it to a good SIM card, that never loses connection with the satellite. The moment it loses connection, we lose the network. It continues to be my earnest effort to always be in the network of the Divine. It is not uncommon for the body-mind to disconnect the Soul from Yoga. But our challenge is to regain the connection as soon as we can. Every liberated Soul who is alive will experience desires of the body and the wandering of the mind. I do not deny this truth. I will be lying if I say that I have no desire or craving. But my Soul makes me realize that these are not my desires. I realize that I live in a body-mind complex and I try to transcend my ego, as I live as the Divine Soul. This helps me overcome all the desires and expectations of a normal human being.
My Soul has travelled forward in these past 5 years and every day is a new learning, a step towards the ultimate goal. The moment one realizes the truth that we are the Divine Soul, this realization can never be reversed. Suppose, while living in a small rented house, you realize that the house opposite yours, a large villa which has been locked for 3 years and is the most luxurious home one could dream of, actually belonged to you, what would you do? If a lawyer friend brought you a document that showed that the elderly man who owned the villa was actually your grandfather and had willed it to you after his death, would you still live in that small rented house after realizing that the large bungalow opposite your house actually belonged to you? Most likely you would move into your own house once you realize the truth.
So also, once I realized the truth and enjoyed the blissfulness of being the Soul, it made no sense for me to go back and live as the body and mind. However, in this case, it is not out of choice, but because I am embodied, I am dragged into the world that tries to make me miserable. It takes a lot of conviction after true realization to live as the Divine Soul. My mind often plays tricks on me. It confuses me with its thoughts, just as it drags me into losing the bliss of the Soul by pulling me into the world, whether it is through reminding me of my duties, or dragging me into the desires of lust. Even further, it threatens me with shame! The mind is an expert in stopping the realized one from achieving the ultimate goal of liberation.
So, I live a life with a constant war within. My realized self, battles with the mind and ego and senses of the body. This war is constant and ongoing. It never stops. Unless I live being conscious of who I truly am, I can easily lose the battle. What helps me is my constant Yoga, my Divine connection and what helped me for many years was the grace and guidance of my Guru, who left the earthly abode a year ago, after traversing it for a hundred years. He lived like a Divine Soul and his life was a testimony.
I face a challenge because of my worldly blessings. I am blessed with a lot of wealth, property, name and fame and it is very easy for me to fall in this well of worldly possessions. I am grateful that I do not sink into them. I know I am only a trustee, a custodian of all this. Nothing belongs to me, the Soul that I truly am. All this seems to be owned by the body that I live in and so, I try to be a good caretaker of these possessions. I try to effectively use the wea