Stephanie Snyder will be visiting triyoga in March for a series of workshops, including an exploration of the classic text, the Atma Bodha, and how to apply the teachings to our daily lives. Here, she gives us her personal insights into the text and a flavour of what to expect during her visit:Â Â
Who am I? You have a name but you are not your name. You have a job but you are not your job. You’re in a relationship or you’re not but you are not your relationship status. You have a bank account balance but you are not that. So why do we often live our lives as though those things define us or worse, affirm our value? This misunderstanding about our inherent value and identity is at the root of our suffering. If you tie your value or identity to your profession, what happens if you lose the job? Who are you without the money, the relationship, and all of these external qualifiers? When you strip all of those accessories away, what is left?
This longing to understand who we are is compulsory to the human experience. This is where the Atma Bhoda text is so helpful and why I am offering a full weekend of workshops infused with its teaching. Atma is the true self. Bhoda comes from the Sanskrit root ‘budh’ which means ‘to know’. The Atma Bhoda is the text of self-knowledge. Every human being has a hankering to feel significant. We tend to chase after our value thinking once I have a child, become the CEO, or (fill in the blank) then I will feel significant. And when we finally achieve the goal, we may experience some pleasure or satisfaction but it begins to fade immediately. We get that same hankering again, the call from somewhere deep within to express our significance. We become restless. We start chasing the next thing that is sure to make us happy, that will affirm us. Never pausing to ask ourselves: is it working?
The reason we feel compelled to experience and express our significance is because we are! But not because of any achievement or status, that is a confusion that keeps us chasing our tail.
The word for unbroken joy in Sanskrit is ananda. Nanda means joy. The ‘a’ in front of ‘nanda’ indicates ‘from all sides’. Ananda is joy from all sides. The Atma Bhoda helps us understand that ananda is who we are. That we need not turn this way and that trying to catch joy from one side or another. The light of this understanding dispels all longing. The Atma Bhoda shows us that our significance is inherent and complete. Therefore it can never be diminished or enhanced by any external qualifier.
The text ends by explaining that once we realise our inherent nature which is sacred, untouched by the outer world and independent of time and place, which destroys the pairs of opposites, illumines all and also itself- this brings spontaneously with it eternal joy.
