Dear Amita,

Man is born for two reasons: The first is to complete our Destiny, and the second is to make spiritual progress in order to attain God- realization, or everlasting Bliss. It is only after our Destiny is completed through various relationships, interactions and situations, that one can achieve God-realization, or realize the divinity within oneself.

    When God gave us life, He gave us the willful action (free choice) to do whatever we wanted. With our willful action, we can choose either to ride the roller coaster of happiness and unhappiness caused by the Great Illusion (Maya), or do spiritual practice and go beyond the Great Illusion.

    Holy texts and spiritual paths underlying various religions provide instruction in how to execute these duties. In other words, they show us the purpose of life. For example, Righteousness (Dharma), wealth, desire and the Final Liberation (Moksha) are the four pursuits of human life according to Hindu Scriptures. In order to achieve this four-fold purpose, one has take help from society, the guidance laid down by Holy people (Saints and Sages), efforts of our ancestors and God. In other words, one is supposed to repay the ‘debt’ or perform one’s duty towards society, Holy people, ancestors and God.

    The Vedas have laid down a system of stages of life as a means of performing these duties. When explaining the duties to be performed in the various stages of life, man’s lifespan is considered to be one hundred years and has been divided into four parts. Each part is called a stage. The four stages are:

The stage of a celibate (brahmacharya): In this stage, one has to live in the hermitage of a spiritual master (Guru), and study the Holy Scriptures. This includes study of the code of Righteousness and undertaking vowed religious observances.

The stage of a householder (gruhastha): In this stage, through procreation, performing fire sacrifices, study of scriptures, and receiving and serving guests, one repays the three debts towards society, ancestors and God, respectively. The main form of spiritual practice is to make offerings to social and religious causes and shoulder the responsibility of caring for the needs of those observing the path of Spirituality through renunciation (sannyas).

The stage of a retired householder (vanaprastha): In this stage, as one ages, one retires to live in the forest, renouncing one’s home. Spiritual practice of this stage is undertaken with the objectives of purifying the physical body and undertaking the study of scriptures. One can accept this stage when one has borne a son, or their son bears a son. This stage occurs when one is between 50 and 75 years old. However, if one has developed intense detachment, then according to the Holy scriptures, one is allowed to go directly from the celibate stage to this stage, without having to go through the 25 years of the householder stage.

    It is noteworthy that living in a retirement home is not necessarily equivalent to this stage, as one may not necessarily have developed detachment from one’s possessions and relationships to execute the duties in this stage.

The stage of a renunciant (sannyas): ‘Sann’ means “all”, and ‘nyas’ means “to give up”. In this final stage, towards the end of life, one renounces the world in order to attain God-realization. In the stage of retired householder, since one lives in one place, even though it is a forest, there is a chance of developing attachment for that place. To avoid developing such attachment, a renunciant does not stay in one place for more than three days. One can undertake this stage only after going through all the other three stages, or when one develops detachment irrespective of the stage that one is currently in. One can undertake this stage only after one has sought permission for doing so from one’s parent or caretaker.

    These stages are beneficial in gradually detaching oneself from desire and wealth, thus helping one to face the cycle of happiness and unhappiness due to Destiny, and attain God-realization. To accomplish the spiritual practice of this final stage, the first three are helpful. Thus, the four stages are inter-related. In light of this, seekers of the Sanatan organization are encouraged to practice Spirituality while living in society and developing gradual detachment by performing spiritual practice in ashrams (hermitages) periodically. Those with intense motivation for God-realization may leave their worldly pursuits to do full-time spiritual practice in a hermitage.