What does independence mean to you?

Independence generally means...
not depending upon another. Independence means there is no superior over us. Independence is when no one interferes. Independence is when one feels fearless that, ‘Nothing can cause any harm to me!’ Independence is experienced when one is totally free and liberated!

Param Pujya Dada Bhagwan, the Enlightened being, explains:
“In reality, this world is truly independent and no one can interfere with another. And if it were not so, there would be no end to people's fear and no one would achieve liberation. Even Lord Mahavir would not have attained liberation.

Lord Mahavir was completely impervious to any feelings projected towards him by others. People's feelings towards him ranged from reverence to contempt; from love to sexual desire; from respect to insult, but nothing affected him. There was no element of retaliation in him to anything.

The one who is free from retaliation attains final liberation (complete independence). The one who retaliates has to stay behind to suffer the consequences.”

So, who can become free and independent?
Param Pujya Dadashri reveals, “The one whose anger-pride-deceit-greed are gone can be free and independent; or else not, how can he? The reason that you have a superior over you is because of these mistakes. You will have to destroy your mistakes, isn’t it?”

The world is entirely independent. Our mistakes and our blunders are our only superiors
“If you are not at fault, no one in this world will bother you. Do people or policemen in the street bother you?” asks Param Pujya Dadashri.
No, it means you have not committed those faults!

Param Pujya Dadashri further clarifies, “No one can harm or harass anyone else in this world. The harassments you experience in your life are a result of the harassment you had meted out upon others in your past life. These people that harass you are ‘visitors’ that you have invited yourself. They come with as much force as you had initially exerted. All that you encounter in your life are the collective circumstances of what you had done in your previous life.”

We have no Boss to command over us; even God is not our Superior?
“People believe that God is their superior and that if they were to pray to him, God will free them from everything. But there is actually no superior; you yourself are your superior. You are your own protector and your own destroyer. You are whole and sole responsible for yourself. You are the boss. Absolutely no one else can meddle in it.

Every living being in this universe is the Lord of this universe. It is because of your ignorance of your real Self that you live life like a struggling creature. He that has no sense of ownership of his own body is the owner of the entire universe. This whole universe belongs to you. To understand this is liberation. Why then do you still not understand this? It is because you are still bound by your mistakes.

I have no superior over me. There is absolutely no one above you up there. It’s only you! There is no one to impose any punishment on you, nor is there anyone to grant you life. You yourself are responsible for your birth and for the cycle of your birth and death. If you asked me whether anyone was capable of interfering in your life, I would categorically say No, No, No! If you ask me whether I have any superior over me, again I would give you a categorical answer, No, No, No!” says Param Pujya Dadashri.

If we want absolute independence and freedom, then we will have to destroy all our mistakes.
Who can bother us if we destroy our mistakes?
No one!
And how do we destroy our mistakes?
We can realize and see our mistakes only upon discovering ‘who I really am?’ This happens when we attai
Self-Realization!

We are really a pure Soul that is Free and Independentr
We are really a pure Soul and yet we claim that, ‘I am John (please insert your name here).’
Claiming to be something that we are not is called the ego. It is this ego, created through false impositions, that binds karma, and it is the ego that experiences the fruits of karma. When this ego leaves, we become the Soul; we become independent.

Due to ignorance of our real Self, since innumerable births, we, the Soul, have had to accompany the body complex through the vicious cycle of births and deaths.

When the wrong belief about one’s real identity is gone, one becomes independentr
When the wrong belief about one’s real identity is gone, one becomes independent; completely independent! But only when one attains the human form and meets the Gnani Purush, one can achieve liberation. It is for this reason that the spiritually and highly-developed celestial beings, even amidst bountiful luxuries, have an intense desire to acquire human form when their Soul leaves the celestial body.

We are already lucky to have been born as a human being in this birth. And we are even luckier to have a Gnani, the Enlightened One, at this time amidst us.

So come, let’s go to Gnani, who is capable of destroying our blunder (the ignorance of the Self) and is able to show us the way to destroy all our mistakes (emerging from anger-pride-deceit and greed). Let’s become free and independent using the path that the Gnani shows us!

To know more: https://www.dadabhagwan.org/path-to-happiness/spiritual-science/moksha/