The vedantic philosophy proclaims that every individual is an embodiment of Sat-Chit-Ananda, the three states of consciousness. It is also said that there is God in every individual. To realize the God in oneself, one has to be in the triple conscious state, i.e the state of satchitananda. This state is considered as the state of Brahman or God.

Since I am no expert in the vedas and still a student in the class called life I am reporducing the explanation of sat-chit-ananda given in a discourse by Sathya Sai Baba.

For this endless aspect of Brahman people have also ascribed three different meanings. They are Sat, Chit and Ananda. The first word 'Sat' is regarded as more important than the others. 'Chit' has been regarded as something which gives knowledge about the infinite. 'Ananda' has been regarded as the bliss or happiness of a type quite different from and higher than the sensory happiness. The first quality is 'being' and refers to that which signifies permanence. The second quality is awareness and the third quality is bliss. These three qualities are associated with Brahman. For the first word Sat, we shall take an example from common daily life.

Sat:-

In this world many people die and we all see the dead bodies being disposed of. In spite of the fact that several people die and leave the world, each individual thinks that he is going to be permanent. In spite of the fact that this person sees so many people die, he still has the desire to live forever and he genuinely feels that he alone is permanent. If we ask ourselves whether this feeling is due to ignorance or lack of knowledge and whether it is an illusion, we come to the conclusion that to him, it is a very important truth. Within him there is a quality of permanence and the divine self that is indestructible gives him this feeling of permanence. Man daily sees and experiences sorrows and pleasures, which are quite common in this world, but he aspires to have bliss and Ananda. What does this signify? This signifies the aspect of Brahman and this is the aspect of Ananda in him. Everyone knows that when he is in some temporary trouble, he tends to say 'Oh God! Why not let me die instead of putting me through this torture'? These words are not really coming from the depths of his heart. Nobody would say, from the depths of his heart that he would die rather than live a troubled life. This is only an apparent feeling which arises because of the temporary troubled state of his mind.

Sometimes as a result of distress and difficult circumstances, we think that we better die but in truth and in fact even an old woman who is not able to use her legs would not like to depart from life. In this, we should see that we are really hankering after permanency, an inherent quality of the Brahman in each one of us. We should ask what it is that makes us want to live for and hanker after, and we get the answer that it is Brahman. So, whether we are in the Adhyatmic path or in a path completely devoid of belief in God, we are hankering after something and that is the aspect of Brahman.

Chit:-

When we try to understand the second word, 'Chit' or awareness, we should ask ourselves what it is that we are really wanting to be aware of. We want to be aware of everything that we see or hear. If any one sees a few people who are grouped together and talking about something, immediately he tries to go there and find out what they are talking about. Even if that is something which is not relevant to us, we want to know about it. Mothers who continually spend their time with their children and fathers who are affectionate and concerned about their children will understand this aspect well. When the parents take the children either to a cinema or to an exhibition, the parents will be subjected to a stream of questions about various things and the mother and father are often fed up with the large number of questions which these children ask. Children accompanying their parents keep on asking 'what is this'? 'who is that'? 'why is this'? and on and so on. They keep on asking these questions till the parents are fed up. In these questions, we see an attempt on the part of the children to look at this beautiful world and take the entire world into themselves. To what aspect does this desire to know everything belong? Is there any connection between these children and the various things which they want to understand? Is there any relevance of these children to the things they want to learn? There is no such connection or obvious relevance. There is some internal urge and an intense feeling in these children by which they want to become aware and learn of all the manifestations around them. This is an aspect of Brahman. That is why it has been said that 'awareness is life'. In other words this desire to be wise about everything is something which is present inside in your heart.

Ananda:-

We come to the third aspect, Ananda or bliss. Man always wants to have bliss. Man is hankering after bliss. He does not want to have sorrow at any time or under any circumstances. Bliss is something natural to us. Sorrow or pain are unnatural to man. There is a small example. When a child is happy and playing, even the mother does not ask him anything nor does she question how this happiness has come about. But if the same child is crying, the mother will come running irrespective of the importance of the work in which she is engaged. The cry of the child is something unnatural and immediately attracts the attention of the mother. If someone is happy and is enjoying himself no one will go and ask him why he is so happy. If someone is crying, anyone who notices it would go and ask why he is crying. Sorrow is not natural to us. So, only if someone is steeped in sorrow does another person want to enquire why one is in sorrow. If you are happy, no one will come and ask you why you have not been crying in the recent past. So what is natural to us is Ananda or bliss and this is a strength to us. It is such bliss and happiness that has the form of our Atma. This truth of existence or being, this awareness and this bliss constitute the Brahman in us. If we try to look and find these aspects of Brahman somewhere external and outside of us, we will not find them and that is not the right thing to do. This aspect of Brahman is a part and parcel of our life. This aspect of Brahman has been described by Sankara as 'Jeevo Vedai'.

Therefore, in the very first instance we should understand these three aspects of Brahman, namely Sat, Chit and Ananda. In every one there is this aspect of Sat and in every one there is wisdom and everyone has the bliss in him. Therefore every one must attach importance only to the aspect of Brahman. But we are promoting the illusion of attachment to the body and because of this we are unable to understand the real aspect of Brahman.

 

Being in the state of sat-chit-ananda at least seems easy in theory. It's upto each of one of us to put them into practice.