DESIRE FOR GOD

In his discussion of Shankara’s Crest Jewel of Discrimination, Swami Prabhavananda notes that in order for a person to be liberated, he must first have the will to do it.  He first must be born a human, of course, but then he must have the will to know God and be liberated.  Ramakrishna said, pray that you have the will to do it. 
 
Necessary for liberation, Prabhavananda went on to explain, are health, the will, purity, the desire to live a spiritual life, spiritual practices, including “discrimination” between the Atman and the non-Atman, which is to say between the real and the unreal, and then direct perception of Brahman, continuous union with Brahman, constant recollectedness, in other words recalling God throughout the day, and from this, Prabhavananda said, a person attains final liberation.

What he does not say, however, is that these conditions are inevitable in the person.  It will take thousands of lifetimes possibly, hopefully fewer, but it is the nature of the process that the conditions will occur eventually, as will the liberation. 
 
This is because the desire for God and liberation is, in fact, the desire of the Atman for Brahman, its source.  Like the needle of a compass is drawn to a magnet, so is the Atman in a person pulled toward Brahman.  The purpose of life, Ramakrishna said, is to find God, but what he meant by this was that it is the Atman’s purpose, which then, as the Atman emerges in him, becomes the person’s purpose.