Today, it is possible to attain Self Realization (enlightenment) without making any changes to your life style. This is the awe-inspiring uniqueness of Akram Vignan, which is a short-cut path of the Knowledge of the Self, which leads to ultimate liberation.  

Even while living with your spouse and children, you can make progress towards your own salvation. Dadashri, the Gnani Purush to whom this Knowledge manifested in 1958, too was living a worldly life. Dadashri was able to impart this knowledge to people in a two-hour process called Gnan Vidhi (spiritual ceremony for giving the Knowledge of the Soul).  This process permanently separates the Soul, which is one’s real Self from the non-self (the ego) resulting in a constant and eternal spiritual awareness of ‘I am a Pure Soul’.   This is a shortcut path of Enlightenment, which does not require any effort or practice of austerities on the part of the person seeking real knowledge or enlightenment.

Dadashri used to say “I will give you your Atma (Soul) in your hands, so all that remains is for you to enjoy the bliss of the experience.” This is the ‘elevator path’ (a shortcut path as opposed to the traditional kramic path in which one progress towards liberation one painstaking step at a time). After Self-Realization, you simply have to remain in the ‘elevator’ i.e. the newly acquired awareness of the Self, the ‘elevator’ will take you to your destination. After Self-Realization, you will not bind any new karmas but your pending karmas which you have brought from your past life will remain.  You have no choice but discharge them.  It is the experience of all who have acquired Self-Enlightenment that regardless of the severity of their pending karmas, they are able to discharge them with equanimity under the awareness of the Self that constantly prevails.

One has had countless past lives and will continue to have countless future lives too as long as one remains entrenched in the grip of the illusion of ‘I am this body’. This Knowledge of the Soul, is such that it gives one final liberation (moksha) in a couple of lifetimes! This is because after Self-Realization, one ceases to bind any new karmas. Upon Self-Realization, first comes liberation from the ignorance of the Self, then when all pending karmas have been discharged, final liberation is inevitable. Dadashri has said that final liberation can materialize in as little as one more lifetime, depending upon the intensity of the individual’s awareness after enlightenment. He used to say, “because of the present time-cycle you will still have one more birth to go.”

On the special day of the Gnan Vidhi, the Gnani (currently Pujya Deepakbhai) through divine grace, severs the ‘ropes of ignorance’ that has kept one bound for infinite lives.  After this comes the experience of real freedom and inner peace.  This experience is a result of the power of Knowledge destroying majority of one’s past karmas.  Thereafter one has to simply endure the effects of the remaining karmas.  Any pain and suffering that ensues as past karmas unfold to give effect, is minimized due to the separation within.  The separation within comes from the constant awareness of ‘I am pure soul’.  Dadashri has said, “You should experience the awareness that you have been freed. This liberation is not a joke. It is very real. I will give you just that!”

“The experience of the Self is the destruction of the experience of ‘I am the body’. When the experience of ‘I am this body’ goes, new karmas cease to bind you. What more could you want? That which you cannot find through efforts of countless lifetimes, I will give you in just one hour. Then you will feel that you have achieved your goal as a human being. You cannot achieve this even after a thousand lifetimes’ worth of effort.”

To acquire real knowledge is the birth right of all human beings. Nothing or no one can keep in bondage, the one who seeks liberation; on the other hand, nothing or no one can liberate the one who wishes to remain bound.