The great game

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Sri Aurobindo has stated what was known to all of Sanatan dharma

The whole thing is a Royal drama. God created the universe, hid himself within each atom, then told find me ! This is my version. But instead of finding God within oneself, people look outside. And they can’t find him. Then they debate. Or argue about the presentation or form of God or the right word to call God or his form. Adamantly, if I may say so. And my way is the only right way , they will say. Amazing, isn’t it ?

Instead, look within. Stop the outside chaos from your mind and emotions. Instantly you see the starting point of the chaos. Your own ego and that came from not recognizing God

If you are happy, remember it is a gift from God. It can be taken away

If you are unhappy, it is from your own misdeed Of not making the effort to find yourself. Both situations are a blessing from God.

So why prolong this endless game. For paltry things? Go for the grand Prize. The God within

This is what Aurobindo said

The world is a great game of hide and seek in which the real hides behind the apparent, spirit behind matter. The apparent masquerades as real, the real is seen dimly as if it were an unsubstantial shadow. The grandeur of the visible universe and its laws enslaves men’s imaginations. “This is a mighty machine,” we cry, “but it moves of its own force and needs neither guide nor maker; for its motion is eternal.” Blinded by a half truth we fail to see that, instead of a machine without a maker, there is really only an existence and no machine. The Hindus have many images by which they seek to convey their knowledge of the relation between God and the world, but the idea of the machine does not figure largely among them. It is a spider and his web, a fire with many sparks, a pool of salt water in which every particle is penetrated by the salt. The world is a waking dream, an embodied vision, a mass of knowledge arranged in corporeal appearances expressing so many ideas which are each only a part of one unchanging truth. Everything becomes, nothing is made. Everything is put out from latency, nothing is brought into existence. Only that which was, can be, not that which was not. And that which is, cannot perish; it can only lose itself. All is eternal in the eternal spirit.

Sri Aurobindo, Essays in Philosophy and Yoga, CWSA volume 13, page 64.