Why should you realise your true nature or Atman?
~ Swami Sivananda
Even the greatest of persons will in course of time become the lowest of the low. Countless kings, earls, barons, emperors and millionaires have come and gone. Where are those distinguished poets, intellectual geniuses, reputed scientists with boasted intellects? Where are Shakespeare, Kalidas, Byron, Newton, Kant, Plato and Faraday?
In youth you are enveloped with total ignorance, in adult age you are entangled in the meshes of women (or men), in old age you groan under the burden of Samsara and debility. You eventually die and pass away from the scene. Being thus always occupied, when will you, dear brothers, find time to devote yourself to the commission of virtuous deeds, Nishkama Karma, Bhajan, Satsanga, Kirtan and meditation?
Why should you realise Atman? Because Self-realisation gives you freedom from the Samsaric wheel of birth and death and bestows on you supreme peace, illimitable Ananda and unalloyed felicity. Hear the emphatic declaration of the Srutis: "This Atman (Self) which is free from sin, undecaying, undying, free from sorrow, hunger and thirst, with true desires and true resolves, that is what is to be sought after and which one must wish to understand. One who has sought after this Self and understands It, obtains all worlds and all desires. " "The Infinite (the great) is Bliss. There is no bliss in what is small. The Infinite alone is Bliss. But one should wish to understand the Infinite. "
- Chhandogya Upanishad