“The hero’s journey always begins with the call. One way or another, a guide must come to say, “Look, you’re in Sleepy Land. Wake. Come on a trip. There is a whole aspect of your consciousness, your being, that’s not been touched. So you’re at home here? Well, there’s not enough of you there.” And so it starts.” – Joseph Campbell

Diwali comes from the Sanskrit word “Deepavali”, which literally means a “row of lights”. Diwali; the Festival of Lights, like almost every other major festival in India, has multiple origin stories. It has also been adopted over the centuries by other religions such as Sikhism, Buddhism and Jainism, each celebrating it in the way that speaks to their heart and aligns with their own faith, Hinduism & India offers that flexibility.

Some of my happiest childhood memories are of celebrating Diwali with my family, the house smelling of oil lamps, the neighborhood loud with the sound of crackers. My mother the greatest cook ever, would make special dishes infused with her “special ingredient that she called love”, my father would hold my hand trying to keep me safe while helping me light firecrackers. Neighbors and friends – Hindus, Jains, Sikhs & Muslims would stop by, enjoying & wishing each other “Shubh Deepavali” – Happy Diwali. That was the India of my childhood.

One of the most common Hindu stories about Diwali is celebrating Prince Ram’s return to his kingdom after being exiled for 14 years. But for it to make proper sense, I want to take a step back and tell you who Ram was really & where he comes from & why.

Hinduism is a pluralistic religion. It is complex, multi-faceted, chaotic, contradictory & complementary, a religion of many religions, everything everywhere all at once! 🙂 The word “Hindu” didn’t even begin its journey as a religion; Hindus were simply people who lived at the bank of the Sindhu or the Indus river; the Indus Valley civilization, so Hinduism was a civilization before it was a religion. There is no single doctrine that defines Hinduism, no one greatest story ever told.  Yet it remains the world’s oldest living religion and the third largest.  

There are hundreds of books and multitudes of stories in Hinduism, which is predicated on the idea that the eternal wisdom of the ages and of divinity cannot be confined to a single sacred book and that the Divine i.e. God with a big ”G” is essentially unknowable & incomprehensible to humans. But because we humans, with our limited minds, need something more specific to grasp, we visualize God in forms that we find more easily recognizable. And this is what gave the concept of multiple gods in Hinduism – but most of them are gods with small “g”. And this is where we come to the origin of Ram.

The Hindu religious story begins with “Brahman” – which is the Cosmic Principle, the single binding unity behind diversity in all that exists in the universe. In ancient books, it has been described as the unchanging, permanent, highest reality. It is formless and genderless, it just is. This primal energy of the universe is the God with the big “G”. From this primal Cosmic energy (the singular) arose the masculine consciousness & the feminine creative energy, which manifests in Trinities; The Creator, the Preserver and the Destroyer. Things come into being – so they are created, things persevere as a life-form and things die. Death is essential for life to continue, so it is all a big circle. The preserver consciousness is known as Vishnu (which means “the one who is all pervasive”). Whenever the world is threatened with evil, chaos, and destructive forces, the Vishnu consciousness descends in the form of an Avatar (incarnation) to restore the cosmic order, and protect the Dharma which literally means “to hold together”, Dharma is the innermost constitution of a thing, the law of its inner being. The male consciousness always has a female counterpart, which is where it derives its creative energy from. Vishnu’s female consort is known as Lakshmi, whose names means “she who leads to one’s goal”.

Ram whose story is one of the more common stories of Diwali is an Avatar of Vishnu; the preserver consciousness and his wife Sita is an Avatar of Lakshmi; his female counterpart.

The difficult part is over. Now to the fun part.

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Once upon a time thousands of years ago, Dashratha, King of Ayodhya, a city located in Northern India, had three wives and four sons: Ram (also known as Rama) was the eldest, Lakshman and Shatrughan are next & they are twins and Bharat is the youngest. The brothers loved each other and all looked up to Ram who was a virtuous, wise, and strong young prince. Ram married Sita and Dashratha wished to pass the throne to his eldest son. But the mother of Dashratha’s youngest son, Barat, who is Ram’s step-mother was jealous and wanted her son to be king. She manipulated Dashratha; the king, into sending Ram into exile for 14 years.

Ram, with his unwavering adherence to duty and obedience to his father, accepted the exile without any resistance. His loving wife Sita and one of his loyal brothers Lakshman adhering to their own duties accompanied him. For 13 years, the trio faced various challenges, but carried on, growing from their experience.

In a classic case of, “it is always darkest before the dawn”, in their 14th year, just when it’s time to return home, Sita is abducted by the 10-headed demon king Ravan (also known as Ravana). Ram is distraught. But with the help of allies such as the monkey-god Hanuman and an army of monkeys (sometimes understood as tribal people whose totem was a monkey), Ram eventually faces Ravan.

Now hopefully some of you are wondering what happened to Ram being an Avatar of Vishnu; the preserver consciousness that manifests to preserve the order. To answer that question, we must ask the question “Who was Ravan”? The 10-headed demon Ravan was himself once a scholar, a learned and accomplished individual, a warrior-king with tremendous strength and magical abilities. He also had immense knowledge of scriptures, music, and warfare, but over time he had lost his way & became arrogant & autocratic. The problem was a long time ago when he was still good he had got a boon from Gods that he be invincible, by being granted immunity from being killed by gods, demons, or spirits. In his hubris, he had dismissed ‘humans’ deeming them too insignificant to pose any kind of threat to him.

Over time Ravan became a tyrant. The balance of power between good and evil tilted so far towards evil due to Ravan, that Lord Vishnu; the preserver consciousness (which I mentioned earlier) re-incarnated in human form as Ram to restore the Dharma (order).

After many battles between the armies, Ram & Ravan finally face each other. Ram tries to chop off Ravan’s head but every time a new head pops up. He is then reminded by an ally to aim his arrow at the heart of Ravan or navel (its unclear). Before Ram fires the fatal arrow, he takes THREE STEPS BACK, prays to Lord Shiva (the destroyer consciousness) and then shoots at Ravan’s heart (or navel). Ravan falls.

Ram rescues Sita. And after that, they make their way back from exile to their home. The subjects of his kingdom in their jubilance light clay oil lamps to illuminate the streets & mark the triumphant return of Ram; the victory of good over evil and the return of order. Ram assumes his rightful position as king of his kingdom.

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Now lest you should think this is THE story of Ram or Ramayana, that is far from the case. There are multiple stories, numerous interpretations and many contractions, controversies & critiques. More recently it has been called a racist and sexist story. Ram’s conquest of Lanka is seen by some as the story of the northern Aryan race subjugating the southern Dravidian race of Ravan. And if you think Ram had it hard, Sita’s travails were way harder simply because of being a woman in a patriarchical society.

But what does this three thousand year old myth of demons & gods, kings & queens, – and monkeys – have to offer us today? It is so fantastical, it can only be a lie, right?

Not if we recall Joseph Campbell who told us that “Myth is not a lie. It is the truth we cannot tell in a literal way.” The power of myth lies in its ability to communicate complex, profound ideas in a way that resonates on an emotional and spiritual level. Myths endure when they tap into universal truths and human experiences. And this myth from India has endured thousands of years and is still a living experience for hundreds of millions of people.

Every aspect of Ram’s story is symbolic and representational. Its hero Ram represents the spirit of righteousness. Even its villain, Ravan was a complex, tragic figure with a deep intellectual and moral dimension, who came to represent ego and the dark side of power. Ravan’s ten heads symbolize his multifaceted personality. But they also symbolize something else. Human beings tend to deal with most problems at a surface level, without the patience to dig deep and find the root cause, as a result the problem just morphs but never goes away entirely – not until one finally finds & aims at its heart.
Sita; the heroine of this story represents the divine feminine, loyalty and devotion. Her abduction symbolizes the displacement of the feminine principle in the world, leading to chaos, and the war that follows is the rebalancing act, so Sita is the catalyst for a war that ultimately restores balance between the feminine and masculine principles.

And the army of monkeys are now understood as tribal people whose totem was a monkey, and whose rag-tag army came together with such a sense of devotion & determination that it managed to defeat the most organized armed forces of the time.
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Now let’s go back to the story and remember the three steps Ram took before he shot the fatal arrow that killed Ravana. Those three steps have great symbolic significance:

1. The first step signifies that Ram was acting in alignment with his duty as a king and a warrior. Despite his personal grievances, Ram was not seeking revenge against Ravan but doing his duty to uphold righteousness. Because heroes don’t seek revenge.
2. The second step symbolizes Rama’s recognition of his opponent’s power and intellect. The difference between Ram and Ravan was not of prowess or skill but of arrogance. No matter how intelligent we are, we are all susceptible to arrogance, we are all susceptible to becoming Ravan. The respect Ram shows even for his adversary makes his a victory of humility over arrogance.
3. The third step signifies Rama’s determination to bring justice to the world. By defeating Ravana, he was not only rescuing Sita but also restoring balance in the universe by eliminating a source of great evil and fulfilling the purpose of his existence which as an Avatar of the preserver consciousness, is to bring victory of good over evil and restore the Dharma.

So two of the major takeaways of this story are the triumph of humility & duty over arrogance & selfish desire and of good over evil. But there is a third takeaway.

According to Hindu mythology, it was the divine purpose and the specific qualities of Ram that made him the only one capable of defeating and killing Ravan. What is worth noting is that even though Ram is understood to be an Avatar of God, he is not spared the trials and tribulations of the human experience. He is thrown out of his own kingdom, is forced to live in exile, his wife is kidnapped and he has to fight a war to get her back. In going through these travails with grace and a sense of duty & purpose, Ram becomes a teacher, a guru. He presents a manifestation of potential and possibility that lives inside each of us. The Hindu dharma tells us we are all an avatar of the divine, all manifestations of pure consciousness. Our human journey like Ram’s is full of travails and often entails some form of exile; a disconnection from our whole selves. The work of integration requires much grace and a sense of duty & purpose. In every exile, a King (or Queen) who presumes a birthright to rule dies. After every exile, a King (or Queen) with a divine purpose uniquely their own is born. The exile is an inner journey of wholeness, of finding humility, of coming home to oneself & becoming one with the world. A journey we all must undertake as humans.

And that to me is the essence of the myth known as “Ramayana” (the story of Ram) – that has been celebrated in India for thousands of years, and is being celebrated today – along with us.

Swati Srivastava is an immigrant and a multi award-winning writer, director, and voiceover artist. A filmmaker & storyteller, Swati turns ideas into experience. She is also an environmentalist and an immigrant to the United States. She can be reached via Linkedin and swati@TiredAndBeatup.com