Does Vikshepa mean the ignorance to think that the goal of life is his and his relative's happiness?

[Śrī Ganesh asked: Pādanamaskāraṃ Swāmiji, I have understood Vikṣepa as the ignorance of an individual who thinks that the goal of life is his and his relative's happiness. A person can certainly cross this. Is my understanding correct?]

Swāmi Replied:- Ajñāna vikṣepa means the practical influence of ignorance due to its long standing. Ajñāna āvaraṇa means the theoretical influence of ignorance, which disappears as soon as the truth is realised. Śaṅkara gave a beautiful example for this concept:- A person is sleeping and saw a tiger in the dream for a long time and was terribly frightened. He somehow woke up and realised that the tiger is not real but false. This realisation is the end of Ajñāna Āvaraṇa. Even though, such realisation was got, still, he was shivering due to the long practical experience of the dream. Such shivering disappears after a long time only. Not only this, he often says “whenever I remember that dream I shiver”. Hence, getting rid of the theoretical ignorance by realisation is completely different from getting rid of the practical influence of the ignorance. Theory is very easy whereas practice is very very difficult. The soul can never realise this world as practically false by thinking that this world is unreal. The reason for this permanent practical influence is not due to Ajñāna vikṣepa as said in the case of dream tiger, but, the actual reason is that the world is as real as the soul.

Both world and soul are relative realities and God alone is the absolute reality. Hence, world can be practically realised as unreal by God and not by the soul because the soul is a part of the world and is a relative reality like the relatively real world. Therefore, soul is absolute reality in the view of the world and world is absolute reality in the view of the soul. Hence, you shall not say that the world is real because of influence of your practical ignorance, in which case the world should have been actually unreal for you. If you leave the worldly bonds for the sake of God thinking that God is absolutely real and world is relatively real, it does not speak about your real love to God because there is a valid reason for your real love to God. If God and world are in the same phase of reality and still you love God due to your attraction to the personality of God, such love is real love. Hence, the competition comes between relatively real mediated God and relatively real world (worldly bonds). The competition never comes between absolutely real unimaginable God and relatively real world. The mediated God has all the properties of the worldly medium as any other worldly bond has, which are birth, death, illness, hunger, thirst, sex, sleep etc., and hence, the competition is not based on the point of reality.

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