Rasas in Divine Relationships

Rasas are emotions, the plethora of feelings experienced by our gods, fellow humans, and even our mighty animal kingdom. It transforms an external experience into an internal feeling, which in turn enables us to form our society, our relations, and eventually ourselves. Each of us can be described by features dominated by a single emotion or a combination of emotions. Thus, it is safe to say that essentially rasa is in everything and everything has rasa—our everyday, our vulnerabilities, our struggles, and most of all our triumphs. Sadly, our hectic lifestyles are driving us farther away from our abilities to express and experience our emotions freely. Bounded by social restrictions, we, the new, modern humans, are allowing ourselves to be held back by our liabilities. In an effort to break these bondages, Rasas in Divine Relationships uniquely interweaves the concept of emotions, rasas, from the Natya Shastra (a treatise on the performing arts) and the lives and stories of deific couples, to lead as examples. These larger-than-life characters with extraordinary qualities, upon whom we mortals base our belief system, are depicted as being vulnerable to some of the base desires and vices, thereby making them relatable for the present generations.