Square 28: Apt religion (sudharma)

Square 28 in Leela is Apt religion, sudharma in Sanskrit, and it is the base of an arrow. It means following your own dharma, living in tune with the laws of the game rather than someone else's rules. It opens the fourth row, Attaining Balance, and its arrow carries the player directly to square 50, the Plane of austerity.

What square 28 means

Johari defines Apt religion as one's own dharma: living in harmony with the laws of the game. The emphasis falls on the word own. This is not a creed adopted from outside or a practice copied because it works for others. It is the way of life and the discipline that actually fit your nature, your stage and your duties. What suits one seeker can be a burden to another, and the game respects that difference.

Sudharma joins su, good or right, with dharma, the order that holds things together and the duty that follows from it. The board contrasts it with its neighbour: square 29, Irreligiosity, adharma, is blind faith that ignores cosmic law, and its snake falls to Delusion at 6. The two lie side by side, and between them sits the whole question of how a person relates to faith and practice.

Apt religion is the first square of the row Johari calls Attaining Balance, linked to Anahata, the heart chakra of air. In the heart, religion stops being a set of outer rules and becomes alignment with what is true for you. Johari writes that “sudharma leads him to the plane of austerity... directly to the sixth row”: the right practice makes real effort possible.

On the board

Apt religion is an arrow base: landing on 28 lifts the player at once from row 4 to square 50, the Plane of austerity in row 6. Because rows alternate direction, 28 sits directly above Selfless service (27) at the end of the third row. A player arrives by an ordinary throw, for example a 2 from Sorrow (26), a 3 from Good company (25) or a 5 from the Celestial plane (23).

The Bhagavad Gita and this square

Its verse is Gita 3.35: better your own dharma done imperfectly than another's done well, so follow your own nature and your path will be true. The Mahabharata episode is the righteous butcher of Mithila, a humble tradesman whose faithful performance of his own duty made him a teacher of dharma.

Better your own dharma done imperfectly than another's done well. Follow your own nature and your path will be true.

Gita 3.35 · The righteous butcher of Mithila

Questions to reflect on

• Which practice do I genuinely need?
• Which rules am I following only because others follow them?
• What would it look like to live my own dharma this week, imperfectly?