# Leela Square 35: Purgatory (narka-loka) Meaning

Square 35 in Leela is Purgatory, narka-loka in Sanskrit. It means bearing the consequences of freely chosen actions and accepting them without judgement, as a sign that something can be improved. It lies in the fourth row, Attaining Balance, and it is where the snake of the Plane of violence at 52 delivers a fallen player.

## Meaning

Johari describes Purgatory as bearing the consequences of actions one has freely chosen. What makes the square distinctive is how those consequences are seen. In the fourth chakra they appear “as the sign of an imperfection of action and the need to improve,” without valuation. There is no verdict here and no condemnation, only an honest look at results and a willingness to learn from them.

Narka, more often written naraka, is the Sanskrit word for hell, and loka means plane. Yet the board places this hell in the heart row, beside taste and clarity, not at the bottom of the game. That placement is the lesson: suffering that follows our own choices is not eternal punishment but a stage, and accepting responsibility for it is what opens the way forward.

Purgatory belongs to the row of Anahata, the heart chakra of air. Only a heart that has found some balance can look at its own mistakes without collapsing into guilt or hardening into defence. The square asks for responsibility rather than blame, and the next square, Clarity of consciousness, shows what such honesty makes possible. Seen this way, purgatory is less a sentence than a workshop, where action is examined and refined. It is temporary by nature.

## On the board

Purgatory is the tail of a snake: a player who lands on the Plane of violence (52) in row 6 falls here at once, two rows down. Johari calls it the fourth-chakra purgatory where the player must atone. It can also be reached by an ordinary throw from the squares just before it in row 4, from Good tendencies (30) to the Plane of taste (34). No arrow or snake starts on 35, and a throw of 2 from here reaches True awareness (37) and its arrow to 66.

Its verse is Gita 16.16: caught in the net of delusion, people fall into hell, and desire, anger and greed are its gates; hell is not eternal punishment but the result of a choice you can change. The Mahabharata episode is Yudhishthira's vision of hell, which proves to be a passing illusion.

## Questions

- What am I ready to take responsibility for?
- Which consequence am I still treating as a punishment rather than a lesson?
- What one change would show that I have learned from it?

**What does Purgatory mean in Leela?**
Square 35, Purgatory (narka-loka), means accepting the consequences of your own freely chosen actions. Johari stresses that in the heart chakra these consequences are seen without valuation, as a sign of imperfect action and the need to improve. It is a place for responsibility and correction, not for guilt or condemnation.

**Which snake leads to square 35 in Leela?**
The snake of the Plane of violence, starting on square 52 in the sixth row, ends on square 35, Purgatory. Johari describes it as a snake that draws the player down to fourth-chakra purgatory, where he must atone. It is one of only three snakes in the game that do not return the player to the first row.