Square 57: Gaseous plane (vayu-loka)

Square 57 in Leela is the Gaseous plane, vayu-loka, the plane of air. Johari describes it as the essence of air: weightlessness, formlessness and true freedom of action. It sits in row 7, the crown chakra, where the elements return in their subtlest form, and asks what it would take for a player to act without heaviness.

What square 57 means

For Johari the Gaseous plane is the essence of air: weightless, formless and free. Air moves everywhere and is held by nothing. On this square the player tastes action that is not weighed down by fear, habit or the need for a particular result.

The Sanskrit vayu means wind or air, and also the god of the wind; loka means plane or world. Air is the element of the heart chakra, linked to movement and breath. Meeting it again near the crown, it is no longer feeling or longing but pure mobility, the ability to go where one is needed.

Square 57 belongs to row 7, The Plane of Reality, and the Sahasrara chakra. With 56 primal sound and 58 light, it forms a run of subtle elements in the plane of truth. Yet freedom can also scatter: the mind, too, is as restless as the wind. Real freedom of action keeps a still centre.

What the square teaches is lightness with direction. Letting go of what weighs you down is half of freedom. The other half is knowing what you are free for. On this square, the player can ask which habits and fears still keep them on the ground, and which direction their freedom wants to take.

On the board

Square 57 sits in row 7, The Plane of Reality, between Primal vibrations at 56 and Radiation at 58. No arrow or snake ends here, so a player arrives by an ordinary throw. It is a plain square with no climb and no fall. The player moves on by count, toward a part of the row where snakes wait at 61 and 63.

The Bhagavad Gita and this square

Gita 9.6 says that as the mighty wind moves everywhere yet rests in space, all beings rest in the Highest; freedom of movement needs that resting place. When Bhima meets Hanuman, his elder brother through the wind god Vayu, and cannot lift the old monkey's tail, strength learns humility.

As the mighty wind moves everywhere yet rests in space, all beings rest in the Highest. The mind is restless as wind; find stillness within movement.

Gita 9.6 · Bhima meets Hanuman

Questions to reflect on

• What would make me freer?
• What weight am I carrying that is no longer mine to carry?
• Where in my life is there movement, and where is there stillness inside it?