Every soul is essentially Divine. One becomes what he often thinks. He who always thinks that he is the Ātmā becomes That. He combines his head and heart and fixes both in the Self. He pours the mind into the Flame of Ātmā. This is not an easy affair. It requires years of Sādhanā.
The aspirant seeks a proper Guru, serves him, hears his teachings, studies under him the sacred lore, the books of spiritual knowledge, ponders over the truths heard by him, and thus gets an intellectual grasp of the object of realization.
Then he strives to realize the Truth with a strong faith and ceaseless aspiration. Mere intellectual learning counts nothing to him. He begins to examine the nature of things. He enquires within himself, Who am I? Who is it that moves in names and forms before me? Am I this changing body of nature?
When I forget the body in sleep, even then I live. When my senses of knowing and acting cease their functions, even then I live. In dreamless sleep mental waves cease; yet I live.
A dead body has a head, has all the physical parts of the body complete; yet it does not function. Who is it that lived and moved in this microcosm? He must be something beyond the body, the vital and the mind. That is the Indweller, the Antarātmā. He I am “सोऽहम्”.
The internal enquiry and journey of the physical body from birth to death evolves from Koham to SoHam.