Long ago there were four seekers, and no two were alike.

The first was an elephant named Gajendra, king of his herd. One hot afternoon he waded into a lake to drink, and a great crocodile clamped its jaws around his leg and began to drag him under. Gajendra pulled with all his mighty strength — for days he fought — but slowly he was losing. At last, half-drowned and out of strength, he lifted a lotus in his trunk and cried out to God, "Save me!" That was all. A cry from the middle of trouble. And God came at once. Gajendra was the distressed one — the ārta.

The second was a boy named Nachiketa, who travelled all the way to the house of Death itself. Death offered him gold, horses, long life, every pleasure on earth. The boy refused them all. "I do not want toys," he said. "I want to understand what happens to the soul. Teach me that." He hungered only to know. Nachiketa was the seeker of knowledge — the jijñāsu.

The third was a small prince named Dhruva, only five years old, who had been told he was not good enough to sit on his father's lap. Stung and hurt, he marched into the forest to pray — at first wanting just one thing: a place higher than anyone else's, a throne above the stars. He prayed for a reward. Dhruva was the seeker of gain — the arthārthī. (And God, who gave him far more than he asked, did not turn him away.)

The fourth was the sage Shuka, who wanted nothing at all. Not rescue, not answers, not gifts. He had already seen that God was everywhere and in everything, and he loved that truth the way you love sunlight — simply, with no reason and no list of wishes. Shuka was the wise one — the jñānī.

Four hearts, four very different calls: one crying in pain, one burning with questions, one hoping for a gift, one quietly in love. And the strange, beautiful thing, Krishna says, is this — every single one of them turned toward him. He welcomed all four. There is no wrong door, only the doorway you happen to be standing in. What matters is that you walk through it.