Answer

What you are describing is very close to what Jain Dharma calls vairāgya bhāvanā or saṃvega — a deep inner shaking after seeing the truth of saṃsār.

It is not merely ordinary sadness. It is not just fear of death. It is not just temporary emotion. It is a serious spiritual awakening in which the soul begins to feel:

• “This worldly life is repetitive and ultimately unsatisfying.”
• “Birth, aging, disease, separation, death — this cycle has no real security.”
• “Wealth, status, family roles, and worldly achievements cannot accompany me beyond death.”
• “I have wandered in saṃsār for countless births.”
• “Now I should turn toward mokṣa.”

In Jain understanding, such a feeling can be called vairāgya when it creates detachment from worldly pleasures and sincere attraction toward liberation.

But whether it is complete, stable, mature vairāgya or an initial awakening of vairāgya depends on whether it becomes steady, wise, disciplined, and guided by right faith, right knowledge, and right conduct.

From what you described, it sounds like a genuine and powerful beginning of vairāgya, mixed with deep compassion, fear of saṃsār, and attachment toward your mother.

Explanation

In Jain Dharma, vairāgya does not mean hatred toward the world. It means seeing the world correctly.

A person with vairāgya begins to understand:

• Worldly relations are temporary.
• The body is temporary.
• Money is temporary.
• Status is temporary.
• Pleasure is temporary.
• Even heavenly pleasures are temporary.
• Only the soul and its karmic journey continue.
• Only liberation is permanent freedom.

When you saw the death poster, something very important happened inside you. That incident became a mirror. You did not merely see someone’s death; you saw the nature of saṃsār.

You saw that a person may work for decades, build relationships, earn money, support family, fulfill social duties, and then one day the body is gone. Others continue. Shops open. People talk for a few days. Life moves on.

This kind of inner realization is deeply connected with Jain contemplations such as:

• Anitya bhāvanā — everything worldly is impermanent.
• Aśaraṇa bhāvanā — no worldly shelter can ultimately protect the soul from death and karma.
• Saṃsāra bhāvanā — the soul has wandered endlessly through countless births.
• Ekatva bhāvanā — the soul is ultimately alone in experiencing its karmas.
• Anyatva bhāvanā — the body, possessions, and relations are separate from the soul.
• Aśuci bhāvanā — the body is not something to be falsely glorified.
• Saṃvara and nirjarā bhāvanā — one must stop new karmas and shed old karmas.
• Bodhi-durlabha bhāvanā — right faith, right knowledge, and the path to liberation are extremely rare.

Your thought that “I have become an ant, king, beggar, tree, whale, dog, lizard, spider, and so on infinite times” is also very aligned with Jain understanding of saṃsār. Jain Dharma teaches that the soul has wandered through countless forms of existence due to karma. Sometimes as a human, sometimes as an animal, sometimes in lower states, sometimes in heavenly states, and countless other conditions.

The pain you felt while thinking of suffering beings is also significant. But in Jain Dharma, compassion must mature into right conduct. Merely feeling pain for the world is not enough. The question becomes:

• Am I reducing my own passions?
• Am I practicing ahiṃsā more carefully?
• Am I reducing attachment?
• Am I moving toward samyag darśan, samyag jñān, and samyag cāritra?
• Am I becoming more humble, restrained, and inwardly pure?

That is where emotional vairāgya becomes spiritual vairāgya.

Is This True Vairāgya?

It may be helpful to distinguish between different levels.

1. Momentary vairāgya

This arises after seeing death, illness, failure, betrayal, old age, or suffering. It can be intense, but it may reduce after some days or months.

For example:

• Someone attends a funeral and feels, “Everything is meaningless.”
• Someone sees disease and feels, “I must leave the world.”
• Someone reads scripture and feels deeply moved.

This is not false. It is meaningful. But it may not yet be stable.

2. Emotional vairāgya

This includes tears, sadness, shock, and strong feelings of renunciation. It can be spiritually valuable, but emotion alone is not enough for dīkṣā.

If the feeling depends only on a disturbing event, it may fade when normal life resumes.

3. Reflective vairāgya

This is deeper. Here the person repeatedly contemplates the nature of saṃsār, karma, impermanence, and the soul. The person does not depend only on emotional shock. Understanding becomes stronger.

4. Mature vairāgya

This is steadier. The person becomes less attracted to sense pleasures, praise, possessions, arguments, ego, comfort, and social identity. The person’s daily conduct changes.

Signs of mature vairāgya include:

• Less anger.
• Less greed.
• Less pride.
• Less deceit.
• Less dependence on comfort.
• Less fascination for money and status.
• More interest in svādhyāy, sāmāyik, pratikramaṇ, tapas, and guru-sevā.
• More ability to accept hardship calmly.
• More carefulness in ahiṃsā.
• More humility toward sādhus, sādhvīs, śrāvaks, and śrāvikās.

5. Dīkṣā-yogya vairāgya

This is the level where one is not only emotionally moved, but genuinely prepared to leave household life under the guidance of a true Jain Guru.

Dīkṣā requires:

• Firm conviction in the path of mokṣa.
• Readiness to leave possessions.
• Readiness to live under discipline.
• Readiness to follow the five mahāvratas.
• Readiness to bear heat, cold, hunger, insult, illness, and discomfort.
• Readiness to reduce attachment even to beloved family members.
• Stable faith in Tīrthankar Bhagwān’s path.
• Guidance and approval of a competent Guru.

So, based on your description, I would say:

Your feeling is a genuine awakening of vairāgya, but whether it is mature enough for dīkṣā must be examined patiently under the guidance of a learned Jain Guru.

Your Attachment to Your Mother

Your tears at the thought of leaving your mother are very human and understandable.

In Jain Dharma, attachment to parents is still attachment, but it is not to be treated with harshness or disrespect. Jain Dharma never teaches cruelty. It teaches purification.

There is a difference between:

• Gratitude toward mother, and
• Attachment that binds the soul.

Gratitude is noble. Attachment is bondage.

You may deeply respect, serve, and care for your mother. But if your soul believes, “I cannot walk toward liberation because I cannot separate from this relation,” then that shows moha is still strong.

This does not mean you should forcibly suppress love. Instead, contemplate:

• My mother is also an independent soul.
• I am also an independent soul.
• Our relation is due to karmic connection.
• We have met in this birth, but in countless past births relations have changed endlessly.
• True welfare of any soul is not possession, but liberation.

In Jain understanding, the highest love is not worldly clinging. The highest love is wishing for the soul’s freedom from karma.

If your vairāgya matures, your love for your mother will become purer — less possessive, more compassionate, more spiritual.

“I Must Help Everyone Attain Mokṣa”

This thought has a compassionate foundation, but it needs careful Jain understanding.

In Jain Dharma, no one can give mokṣa to another soul directly. Even Tīrthankar Bhagwān does not “liberate” souls by force. Tīrthankars show the path. Each soul must walk the path by its own effort.

So the correct understanding is:

• You cannot make everyone attain mokṣa.
• You cannot remove another soul’s karma directly.
• You cannot walk on behalf of another soul.
• But you can share the path respectfully.
• You can inspire through your conduct.
• You can practice ahiṃsā, compassion, restraint, and truth.
• You can support dharma.
• You can become an instrument for others to remember the path.

So the feeling “The path of Tīrthankar Bhagwān belongs to all souls” is beautiful.

But the thought “I must help everyone attain mokṣa” should mature into:

“I must purify my own soul and, with humility, become a cause of inspiration for others wherever possible.”

In Jain Dharma, self-purification comes first. A lamp that is lit can give light to others. An unlit lamp cannot.

Why the Intensity Reduced

It is common for the intensity of such feelings to reduce over time.

This does not necessarily mean the original feeling was false.

There are several reasons this may happen:

• Old karmic habits pull the mind back toward normal worldly life.
• Daily responsibilities cover the intensity of contemplation.
• Attachment, comfort, and routine slowly regain strength.
• The shock of death becomes psychologically less fresh.
• Without regular svādhyāy and sādhana, vairāgya may weaken.

In Jain Dharma, spiritual feelings must be protected by practice.

If a person receives a spark but does not protect it, wind can extinguish it. If protected carefully, that spark can become a steady flame.

Your vairāgya arose from seeing death and contemplating saṃsār. To make it stable, you need regular spiritual nourishment.

This may include:

• Daily contemplation of the twelve bhāvanās.
• Sāmāyik.
• Pratikramaṇ.
• Svādhyāy of authentic Jain scriptures.
• Listening to pravachan from a genuine Jain Guru.
• Practicing small forms of renunciation.
• Reducing unnecessary possessions.
• Reducing food attachment, entertainment attachment, and praise attachment.
• Observing upvās, ekāśanā, bīyāśanā, āyambil, or other tapas according to capacity and guidance.
• Serving sādhus, sādhvīs, and the Jain saṅgh respectfully.

If You Abandon This Thought Again, Will It Come Back?

From a Jain perspective, no one should claim with certainty exactly how and when a feeling will return. That depends on karma, inner impressions, present effort, association, and future circumstances.

So the most accurate answer is:

It may come back, but you should not depend on another shock, death, or painful event to awaken you again.

The fact that this feeling came once ten years ago and again ten months ago suggests that the saṃskār of vairāgya is present within you. It has not disappeared completely. It resurfaced when a powerful reminder appeared.

But it is spiritually risky to think:

• “If I ignore it now, it will return later.”
• “I can postpone renunciation.”
• “Some future event will awaken me again.”

Jain Dharma repeatedly emphasizes the rarity of human birth, right faith, right guidance, and the opportunity for spiritual effort. The mind may not remain the same. Health may not remain the same. Circumstances may not remain the same. Association may not remain the same. Life itself is uncertain.

Therefore, instead of asking only “Will it come back?” the deeper question is:

“How can I protect and mature this vairāgya now?”

You do not have to rush into dīkṣā immediately. But you should also not neglect the awakening.

What You Should Do Now

A balanced Jain approach would be:

1. Do not suppress the feeling.

Do not tell yourself, “This is just sadness.” Treat it as a serious spiritual call.

2. Do not rush emotionally.

Dīkṣā should not be taken only in a wave of grief, shock, or sadness. It should be taken with stable conviction, guidance, and preparedness.

3. Go to a learned Jain Guru.

This is very important. Speak honestly to a true Jain sādhū, sādhvī, ācārya, upādhyāy, or spiritually mature guide in your tradition. Tell them exactly what you wrote here.

They can assess:

• your vairāgya,
• your attachment,
• your responsibilities,
• your mental steadiness,
• your understanding of dīkṣā,
• your readiness for discipline.

4. Begin living like a serious mumukṣu.

A mumukṣu is one who sincerely desires mokṣa.

Before dīkṣā, one can test and strengthen oneself through disciplined lay practice.

You may gradually practice:

• regular sāmāyik,
• daily pratikramaṇ,
• limited possessions,
• controlled speech,
• simple food,
• less sleep and laziness,
• less entertainment,
• more scriptural study,
• more maitrī toward all beings,
• forgiveness in daily life,
• carefulness in ahiṃsā,
• periodic fasting or other tapas with guidance.

5. Observe whether detachment is increasing.

Ask yourself honestly:

• Is my anger reducing?
• Is my greed reducing?
• Is my ego reducing?
• Is my attachment to praise reducing?
• Is my desire for comfort reducing?
• Is my compassion becoming more stable?
• Is my interest in mokṣa steady even when I am not sad?
• Can I accept discipline happily?
• Can I live simply without inner complaint?

These questions are important because true vairāgya is not only tears at the thought of death. True vairāgya transforms conduct.

Difference Between Sadness and Vairāgya

This is very important.

Sadness says:

• “Life is painful.”
• “Everything is meaningless.”
• “I feel heavy.”
• “I want to escape.”

Vairāgya says:

• “Saṃsār is painful because of karma and attachment.”
• “Human birth is valuable because I can practice dharma.”
• “I should purify my soul.”
• “I should reduce passions.”
• “I should walk the path shown by Arihant Bhagwān.”

If your feeling makes you hopeless, inactive, careless, or depressed, then it needs guidance and balance.

If your feeling makes you more disciplined, compassionate, detached, humble, and dharma-oriented, then it is becoming true vairāgya.

In Jain Dharma, vairāgya is not despair. It is clarity.

It does not say, “Nothing matters.”

It says, “Only soul-purification truly matters.”

Spiritual Understanding

Your experience is spiritually meaningful because you saw three major truths:

1. Death is certain.

Every embodied being must leave the body.

2. Worldly achievements are limited.

Money, name, family status, property, and social identity do not accompany the soul after death.

3. Mokṣa is the true goal.

Only liberation from karma gives complete and permanent freedom.

But Jain Dharma also teaches that the path must be walked with right understanding. Emotion is a doorway, but discipline is the path.

If this vairāgya is genuine, it should slowly become:

• less dramatic but more steady,
• less tearful but more disciplined,
• less dependent on shock but more rooted in knowledge,
• less about escaping sadness and more about attaining mokṣa,
• less about changing everyone and more about purifying oneself.

That is the maturing of vairāgya.

Takeaway

Yes, what arose in you appears to be a genuine awakening of vairāgya and saṃvega. But it must be protected, tested, and matured through daily Jain sādhana and guidance from a true Jain Guru.

Do not ignore it. Do not rush blindly. Do not depend on another painful event to awaken you again.

Use this rare inner call to become a sincere mumukṣu.

If dīkṣā is truly your path, let it grow from steady conviction, reduced attachment, disciplined conduct, and Guru’s guidance — not only from emotional intensity.

The most important thing now is this:

Turn the feeling into practice.