Evolutionary Change and the Process of Time

Evolutionary changes take place in what we may call “evolutionary time”, which measures major changes over millennia, certainly far beyond the span of any individual human lifetime. Thus, when we look at any attempt to modify human nature, not to speak of physical characteristics that are embedded in the DNA, or even the long and deeply embedded habits in our vital nature that are part of the subconscious inheritance we have that frame our way of reacting to circumstances, we cannot expect to see radical change in the course of a few years’ time. Sri Aurobindo has pointed out that with the conscious participation of the mental intelligence, and the bringing forward into action of the soul, the psychic being, the process can be speeded up, but he also did not envisage a complete transformation of human nature in the course of even one century. He reflected at some point that the changes he was looking for might take several hundred years.

This does not mean, however, that an individual called to this pursuit should simply either give up, or even slack off in the effort. Sri Aurobindo described the proper attitude in this regard as one that has the energy to accomplish everything without delay, while at the same time maintaining the patience for the deed to be accomplished over the course of many lifetimes.

The individual can avoid the depths of depression due to the time it takes, but identifying, not with the individual ego-personality, but with the psychic being and through its identification with the Divine, the universal manifestation, the Divine Shakti. The psychic being recognises the timeless nature of the universal unfoldment, and does not get burdened by the slow pace of the human process.

The Mother notes: “In the human consciousness everything is very slow. When we compare the time that is necessary to realise something with the average length of human existence, it seems interminable. But happily there comes a time when one escapes from this notion, when one begins to feel no longer according to human measures. As soon as one is truly in touch with the psychic, one loses this kind of narrowness and of agony also, this agony which is so bad: ‘I must be quick, I must be quick, there is not much time, I must hurry, there is not much time.’ One does things very badly or doesn’t do them at all any more. But as soon as there is a contact with the psychic, then indeed this disappears; one begins to be a little more vast and calm and peaceful, and to live in eternity.”

“Psychic poise means the poise of the being which comes from the fact that the psychic, which governs the movements of the being, is the master of all the movements of the consciousness. The psychic is always well poised. So when it is active and governs the being, it inevitably brings a balance.”

Sri Aurobindo and The Mother, Living Within: The Yoga Approach to Psychological Health and Growth, The Psychic Being and Psychological Health, The Psychic — Source of Inner Well-Being, pp. 119-122