Aspiration and the Witness Consciousness

When spiritual seekers attempt to implement the technique of the separation of Purusha and Prakriti, they generally go through a stage where they try to utilize the mind to observe. The mind, however, is not the instrument for the actual shift to the standpoint of the Purusha; in fact, the mind is one of the elements that is to be observed by the Purusha.

The Shwetashwatara Upanishad provides a clue: “Two winged birds cling about a common tree, comrades, yoke-fellows; and one eats the sweet fruit of the tree, the other eats not, but watches. The Soul upon a common tree is absorbed and because he is not lord, grieves and is bewildered; but when he sees and cleaves to that other who is the Lord, he knows that all is His greatness and his sorrow passes away from him.” [The Upanishads, translated by Sri Aurobindo, Shwetashwatara Upanishad, Chapter 4, Verses 6-7]

The external being, which includes body, life and mind, need to be focused and concentrated on their effort to succeed at their actions in the world. They constitute the active instruments of the ego-personality, and it is this ego-personality that takes pride in the accomplishments and achievements it has to its credit in the world.

The shift of awareness to a more inward state of observation may begin with the mind attempting to do this. But the mind is focused on classifying, analyzing and judging, and thus, it becomes a partisan in the activities, with pride and shame as two of the reactions it develops. This is clearly not the separation that Sri Aurobindo describes when he speaks about the Purusha standpoint and its pure observation of the external nature, without judgment and without taking any emotional stance in regard to the actions of that external nature. The stance of the Purusha is that of the true spiritual being who is embodied in the external nature.

The psychic being, the true soul in the individual, is the connecting link to this spiritual standpoint and it is the aspiration of the psychic being that needs to be fully and completely concentrated in its complete and undeviating focus. The external being attempts to take the credit for the results achieved by the psychic being, and the mind and vital latch on to progress and can become proud or vain. The more intense and pure the aspiration, the more it can actually break through the obstacles and resistances of the outer nature and achieve oneness with the true spiritual being who manifests through the individual and his ego-personality. The status that results is the unity or oneness of the soul, the spirit and the act of aspiration, so that there is no separation or distinction that can occur.

A disciple asks: “Mother, when we make an effort, there’s something in us which becomes very self-satisfied and boastful and contented with this effort, and that spoils everything. Then how can we get rid of this?”

The Mother answers: “Ah, that’s what looks on at what it is doing! There is always someone who observes when one is doing something. Now sometimes, he becomes proud. Obviously, this takes away much strength from the effort. I think it is that: it is the habit of looking at oneself acting, looking at oneself living. It is necessary to observe oneself but I think it is still more necessary to try to be absolutely sincere and spontaneous, very spontaneous in what one does: not always to go on observing oneself, looking at what one is doing, judging oneself — sometimes severely. In fact is is almost as bad as patting oneself with satisfaction, the two are equally bad. One should be so sincere in his aspiration that he doesn’t even know he is aspiring, that he becomes aspiration itself. When this indeed can be realised, one truly attains to an extraordinary power.”

“One minute, one minute of this, and you can prepare years of realisation. When one is no longer a self-regarding being, an ego looking at itself acting, when one becomes the action itself, above all in the aspiration, this truly is good. When there is no longer a person who is aspiring, when it is an aspiration which leaps up with a fully concentrated impulsion, then truly it goes very far. Otherwise there is always mixed up in a little vanity, a little self-complacency, a little self-pity also, all kinds of little things which come and spoil everything. But it is difficult.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Powers Within, Chapter IX Aspiration and Prayer pp. 90-91