We tend to look on ourselves as being of a specific nature and having a specific personality. We see main lines of understanding, of reaction, and of action and look upon these as ‘who we are’. If we take a closer look, however, we soon begin to see that we are not as simple and homogeneous as ... Views: 303
Sincerity is not as simple as believing in and meaning what we say to others. This is what we ordinarily consider to be sincerity. Sri Aurobindo and the Mother have a much more far-reaching idea of sincerity relating to the practice of yoga in the furtherance of spiritual growth. Sincerity ... Views: 337
The mind is the characteristic power exercised by the human race. While the higher reasoning and abstract mind is somewhat limited in its action across the broad spectrum of human individuals, the basic mental powers are widespread, providing the capability to review, categorize and classify, ... Views: 228
We predict the times and the seasons, we can predict to a certainty physical and mechanical operations, and we can even predict within a range, the pattern and scope of a particular set of events we set in motion in various fields. We expect that the physical world in which we live follows ... Views: 331
For most people, purity is connected with a moral precept, and for most, this has eventually been related to the question of sexual relations. The question of chastity, and withholding of sexual activity until the socially sanctioned relationship of marriage has been put in place, holds a ... Views: 362
There is a clear divide between those who have actually experienced the action of spiritual or yoga-force, and those who have a mental conception of spirituality but have not had a strong experience thus far that makes the theory into something real and actual for them. Once the experience is ... Views: 150
In his book The Mother, Sri Aurobindo defines the conditions and qualities of faith needed to overcome all obstructions or disasters: “To walk through life armoured against all fear, peril and disaster, only two things are needed, two that go always together — the Grace of the Divine Mother and ... Views: 128
The process of the yogic sadhana inevitably begins to shift the consciousness inward and upward, and exposes the seeker to powers, forces and energies that are not easily seen or understood from the standpoint of the external mind and life. Thus, there is what we may call a natural opening to ... Views: 318
When we associate ourselves with our mental identity, we tend to believe that what we ‘think’ is what we ‘are’. However, this leaves open the opportunity for self-deception and ultimate failure to change the nature, as the vital being remains stuck in its old habitual patterns and does not ... Views: 393
When people think about yoga, they generally think about practicing certain poses, or asanas, or doing certain breathing techniques, or chanting various mantras, reading certain books, meditation, or singing devotional songs, etc. Those who take up the practice of Raja Yoga follow an eight-fold ... Views: 230
Virtually everybody, at some point in their lives, has the experience of entering a room or a gathering of some sort and feeling the movement of some vital force rising up within them. It could be a room filled with the energy of greed, or sexual tension or anger. They feel like they are being ... Views: 278
We recognise the electro-magnetic spectrum, the color spectrum, the sound wave spectrum and others, each as representing a continuum of wave forms with varying characteristics. There are shorter, more intense waves and longer wave frequencies. Some conduct tremendous amounts of physical heat, ... Views: 265
Many people consider the concept of ‘karma’ to be some form of moral retributive factor that brings back to an individual the ‘fruits’ of his actions. Thus, they believe, if a man does something considered wrong, dishonest, underhanded, the universal law of karma will eventually right the score. ... Views: 219
Entropy is a scientific theory that holds that the universe tends towards increasing disorder and dissolution over time, eventually having ordered patterns break down into randomness or chaos, and dissolution. While it is set forth in Western science as the second law of thermodynamics in a very ... Views: 610
For most people there is never a moment of silence in the mind. A constant churning of thoughts, ideas, desires, plans, wishes, concerns, feelings, emotions, perceptions, and needs keeps mental activity of one sort or another always going. We seem to actually fear the silence, so if the inner ... Views: 530
Human beings are social animals, and they crave contact and relationship with others. Modern society has broken or weakened many of the links that formerly brought people together, including the nuclear and extended family, and tight-knit communities where people socialized and interacted with ... Views: 523
We observe everywhere that Nature has a development cycle, with focus of attention on what needs to take place at each stage of that cycle, rather than simply jumping ahead to an 'end result' of the development. Thus, we see that plants undergo a stage of sprouting from seed, and the first focus ... Views: 207
We do not usually recognise or appreciate how much influence our environment, our surroundings, the society we live in, the customs and life-ways of that social system impact what we think about, how we focus our attention and what we do with our lives. The Mother puts this also into the process ... Views: 32
Ancient Chinese philosophy enunciated the concept of yin and yang, which represent the opposites that together form a whole, and which are constantly interacting with one another dynamically. The classical image shows a black spot in a white background and a white spot in a black background, ... Views: 376
However much we try, we find that we cannot constantly and consistently hold onto any particular focus of concentration, emotional state, mood or feeling for an extended period of time. The constant action of the 3 Gunas cycles us through periods of light and darkness, action and inaction, ... Views: 340
We speak generally about exercising will-power, particularly when it relates to overcoming an impulsion or attempting to achieve some particular result. We may want to overcome an addiction, or follow a particular diet and we struggle to carry out our resolve. We make ‘new year’s resolutions’ to ... Views: 114
The vital desire-soul animates the external being. When it enters the physical frame, we say that there is life in the body. When it departs, we say that the person has died. This is distinguishable from the true soul, the psychic being, which is not dependent on either the life or death of a ... Views: 296
The imposition of the external world on our mind and senses is so powerful that we don’t pay attention to the vast universe of galaxies and stars. In former times, before the world was widely illuminated by lighting at night, there was at least some opportunity for people to be outside at night, ... Views: 164
The lure of occult powers represents one of the temptations to be faced by the spiritual seeker who begins to access the inner and higher realms of consciousness. These powers may be developed through systematic efforts, following the protocols and laws of action under which these powers exist. ... Views: 551
In various parts of the world, homes and buildings have a clear ‘identity’, through shape, color, size, layout of the rooms, functionality, and location. In other places we see vast tracts of virtually identical houses or apartments in rows, with the same size, shape, color and layout. Someone ... Views: 227
Personal growth and inner growth, the enhancement of the human being and its capabilities and the transcendence of the human being to develop a being awake and active with a new level of consciousness, are not in conflict with one another. The human being must develop to a certain degree to ... Views: 519
For the seekers who wish to depart the creation through unification with the Supreme, the body is often considered to be an obstacle, something that needs a certain amount of begrudging attention in order to allow the meditation to take place uninterruptedly. These seekers prefer to give as ... Views: 209
We can identify a systematic evolution of consciousness in the external world. Life evolves out of Matter, Mind out of Life. We do not, however, thereby determine either a significance or purpose to this evolution nor any causative factors that involve mind and life into matter such that they ... Views: 346
We tend to measure success or failure in terms of specific results we see in our relatively short, individual lifetime, based on our preconceived or societally sanctioned ideas about what constitutes success or failure. When it comes to progress in spiritual development, however, this is not ... Views: 323
The human being consists of multiple levels of consciousness which interact with and impact one another and which, from an evolutionary standpoint, represent a consistent trend of increasing power and subtlety of the consciousness. The consciousness of the body, the physical consciousness is the ... Views: 71
Which comes first, the experience of the Divine Presence or the aspiration to bask in the Presence? This question arose in a dialogue between a disciple and Sri Aurobindo and led to an extensive response from Sri Aurobindo. Sri Aurobindo describes the attitude, motive and dedication of a devotee ... Views: 486
Yogic practitioners have a number of different methods they have utilized to try to gain control over the movement of vital desire. The disturbances caused by desire, and the distractions that result are clearly inimical to success in the yogic sadhana. Some, like those who practice various ... Views: 398
The mind gathers details from the senses, attempts to classify them according to past experience, and then tries to both judge the meaning of the situation and extrapolate how future steps will occur. This process relies on known powers of the mind, powers of analysis, powers of what is known as ... Views: 234
The Mother draws a clear distinction between the individual who is in contact with his own deepest inner truth of being, his swadharma, and the individual who does not pay attention to this deepest truth but lives what we may call a “transactional” existence focused on the aggrandisement and ... Views: 111
Many people hold the idea that science is ‘fact based’ and focused on the external world solely, while the artistic focus is based in the use of imagination and is not as tied to external facts. The difference, however, is not necessarily one of a lack of imagination by those with a scientific ... Views: 125
When an individual sits for meditation, does he come out of the meditation changed in some way? … or is meditation something like a state of ‘statis’ where time goes by, but nothing happens? Is the individual taking a ‘time out’ from life but not moving the purpose and focus of the life forward? ... Views: 486
Suppression of desire can be compared generally to the compression of a spring. The spring increases its latent energy by being compressed and eventually, when it escapes the compression stage, it responds powerfully. When desires are suppressed, they gain in strength and eventually burst forth ... Views: 576
The goal of traditional spiritual paths is mainly to achieve individual liberation or realisation of the Self, although some, such as Mahayana Buddhism, add an element of self-giving in action by having the realised soul, the Bodhisattva, renounce full liberation until such time as all other ... Views: 456
When a seeker awakens to the deformations of the body-life-mind complex, the distorted feelings, the misdirected emotions, the incomplete and misguided thoughts, the entire complex focused on and rooted in the idea of the aggrandisement of the ego-personality at the expense of everything else, ... Views: 242
The vital nature is so deeply intertwined with the mental nature in the current state of human development, and has such a force of desire that it tries to satisfy, that, for most individuals, it is very hard to take an objective view about the thoughts, feelings, actions, reactions, emotions or ... Views: 353
We are trained to believe that the mind relies entirely on the 5 senses of perception and the 5 senses of action in order to receive data or undertake action. If the mind is cut off from the senses, we believe that it is powerless and unable to either sense, communicate or act. Spiritual science ... Views: 64
The human mind likes to have nice, neat categories. “Either/Or”, “Black/White”. It has a hard time dealing with mixed actions or anything that partakes of various allegedly competing or conflicting principles. Thus, the debate over free will and determinism rages on, and eventually comes down to ... Views: 197
The Divine Consciousness encompasses both a vast peace which can fill the being and bring the seeker to a realisation that all the external life details, about which so much worry and fretting take place, are relatively inconsequential in the larger scheme of things. When the peace descends, the ... Views: 471
We all generally understand the concept of force at the material level. Our entire world is driven by this force as the sun energizes the planet, as the wind, the water and the power of fire in the depths of the earth create our material environment. We understand the concept of force at the ... Views: 546
The pivotal role and importance of Divine Grace in the spiritual realisation comes about because all humanity is essentially locked into the framework of our normal mental-vital standpoint and thus, cannot truly transform the consciousness without something intervening from outside this ... Views: 526
It is human nature to want to categorize and pigeon-hole what happens and make developments fit into definitions of our choosing. This same thing occurs when we look at openings of the spiritual nature and the development of or transformation of consciousness. Not only do we want to define and ... Views: 306
In his book The Mother, Sri Aurobindo writes: “In all that is done in the universe, the Divine through his Shakti is behind all action but he is veiled by his Yoga Maya and works through the ego of the Jiva in the lower nature.” The Divine Shakti, the creative force of the universe, the power ... Views: 606
We are predisposed, through cultural habit, to see beauty in an outward form. Those who look a bit deeper warn us that ‘beauty is only skin-deep’, and that outward forms of beauty may hide inward blemishes. The essence of deception is to create the appearance of outward beauty while hiding ... Views: 403
When we recognise that the world is an actual manifestation of the Divine, we can begin to appreciate the Divine in all things that we experience, all things that we see, all that we hear, all that we feel or touch or smell. The Divine manifests through his power, Shakti, which takes various ... Views: 75
The earth is the locus of the evolutionary principle. It is said that when the gods themselves want to grow and evolve, they must consent to take birth on the earth. It is therefore important to understand that the beings who take birth on the earth-plane are, for the most part, taking part in ... Views: 215