Our Many Selves

Preface

Yoga is generally associated with certain set practices such as postures, breathing exercises, meditation and the like. In addition, yoga is understood as consisting in certain rules and norms pertaining to aspects of one's outer life, such as diet, habits and acts of conduct. However, as taught by Sri Aurobindo, yoga consists essentially in inner psychological work aimed at the change and transformation of consciousness. As he states: "Yoga is nothing but practical psychology"¹; "...the whole method of Yoga is psychological; it might almost be termed the consummate practice of a perfect psychological knowledge."²

This book, meant primarily for the general spiritual seeker rather than for the practitioner of Sri Aurobindo's Integral Yoga, deals only with the initial and preliminary steps towards the radical change of consciousness aimed at by the Integral Yoga. These initial tasks of psycho-spiritual growth consist in: emerging progressively from the unconscious state in which one is more or less a fused part of the collective mass rather than an independent individual who is "a truly mental man who thinks for himself, is free from all outer influences, who has an individuality, who exists, has his reality" (p. 104); developing an increasingly greater understanding of oneself by becoming more and more conscious of one's being in all its complexity in order to discern the springs of one's actions arising from the different parts of one's being so as to be able to exercise self-control and attain self-mastery; bringing harmony and order among the diverse parts of one's being which normally are in a state of conflict and disorder; discovering one's true self and unifying one's being—which is normally characterised by division and disunity—by organising all other selves around the true self.

The reader may notice that the majority of passages in this book have been drawn from the works of the Mother because her works consist mostly of the talks she gave to the young folk of the Ashram school to whom she taught in practical terms the preliminary work of inner growth just mentioned above.

Self-understanding is the first step. As the Mother remarks:

"First learn to know yourself perfectly and then to control yourself perfectly."³

"To perfect oneself, one must first become conscious of oneself."⁴

"The distinct character of man", states Sri Aurobindo, "is that he is a mental being"⁵ Therefore man naturally starts with a mental understanding of himself. A mental self-understanding lies in being able to distinguish intellectually the many different and complex parts of one's being. This calls for "a very long training and a long discipline of study and observation",⁶ to identify the respective sources of one's thoughts, feelings, actions and moods. This means being able to give a "label" to the different parts of our make-up which constitute the many selves of our being. To many people "label" and "labelling" have a somewhat pejorative meaning, being associated with a mere mental or intellectual process, devoid of a true understanding of the thing being labelled, and often acting as an obstacle to a true understanding. However, a mental understanding is not necessarily an obstacle. On the contrary, it can be a great aid and a step towards deeper understanding. To shun all mental or intellectual understanding as mere "labelling" is to ignore the fact, stated above, that the distinct character of the human being is that of a mental being, and it is but natural for one to start with a mental understanding and gradually develop a deeper understanding. It is only rare individuals who have a deep self-understanding so as to be able to distinguish the different inner movements of their many selves without having first learnt to label them mentally. As the Mother once said to the children of the Ashram school:

"... if nobody has ever taught you what the psychic or the vital is, you cannot have any notion of the thing. You may say, 'Today I feel good, yesterday I did not.' Till I was twenty-four I knew nothing about all these things, and yet I could distinguish very well these movements. I did not use these words because no one had taught them to me and I had never read anything, but I felt very clearly the difference at different moments and in what state of consciousness I was.

"But you who are here, after all that you have heard and all that you have read and all that I have taught you, you should be conversant with all the movements within you and be able to fix a little label: this is this, that is this other."?⁷

Sri Aurobindo states that it is necessary to distinguish clearly the different parts of one's being not only for the sake of intellectual clarity but also for avoiding confusion in one's experience in sadhana.⁸ Thus, for example, with regard to the distinction between the individual self (Jivatman)—which constitutes a single centre of the multiple Divine—and the all-embracing Divine itself, Sri Aurobindo remarks: "It is important to remember the distinction; for, otherwise, if there is the least vital egoism, one may begin to think of oneself as an Avatar...."⁹

Another example of confusion caused by the inability to distinguish between different parts of the being pertains to the distinction between the psychic being or soul and parts of the being (mental and emotional) which are merely under the influence of the psychic being but are often mistaken to be the psychic being itself (pp. 91-93).

Regarding the importance of such a discrimination, Sri Aurobindo writes:

"There is the true psychic which is always good and there is the psychic opening to mental, vital and other worlds which contain all kinds of things good, bad and indifferent, true, false and half true, thought-suggestions which are of all kinds, and messages also which are of all kinds. What is needed is not to give yourself impartially to all of them but to develop both a sufficient knowledge and experience and a sufficient discrimination to be able to keep your balance and eliminate falsehood, half-truths and mixtures. It will not do to dismiss impatiently the necessity for discrimination on the ground that that is mere intellectualism. The discrimination need not be intellectual, although that also is a thing not to be despised."¹⁰

Thus even a purely intellectual discrimination, not yet founded on experience, is valuable and "a thing not to be despised".

A crucial distinction that one needs to make on the spiritual path is the difference between the psychical and the spiritual. Due to an inadequate knowledge of yogic psychology, psychical phenomena and experiences—which pertain to the inner or subliminal consciousness, a realm of darkness as well as light—are often confused with spiritual experiences, which pertain to the higher consciousness. Regarding the vague and imprecise way in which the term "spiritual" is used not only in popular literature but also in serious writings, the Mother remarks:

"... philosophical, yogic and other systems use the word 'spiritual' in a very vague and loose way. Whatever is not physical is spiritual! In comparison with the physical world all other worlds are spiritual! All thought, all effort which does not tend towards the material life is a spiritual effort. Every tendency which is not strictly human and egoistic is a spiritual tendency. This is a word used to season every dish."¹¹

The distinction between the inner or supraphysical consciousness and the higher or spiritual consciousness is one of the most valuable aspects of yogic psychology for promoting the self-understanding of the spiritual seeker.

Self-understanding must lead to self-mastery. As the Mother, explaining the meaning of her phrase, "to know oneself and control oneself", says:

"This means to be conscious of one's inner truth, conscious of the different parts of one's being and their respective functions. You must know why you do this, why you do that; you must know your thoughts, know your feelings, all your activities, all your movements, of what you are capable, etc. And to know oneself is not enough: this knowledge must bring a conscious control. To know oneself perfectly is to control oneself perfectly."¹²

These statements imply that an understanding of the different parts of one's being constituting our different selves must result in self-control and self-mastery if the mental understanding is to become true self-knowledge. But true self-mastery can come about only when the different parts of the being—which are normally divided and conflicted—are unified around the inmost centre of our being, the soul or psychic being. As the Mother remarks, "This unification is indispensable if one wants to be the master of one's being and of all its actions."¹³

Traditionally, the term "yoga"—which literally means "union"—has been generally understood as a path which aims at achieving the union of the individual self with the Universal Self so as to lead to liberation from the ignorance and suffering of life on earth. In Sri Aurobindo's yoga, which aims at not only the liberation of the individual soul but also the transformation of earthly life, yoga implies not only union of the individual soul with the Divine but also the union of the outer being with the soul and the unification of one's being around the soul, for, according to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, it is only through such a unification of one's being that the Divine can be made to manifest and transform the earthly life.