Our Many Selves

The Subliminal - The Inner Being

There is an inner as well as an outer consciousness all through our being, upon all its levels. The ordinary man is aware only of his surface self and quite unaware of all that is concealed by the surface. And yet what is on the surface, what we know or think we know of ourselves and even believe that that is all we are, is only a small part of our being and far the larger part of us is below the surface, the frontal consciousness. Or, more accurately, it is behind the frontal consciousness, behind the veil, occult and known only by an occult knowledge. Modern psychology and psychic science have begun to perceive this truth just a little. Materialistic psychology calls this hidden part the Inconscient, although practically admitting that it is far greater, more powerful and profound than the surface conscious self,—very much as the Upanishads called the superconscient in us the Sleep self, although this Sleep self is said to be an infinitely greater Intelligence, omniscient, omnipotent, Prajna, the Ishwara. Psychic science calls this hidden consciousness the subliminal self, and, here too, it is seen that this subliminal self has more powers, more knowledge, a freer field of movement than the smaller self that is on the surface. But the truth is that all this that is behind, this sea of which our waking consciousness is only a wave or series of waves, cannot be described by any one term, for it is very complex. Part of it is subconscient, lower than our waking consciousness; part of it is on a level with it but behind and much larger than it; part is above and superconscient to us. What we call our mind is only an outer mind, a surface mental action, instrumental for the partial expression of a larger mind behind of which we are not ordinarily aware and can only know by going inside ourselves. So too what we know of the vital in us is only the outer vital, a surface activity partially expressing a larger secret vital which we can only know by going within. Equally, what we call our physical being is only a visible projection of a greater and subtler invisible physical consciousness which is much more complex, much more aware, much wider in its receptiveness, much more open and plastic and free.

If you understand and experience this truth, then only you will be able to realise what is meant by the inner mental, the inner vital, the inner physical consciousness. But it must be noted that this term “inner” is used in two different senses. Sometimes it denotes the consciousness behind the veil of the outer being, the mental or vital or physical within, which is in direct touch with the universal mind, the universal life forces, the universal physical forces. Sometimes, on the other hand, we mean an inmost mental, vital, physical, more specifically called the true mind, the true vital, the true physical consciousness which is nearest to the soul and can most easily and directly respond to the Divine Light and Power. There is no real Yoga possible, still less any integral Yoga, if we do not go back from the outer self and become aware of all this inner being and inner nature. For then alone can we break the limitations of the ignorant external self which receives consciously only the outer touches and knows things indirectly through the outer mind and senses, and become directly aware of the universal consciousness and the universal forces that play through us and around us. And then only too can we hope to be directly aware of the Divine in us and directly in touch with the Divine Light and the Divine Force. Otherwise we can feel the Divine only through external signs and external results and that is a difficult and uncertain way and very occasional and inconstant, and it leads only to belief and not to knowledge, not to the direct consciousness and awareness of the constant presence.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - I: The Physical Consciousness

There are, we might say, two beings in us, one on the surface, our ordinary exterior mind, life, body consciousness, another behind the veil, an inner mind, an inner life, an inner physical consciousness constituting another or inner self. This inner self once awake opens in its turn to our true real and eternal self. It opens inwardly to the soul, called in the language of this Yoga the psychic being which supports our successive births and at each birth assumes a new mind, life and body. It opens above to the Self or spirit which is unborn and by conscious recovery of it we transcend the changing personality and achieve freedom and full mastery over our nature.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - III: Three Experiences of the Inner Being

… the subliminal in man is the largest part of his nature and has in it the secret of the unseen dynamisms which explain his surface activities. But the lower vital subconscious which is all that this psycho-analysis of Freud seems to know—and even of that it knows only a few ill-lit corners,—is no more than a restricted and very inferior portion of the subliminal whole. The subliminal self stands behind and supports the whole superficial man; it has in it a larger and more efficient mind behind the surface mind, a larger and more powerful vital behind the surface vital, a subtler and freer physical consciousness behind the surface bodily existence. And above them it opens to higher superconscient as well as below them to lower subconscient ranges.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - IV: The Subconscient and the Integral Yoga

Sweet Mother, what does “the subliminal being” mean, exactly?

Well, it is what he says, you know. It’s what is behind. I think it is what could be called the subtle physical, the subtle vital, the subtle mind. It is something that’s behind what is manifested. One can imagine that what is manifested is like a layer or like a crust or a bark; it is that which we see and with which we are in touch. And it clothes something, it clothes or expresses something which is more subtle and serves as its support.

When one dreams, one goes very often into his subliminal being, and there things are almost the same and yet not absolutely the same; there is a great resemblance and yet there is a difference; and usually this is greater. One has the impression of entering into something that’s vaster; and, for example, one feels that one can do more, that one knows more, one has a power and clear-sightedness which one doesn’t have in the ordinary consciousness; one has the impression while dreaming that one knows many more things than when one is awake. No? Doesn’t this happen? You don’t have dreams like that?… when one dreams and knows a lot, for example, about the secret causes of things, about what a movement expresses… all that, one feels that one knows it. For instance, when one dreams of someone, one knows better what he thinks, what he wants, all these things, better than when one is in waking contact with him. This happens when one has entered the subliminal. Very often one dreams in the subliminal.

The Mother
Questions and Answers (1955): 6 April 1955

It is not necessarily more enlightened, more balanced—no. It is more subtle, it is less dull than our outer consciousness. Our external consciousness is so dull, it has no depth; as our outer understanding has no depth, our sensations have no depth; all this is something as though flat. So here it is fuller, but not necessarily more true.

Then why is it the most important?

Because it is internal. This is what supports the outer. The outer is only an appearance of this. As I said, in a dream when one goes there, one knows things which one doesn’t know, one can do things, one is in touch with things which one doesn’t know in the waking consciousness, because it is too superficial.

It is like the inside of something. The outside is the expression of that, but an altogether surface expression. So naturally it looks the same; in any case more than a resemblance, it has an identity with what we see of it from outside. We see the form, don’t we, the expression; well, this expression has necessarily an analogy—more than an analogy—an identity with what is inside…

It is perhaps—perhaps—something like this, like the taste of a fruit. You know, you see a fruit, it has an appearance, it has a certain colour, it seems to you of a certain kind, but you cannot very well know what it tastes like until you taste it, that is, until you have entered inside it. It is something like this, something analogous to this.

Or maybe as in a watch—note that it is just to try to make myself understood, it is not really like that, it is only to try to make myself understood—when you see a watch, you see a dial and the hands moving, but if you want to know the watch you must open it and see the working inside.

It is something like that—you see only the effect, here; there is a cause behind. It is somewhat like that.

The world as we see it and our outer consciousness are the result of something which is behind, which Sri Aurobindo calls the subliminal. And this itself, as he says, is set in motion by impulses which come from the subconscient below and the superconscient above, and so it is as though it were assembled there, and once it is organised there it is expressed in the outer consciousness, the ordinary consciousness.

The best way is to go there; once you go there you understand what it is. And it is not difficult; one goes there constantly in dreams, very easily, without any effort.

How can we understand that we have gone there?

If you remember, you understand. If one remembers the kind of difference of impression one had: one has a certain impression, and when one returns one feels something like a disconnection, the impression is different, even the point of view one had about things is different. Well, if one remembers this, one understands. If one is in the habit, one can even while speaking or doing something, perceive very well—above all when speaking or thinking or reflecting on something—a second layer which is behind, much vaster, in which things are organised much more synthetically (not positively understandable) than in the outer consciousness. If one reflects just a little and looks at oneself thinking, one can see this at the back very well, one can see the two things moving together like this (gesture)… like the formulated thought and the source of the thought which is behind. And then when one thinks, you see, one has a feeling of being like this, enclosed in something; whereas, there, immediately one feels that one is in contact with many other things; and it is much greater.

The Mother
Questions and Answers (1955): 6 April 1955

… from there [subliminal forces] come all the greater aspirations, ideals, strivings towards a better self and better humanity without which man would be only a thinking animal—as also most of the art, poetry, philosophy, thirst for knowledge which relieve if they do not yet dispel the ignorance.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - I: The Subconscient and the Inconscient

*Environmental Consciousness

*The individual is not limited to the physical body—it is only the external consciousness which feels like that. As soon as one gets over this feeling of limitation, one can feel first the inner consciousness which is connected with the body but does not belong to it, afterwards the planes of consciousness above the body—also a consciousness surrounding the body, but part of oneself, part of the individual being, through which one is in contact with the cosmic forces and with other beings. This last is what I have called the environmental consciousness.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - I: The Environmental Consciousness

Each man has his own personal consciousness entrenched in his body and gets into touch with his surroundings only through his body and senses and the mind using the senses.

Yet all the time the universal forces are pouring into him without his knowing it. He is aware only of thoughts, feelings etc. that rise to the surface and these he takes for his own. Really they come from outside in mind waves, vital waves, waves of feeling and sensation etc. which take particular forms in him and rise to the surface after they have got inside.

But they do not get into his body at once. He carries about with him an environmental consciousness (called by the Theosophists the aura) into which they first enter. If you can become conscious of this environmental self of yours, then you can catch the thought, passion, suggestion or force of illness, or whatever it may be, before it enters and prevent it from entering into you. If things in you are thrown out, they often do not go altogether but take refuge in this environmental atmosphere and from there try to get in again or they go to a distance outside but linger on the outskirts or even perhaps far off, waiting till they get an opportunity to attempt entrance.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - I: The Environmental Consciousness

When these things are rejected by the waking consciousness they try to take refuge in the subconscient or else in what may be called the environmental consciousness and from there they press upon the consciousness trying to recover their hold or simply to recur for a time. If they are in the subconscient they come up most usually in dreams, but they may also surge up into the waking consciousness. If they come from the environment they take the form of thought-suggestions or impulses or a vague restless or disturbing pressure… When the body is full of the new consciousness, Peace and Power at the same time, then this outward pressure is felt but can no longer disturb and finally it recedes to a distance (no longer pressing immediately on the physical mind or body) and either gradually or rapidly disappears.

By environmental consciousness I mean something that each man carries around him, outside his body, even when he is not aware of it,—by which he is in touch with others and with the universal forces. It is through this that the thoughts, feelings etc. of others pass to enter into one—it is through this also that waves of the universal force—desire, sex, etc.—come in and take possession of the mind, vital or body.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - IV: The Subconscient and the Integral Yoga

It is quite normal for difficulties to come back… and it is not a proof that no progress has been made. The recurrence (after one has thought one has conquered) is not unaccountable. I have explained in my writings what happens. When a habitual movement long embedded in the nature is cast out, it takes refuge in some less enlightened part of the nature, and when cast out of the rest of the nature, it takes refuge in the subconscient and from there surges up when you least expect it or comes up in dreams or sudden inconscient movements or it goes out and remains in wait in the environmental being through which the universal Nature works, and attacks from there as a force from outside trying to recover its kingdom by a suggestion or repetition of old movements. One has to stand fast till the power of return fades away. These returns or attacks must be regarded not as parts of oneself, but as invasions—and rejected without allowing any depression or discouragement. If the mind does not sanction them, if the vital refuses to welcome them, if the physical remains steady and refuses to obey the physical urge, then the recurrence of the thought, the vital impulse, the physical feeling will begin to lose its last holds and finally they will be too feeble to cause any trouble.

Sri Aurobindo
Letters on Yoga - IV: The Subconscient and the Integral Yoga