Champaklal's Treasures - Edition-II

Morning Interviews, 1923-1924

One cannot accept everything that comes to the mind as inspiration or intuition and act accordingly.

It is true that the emotional being contains a Truth behind it and that is that of Love. But one cannot and should not go on identifying himself with everybody. It is not a good thing for this Yoga at least. For other Yogas like Bhakti Yoga it is all right. In our Yoga the love must be universal but that only as a feeling and if the feeling is there, it is no harm. But that love must be absolutely calm and above all discrimination. It must know, otherwise one identifies himself with any being and if that is good, it is all right but if his being is not pure one gets all the difficulties of that being into himself. Such external aggression ought to be guarded at least while one is a Sadhak. I know of a Madrasi Sadhak who had an experience like that and then he identified himself with Barindra and some one else and then their influence predominated over him. If one remains open like that to external influences, it creates a lot of troubles in the Sadhak. Yes, the love is for him but we must carefully distinguish identification of other parts of being from that of the spirit.

14 April 1923

Strong rajasic nature has always an outgoing tendency. But that can hardly be said to be a drawback. If that could disqualify a man for Yoga, none of" us could have a chance of practising.

Firm entire absolute will for this is indispensable in this Yoga which he must bring to bear.

Strong intellectual doubt is certainly a great obstacle but who of us had not had! In my case it followed me for years together...

When all the elements are transformed, they become a great asset to the spiritual nature.

16 April 1923

What is the way to eliminate this mechanical play of the mind? How to do away with it?

The physical mind must remain as the instrument to act here on the material plane, only its play, its movements will be transformed and its stuff too. Only withdrawal from the lower movements won't do. When you rise above the mind you can remain either quiescent or become dynamic.

How to transform its movements?

You will have not only to withdraw from its lower movements or play by rejecting it whenever that train of activity begins, but also seek its true movement above. In a thought, in an act, in speech, you have in everything to reject the lower form and seek its truer forms in the Supramental. If you seek and yet cannot always get, it shows that the lower being is not yet used to refer above and act in response to movement from there. It Cannot come all at once. Slowly and with great care it is to act always from an intense intuitive and psychic plane and cannot get beyond that. Of course I am not belittling the psychic, that is also a movement — a higher mental of the soul. But there is the still higher Supramental into which the roots of all you are and do must be refounded, everything changed in the stuff. Between the intuitive and the Supramental there is this difference, that the intuitive is somehow small, insufficient and not capable of transforming anything. The other is full of power and knowledge and complete in itself, it transforms everything.

22-December 1923

Regarding "The Supersensuous Life" by Whiner. Did you read that book? ,

Yes, not everything but some parts.

How do you find it?

Good book. But his idea about the relation of the higher to the lower Nature is not clear except that the higher only makes some impression on the lower; there is no idea of the transformation.

/ thought he has some knowledge through the psychic.

That also is superficial. I mean not that deep soul consciousness which is the basis of the true psychic knowledge. Besides, his intellect is not his strong point, for instance, he defines "Reason as light of nature" or something like that. It is not so. Besides he has not got complete grasp of human psychology.

14' February 1924

I am well impressed with Haribhai. There seems to be something large and warm about him. I do not know how far he would go in the Yoga but apart from it he has something large about him. If he takes to Sadhana more intensely, he would find many difficulties in the way, especially in the vital being. It is a help as well as an obstacle. But if he can bring the psychic being to the surface and develop it, then he can overcome these difficulties and if he can go through, the result would be richer and more ample in his case. He is not like Kashibhai straight and limited. There is a tendency to throw himself out in many activities.

18 February 1924

Sri Aurobindo said about Gandhi's appendicitis that those who (generally) take grapes and oranges get appendicitis. In France once there was an epidemic of it on account of people eating too much of it. Grapes are perfectly harmless otherwise. 21 February 1924

But do you want something immediate — some excitement for a time. What is the use of creating a row and ultimately finding that there are only ten people who stand to the last. Let the people's feeling be raised. Let all feel and then unite. If they all unite then it is easy. Let the country get slowly prepared....

That is the history of every religion, sect or religious institution. It begins with religion and ends in commerce, everywhere you will find the same thing.

28 February 1924

On my visit to Motibabu, Motibabu told me that according to Mr. C. R. Das Sri Aurobindo is lost to India.

Mr. Das had come to Pondicherry after seeing Motibabu and said, Motibabu's work in Chandernagore is not satisfactory. Mr. Das and Motibabu hold opposite views, several of Motibabu's close disciples have also left him. The number of his disciples given by him is unreliable.

The sadhak said to Motibabu that Sri Aurobindo Ghose appears to move very near to Shankaracharya. Sri Aurobindo Ghose told him when he (the sadhak) was at Pondicherry on 15th August 1923 that we should not accept ignorance of life and as ordinary life is full of ignorance, the only possible solution is to reject ordinary life and as this doctrine is preached by Shankaracharya, so Sri Aurobindo Ghose is near to Shankaracharya and therefore there is very little new to learn from him.

That is an entire misreading of my Yoga which aims not at rejection of life but fulfilment of life. Of course, — ordinary life is full of ignorance but it is not impossible to live without ignorance. In fact, life with full consciousness is the meaning of evolution. There is a nescience in matter and life which offers great obstacle when we progress towards conscious life and these obstacles have to be conquered by means of the Supermind. There are several curves and circles coming up and down. They have to be understood and used for transforming the ordinary life. Shankaracharya understood Vijnan as a superior mental consciousness and as this was still mental he rejected that Vijnan, Shankaracharya did not believe in manifestation which to him was Maya. Manifestation is truth of Divine power and has to be accepted. That power is working in us and it is possible for us to identify ourselves with that power and thus take part in the manifestation of the Divine on this earth. For some time I also could not understand Vijnan and mistook higher mental consciousness for Vijnan.

It is not sufficient to realise the higher consciousness in meditation. Its working presence should be felt even while doing the ordinary works of life. But Supermind proper is Divine Consciousness which arranges and guides the movements of the Universe. This Consciousness must be made to be our normal nature, and allowed to descend and transform our mind, life and body. Human effort is of no use. There should be complete surrender so that the higher power will come down and work. It is not difficult to realise Supramental Consciousness but it is very difficult to make it active. Therefore several great souls after realising this consciousness worked through mind and reduced it to mental terms. Therefore they could not experience the working of the Supramental Consciousness in its true nature. This new process has not yet been attempted by anyone up to now. I believe in this process and have accepted it and it is giving good results and unless I complete it, I cannot do any other work, i.e. I do not want to multiply disciples nor can I think of Mother India. When I will get it, it will act in such a way that other people will get it without much trouble. .Even at present I can give something worth giving to others but I do not wish to attempt this until the process is completed. Still I must have some men on whom I can make experiments and they will get according to their capacity. The Divine Life lives in unity but sees the difference also and the reasons of differences. There will be no action where there is knowledge of only unity. True action is possible by reading the truth of all activities by means of the higher consciousness. Human consciousness is limited and therefore called ignorance. The higher consciousness is bound to grow.

26 October 1924

In meditation, the light that I experienced here last year repeats itself. The only difference is that, while that light was white, the light that I now get is more like sunlight, and sometimes blue. Besides it is not steady except on rare occasions. There are also other experiences such as sweet smell, stoppage of breath, stability, vastness, timelessness etc., but these are occasional. The highest experience has been that of possession of self having some control over universal nature, but the ordinary mind takes hold of these experiences and reduces them to its own level.

Do the experiences touch the mind — Yes, except on some occasions " when they live in their own greatness.

Then the unstability of the light is due to vital consciousness and stability is due to physical consciousness. Difficulty is experienced by everyone in making the higher experiences normal as the lower being gets hold of them and reduces them to their own level. That is what has happened also in Motilal Roy's case. The remedy is to increase the stability and purify the being by removing all hostile forces. Calmness is the essential nature of the Purusha. It is Purusha. Every thought and action must be discriminated and hostile forces eliminated, so that the being may be purified. The process is necessary and is sometimes perilous. Even before the purification is done, the physical, vital and mental experiences and higher experiences are very much disturbed by similar experiences and moving forces outside oneself. Their relation must be understood and by discrimination, hostile forces coming from cosmic nature must be conquered. Then when purification is completed, there will be liberation of mental and vital being and mental and vital forces. This is ordinarily called Moksha but the real Moksha comes when there is perfection of the being and then enjoyment follows.

Is it possible to see the world by supramental sight as we see with our eyes and is there in man something like the third eye of Shiva?

Yes, but the supramental vision is not of the same kind as the mental or sensational vision. The being that stands back sees all the forces working in the world. This has been attempted by many in the past and has been acquired by some of them, but our own Yoga is not satisfied by mere vision. We must have power to control those forces. It is possible to know the physical nature of outside things by means of our physical nature, their vital nature by our vital nature, and their mental nature by our mental nature and their supramental nature by our supramental nature. It is possible also to know the inner nature of all things directly.

Is it possible to purify, liberate and perfect our nature i. e. to make an inner change without changing the outer life and whether this can be done as rapidly as changing the outer life?

Generally this is not possible. In my own case, I was very much engrossed with political work and could not make an inner change without changing the outer life. But it all depends on the nature of the individual. 5 or a certain time it is possible to make an inner change without changing the outer life. Afterwards the higher nature becomes very strong and many people are obliged to change the outer life. Our aim is not to get supramental experiences only in meditation but also in making them conscious in every act of ordinary life.

There is one Sutra in Brahmasutras viz., the upadesha of manifestation and non-manifestation in the Upanishads can be explained by the example of a serpent sitting in coiled form or otherwise.

From one standpoint, there is no manifestation as all exist in one; from another standpoint, we are one and yet different. The latter is superficial consciousness. It comes to play when there is projection of the Divine Power like a cinematograph. There are various aspects of the Divine and one example is not sufficient to explain all of them.

26 October 1924

Champklal and Dilip Kumar Roy