Sri Aurobindo : corresp.
THEME/S
The year 1933
It seems to me that you must know by this time about the psychic being — that it is behind the veil and its consciousness also; only a little comes out in the mind and vital and physical. When that consciousness is not concealed, when you are aware of your soul (the psychic being), when its feelings and consciousness are yours, then you have got the consciousness of the psychic being. The feelings and aspirations of the psychic being are all turned towards truth and right consciousness and the Divine; it is the only part that cannot be touched by the hostile forces and their suggestions.
But how to remove that veil and get the psychic in front?
You have to aspire for it and it can only happen when you are sufficiently advanced.
Usually the mind opens first or the heart — the psychic centre opens afterwards.
From where does the mind or the psychic receive the power of discrimination?
It belongs to them by nature — only the mind can
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err, the psychic does not.
Is It not the Mother who warns us indirectly, through the mind or the psychic?
It is only when the Mother speaks directly that you can say "The Mother has said".
Nowadays, I notice that when I do not check the useless thoughts and impulses, some part within feels a sense of uneasiness.
It may be something psychic-mental, that is, an influence of the psychic put out into the mind.
When the psychic has put its influence into the mind, why is it so weak that it cannot prevent the wrong thoughts and impulses coming in, but simply tolerates them with an uneasy feeling?
The mind and the vital have always been dominant and developed themselves and are accustomed to act for themselves. How do you expect an influence coming forward and for the first time to be stronger? The psychic is not uneasy, it makes you uneasy when you do the wrong thing.
The uneasiness created by the psychic is not depression — it is in the nature of a rejection of the wrong movement. If the uneasiness causes depression or vital dissatisfaction, it is not the psychic.
The uneasiness is simply a reminder to you to be more vigilant in future.
In what way am I going so wrong that the psychic becomes too feeble to control my vital and its wrong movements?
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You have been keeping the psychic in the background during a thousand lives and indulging the vital. That is why the psychic is not strong.
Is not our psychic being in itself surrendered to the Divine?
It has to be surrendered consciously and with more knowledge. The psychic aspires to the Divine or answers to things divine, it is surrendered in principle, but it has to develop its surrender in detail carrying with it the surrender of all the being.
Is it true that unless each of our parts — mind, vital and physical—aspires for transformation there cannot be a total surrender?
Yes.
Does your answer mean that all our being must come under the psychic influence and obey it?
Does the psychic aspire through the mind only?
Why should it aspire through the mind only?
Because the mind has a greater purity and openness to the Divine than the vital and the physical.
The psychic can aspire from itself. It can aspire through the vital and the physical also.
When the mind, vital and physical are not awakened, how does the psychic manifest its influence on the material plane?
You do not seem to have understood my answer at all. In the ordinary consciousness in which the mind
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etc. are not awakened the psychic acts as well as it can through them, but according to the laws of the Ignorance.
This evening I saw young D doing Pranams to your photograph and then prostrating himself before it. Is it not rather supernatural for such a little boy to do that?
There is nothing that can be called supernatural. There are children in whom the psychic is already awake.
In the evolution, the animal is at a lower stage than man. How then do we sometimes find dogs and horses so faithful and skilful that even for a human being it would be difficult to act like them?
Faithful yes — but how skilful, except in the special connection of dogs and horses? These are faithful because of the psychic part in them, but in mind they are inferior.
Why do I not feel love and Ananda every time I see the Mother?
Does the psychic consist of a centre as well as a plane?
As for the love and Ananda, it depends on the psychic coming up.
On the Darshan Day (15th August) and the day before It, I felt an intense love for you and for the Mother. It possessed my whole being for some time. And then a high and profound reverence for both of
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you — and "a happiness that no worldly pleasure can give us".
That is obviously psychic.
Along with the ascending movement In the spine, there has been an immense Intensity in the area of the heart. Something from there rises up ardently. Is that the soul?
Something from the psychic at any rate.
Does your answer mean that the psychic has unveiled itself now?
It is trying to open.
It seems that the psychic being has begun to work directly on the outer consciousness, with love and devotion as its main means.
Yes, certainly that is the working of the psychic.
A thrill comes from above and passes through my body, making the adhar stilled for a while.
Of course it is the thrill of the Mother's touch coming from above and felt by the psychic and vital together.
Day by day it is now becoming obvious that the Mother is bestowing upon her child a psychic and spiritual realisation simultaneously.
It is an immense progress.
Through my forehead something has definitely been coming from above. The descent is powerful as well as rapid.
It is the higher consciousness sending its force down into the inner mind centre.
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The descent felt today has not been confined to me alone: it has been rather general. Will it not change the whole atmosphere?
There is an increasing Power descending—but to change the whole atmosphere will take time.
The descent felt before on the forehead is now coming further down as if passing through the nose.
It is coming down towards the externalising mind centre.
After returning from the Mother, I feel as if there is something like a burning fire within. As I did not have such an experience before, I am not sure if it is exactly a fire, but the feeling is constant.
That state pulls me inward, plunging me deep into the peace and silence.
It is all right. It is the fire of aspiration and purification with the beginning of the true inner experience which, if it continues, creates the Yogic consciousness and in the end replaces by it the ordinary outer consciousness.
The central fire is in the psychic being, but it can be lit in all the parts of the being.
There is aspiration during the whole day. Now I feel that it is not my mind alone that aspires but also some being from within joins with it! What is more is that it aspires more constantly than the outer mind. What is that being?
It may be the inner being or part of it — may be the psychic.
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What should be our preparation to bring out the psychic from its veil?
Aspiration for devotion, and refusal of egoistic movement.
I feel as if something from inside presses my outer being constantly for a change.
I suppose it is the pressure of the psychic.
But why has the psychic to press thus?
Your question has no meaning. If the psychic did not press, there would be no sadhana.
My consciousness feels that M's psychic being is much in front. His nature is inwardly well built. Is it a correct observation?
He has a good psychic being —well developed.
A lady visitor was leaving the Ashram today. No sooner did the Mother finish the Pranam ceremony than this lady began to weep. In fact she tried hard to check herself as we all were still there, but it seems she could not help it. Was it not due to her psychic coming in front for the time?
It is not a question of the psychic coming in front. She has a psychic being which is awake and has long been in connection with the Mother on the inner plane.
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THE HEART AND THE PSYCHIC BEING
At times I feel as if my heart opens out or ascends with joy to the Mother. Has the heart also to rise?
The emotional being has to ascend.
What happens to the heart in the process of the Integral Yoga? Is it purified in itself?
Yes, it becomes an instrument of self-expression of the psychic being.
Before it becomes the instrument of the psychic, what does it follow?
The vital — the heart is the centre of the emotional being and the emotions are vital movements. When the heart is purified, the vital emotions change into psychic feelings or else psychicised vital movements.
Sometimes we feel pure and true emotions surging out from us. Are they not directly from the psychic being? For how could the unpurified heart produce anything pure and true?
Pure and true thoughts and emotions and impulsions can rise from the human mind, heart and vital, because all is not evil there. The heart may be unpurified but that does not mean that everything in it is impure.
The heart is part of the vital — it has to be controlled in the same way as the rest, by rejection of the wrong movements, by acceptance of the true psychic surrender
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which prevents all demand and clamour, by calling in the higher light and knowledge.
Whenever an inner love springs out for the Mother, tears rush out too.
If it is tears of love or joy, then they are usually from the psychic being. These are psychic tears of devotion etc.
You have written: "The heart is the seat not only of the psychic but also of the emotional vital." Does this mean that the emotional being itself acts as a veil in front of the psychic?
Yes, when it is full of vital movements or accustomed more to a vital than a psychic way of emotion.
Some dissatisfactions come and affect the heart which is opening to the Mother.
Get rid of these dissatisfactions, they prevent the permanent psychic opening.
Perhaps it is because the psychic is just opening that it comes under the influence of these dissatisfactions?
What the psychic always feels is "What the Mother does is for the best", and accepts all with gladness. It is the vital part of the heart that is easily touched by the suggestions.
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THE VITAL NATURE AND THE PSYCHIC BEING
What is required for the psychic to emerge?
When the psychic touches there is an intensification of love but the lower vital mixes up the love with all sorts of demands.
You speak of the psychic transforming the lower vital. Can it do so completely or is it the higher consciousness that does it?
I mean here a preliminary transformation turning it towards the Divine and purifying it so that it can receive the higher consciousness.
How is it that when one is realising the Self above, one does not get the ecstasies one has when the psychic is active?
Love, joy and happiness come from the psychic. The Self gives peace or a universal Ananda.
Is it possible for the psychic to be inactive even though the Self is realised, and the mind and the vital do not resist the Divine?
It is often like that. The psychic waits till the full stabilisation of the self-realisation down to the physical or sometimes down to the higher vital.
When the consciousness drops a little below the
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overhead centre, there is a sense of separation and the heart begins to yearn.
The yearning of the heart may be there but it should not disturb the peace.
I think it is better to stop it for the present. It is very possible that the vital is taking advantage of it to create dissatisfaction with the progress of the sadhana. The psychic yearning brings no reaction of impatience, dissatisfaction or disturbance.
If the psychic yearning is like that, then how will it express the pangs of separation?
Pangs of separation belong to the vital, not to the psychic; the psychic having no pangs need not express them. The psychic is always turned towards the Divine in faith, joy and confidence — whatever aspiration it has is full of trust and hope.
If the pangs of separation are in the vital, is it because its nature is such that when it turns to the Divine it feels them? Or are they a wrong movement?
It is its ordinary nature applying itself to the movement towards the Divine.
Is this the right way of the vital's opening to the Divine?
No, not in this yoga. It is allowed in certain Vaish-nava forms of Yoga. In this Yoga, the more psychic the movements, the better.
What would be the right way for the vital in this Yoga?
It must conform its movement to the psychic movement.
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It is said that the psychic is in direct connection with the Divine. Why should it then have yearning for the Divine?
It is for the presence of the Divine in the heart consciousness or manifestation here.
How is one to distinguish the bhakti of the vital from that of the psychic?
The main distinction is that the vital demands, the psychic gives itself.
When the whole nature is engrossed in feeling, thinking, acting round the word "Mother", would the psychic be realised?
That would of itself be the psychic state.
An increasing pressure is felt, right from the cardiac centre down to the navel. It rises and descends increasingly.
It means a strong working to connect the psychic and vital together.
Can one be wide-awake to the Mother's presence in sleep even?
That does happen, but usually only when the psychic is in full activity.
I dreamt of three aeroplanes rising from a steamer. What does it indicate?
I suppose something capable of ascent in the psychic, the inner mind, the inner vital.
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During the sadhana, has the psychic also to ascend?
It joins itself to the higher consciousness.
THE POWER OF AGNI AND THE PSYCHIC FIRE
Coming from the Mother, I felt as if a burning transformation had started. I feel around me a burning sensation. To give an example, each of my fingers feels surrounded by a fire.
It is the Agni fire that you feel. Agni is at once a fire of aspiration, a fire of purification, a fire of tapasya, a fire of transformation.
While leaving the Ashram I was conscious of something very weighty, wide, full of power and intensely strong entering not merely through the Brahmic passage at the top of the head but through the whole head.
It is simply the force of the higher consciousness descending in greater mass.
I feel the experience in flesh and teeth and it is becoming more and more dense. Does it mean that there is also a working of peace?
The force can also be dense in that way; but probably it is establishing the solid calm in that way.
Along with the psychic fire in the heart there was
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a simultaneous action of a vital fire. How is that?
There is no incompatibility between them.
What is it that acts in the Agni?
It is the Mother's Force that works in the Agni.
Before my consciousness could realise fully the Self the psychic seems to have come so much forward. Is the experience of a burning action almost everywhere in the being a sign of this?
All that is simply the burning of the Agni in various parts of the being. It prepares it for transformation. But the coming forward of the psychic is another matter and its signs are psychological.
Since it is mostly the Agni that burns within me, why does the mind take it for the psychic fire?
It is some association in the mind probably coupling Agni with the psychic. Of course the individual Agni fire has its starting point in the psychic, but the mere burning of the fire does not show that the psychic is coming forward.
When it burns in the heart it is the fire in the psychic. The psychic fire is individual and takes usually the form of a fire of aspiration or personal tapasya. This Fire is universal and it came from above.
What is experienced in the vital as fire?
The psychic fire may burn in the vital. It all depends on whether it is the fire of the general Force that comes from above or the fire of your soul's aspiration and tapasya.
What does the fire in any part indicate?
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The fire indicates a dynamic action.
You wrote a few days back that the signs of the psychic's coming forward are psychological. What are these signs?
A central love, bhakti, surrender, giving everything, a sight within that sees always clearly what is spiritually right or wrong and automatically rejects the latter — a movement of entire consecration and dedication of all in one to the Mother.
I feel something very intense and as if burning deep within — Just as it was in the case of the fire of aspiration, and yet it is not the same!
It may be the Yogic force (tapas) which is also called Yogagni—Yoga fire.
What is the function of the Yogagni?
It prepares the system, creates the yogic aspirations, brings in the experiences of the sadhana etc.
At about seven a.m. I began to feel the pressure. It was perhaps for the peace because soon I began to experience peace. At eight there was another pressure probably for silence. But I could not maintain the silence properly due to the mechanical thoughts. After a short while, there came a third pressure. It gave me much energy; I could work very quickly without getting tired. Since the beginning of the third pressure I have been feeling much heat in me and around me. What is that heat?
It is the heat of the tapas created by the pressure.
After entering into the condition of peace and
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silence, the fire of aspiration and the Yogagni are not experienced any more. It seems I get one new thing and lose the previous one!
It may be they are not felt at present — the one thing to be felt always is the silence and peace. The Agni in that form is an experience, which you have to feel as an aspiration and a force working.
The higher flow that descends through the top of my head— the Brahmic centre — was felt till now only up to the inner mind centre in the forehead. Now it has extended and runs into the nose.
I do not understand how the higher pressure is not only coming with intensity and power but also burning like a fire.
That is the Agni-force in it.
All that is simply the burning of the Agni in various parts of the being. It prepares for the transformation.
Cannot the passive and the active Self be harmonised so as to govern and change my nature properly? Either one of the two does not seem sufficient to handle the whole of the human nature.
Yes, but the Peace, Purity and Calm of the Self must be fixed — otherwise the active Descent may find the forces it awakes seized on by lower Powers and a confusion created. That has happened with many.
Can the active Descent take place even if Purity, Peace and Calm are not sufficiently established?
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It can, — but to have the peace and calm first is better. Many call down the superior Force first.
Is it not possible at my present stage to maintain my central consciousness in the pure-existence all the time and let my external actions be directed by the Mother's Force so that they may come automatically from the true consciousness?
No, it is not yet possible. The true consciousness must be there in the mind and vital before that is done and the true consciousness is the psychic and the higher. What one can do before that is to use the mental will to direct the actions in the right way or reject the things that have to be rejected. But this you had stopped when the silence, emptiness etc. came down.
Today my inner being collected all its diffused energy of will-power and fought out the inertia massed within me. Was the force used rajas, the vital push, something unspiritual? It was not a silent duel. There were strong vibrations all around me.
There is nothing unspiritual in that — the use of this force is very good — it is tapas, not rajas.
You once wrote: "As for the submind etc., these things have a habit of sticking, so long as the higher dynamic activities are not established." What are the higher dynamic activities?
Knowledge, higher Will, Force, universal Ananda.
With a certain kind of will, I can quiet even the subconscient for a while. But a greater will-power is
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required for a constant bold.
That is one of the higher dynamic activities.
ANANDA AND LOVE
I have been experiencing calm and silence, but the Ananda and love which I was feeling have disappeared.
The basis of calm and silence should be there first — otherwise the Ananda and love may take a too vital character and prove unstable.
You once wrote about the disappearance of love and Ananda: "It is so with all the spiritual experiences. The ordinary consciousness is not accustomed to hold them." But if calm and silence came, would it still be the ordinary consciousness?
I mean by the ordinary consciousness the human consciousness which has to be changed — it is into that consciousness that all these experiences from above come in order to change it first into higher mind and then into a still higher thing. Before divine Love and Ananda can be made to settle, there is much more that is to be done — first the psychic love must be there and other things besides.
How would you distinguish the psychic love from the divine love?
The psychic love is pure and full of self-giving without
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egoistic demands, but it is human and can err and suffer. The Divine Love is something much vaster and deeper and full of light and Ananda.
One is told that without a universal love there can be no real progress. But mostly one remains inwardly withdrawn and concentrated on the Mother.
You are not able now to have the universal love— it is not in your nature. Wait till your nature is widened by the higher consciousness, then your disabilities in that direction will disappear.
Sometimes the being feels something physically all over like a thrill, but it is not exactly a thrill. Is it what may be called a "glow"?
A glow means a subdued but rich light or else a sort of warm exhilaration of a luminous kind.
Somebody told me that the void is a Divine Darkness.
I don't believe much in this Divine Darkness. It is a Christian idea. For us the Divine is Peace, Purity, Wide-ness. Light, Ananda.
A sadhaka need not give himself to an outsider, but can he express his psychic love to him? I would also like to know from you if the sadhaka might help him to rise higher.
It is safer not to indulge in such activities. One is more likely to be drawn into the other's consciousness than to be able to help him — unless he is himself a truth-seeker.
To give oneself to an outsider is to go out from the
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atmosphere of sadhana and give oneself to the outer world forces.
One can have a psychic feeling of love for someone, a universal love for all creatures, but one has to give oneself only to the Divine.
THE CENTRAL BEING AND THE PSYCHIC
Would you please indicate the difference between the psychic being and what is called the central being? Is our psychic a part of this central being and does it receive the Divine's help through it? In Yoga, how does our central being stand in relation to the other parts of our being?
The central being is above the Adhar—most people are not aware of their central being (Jivatman) —they are aware only of the ego.
The psychic is the soul, it is a portion of the Divine that supports the mind and body in the evolution. The psychic gets the Divine's help directly from the Divine.
The central being is that on which all the others depend. If it makes its surrender, that is, renounces its separate fulfilment in order to be an instrument of the Divine, then it is easier for the mind, vital and physical to surrender.
Is it a fact that when circumstances are suitable the central being renounces its separate fulfilment
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and surrenders itself to the Divine?
It has nothing to do with suitable circumstances. If the will of the central being turns towards union with the Divine, then it renounces its separate fulfilment.
Is it true that the Supreme instead of working directly on man acts through the Jivatman?
For the most part the Supreme acts through the Jiva and its nature and the Jiva and the nature act through the ego and the ego acts through the outer instruments — that is the play of the Ignorance.
Is it true that the psychic can come in front and reign over the mind, vital and physical only when the central being has surrendered itself to the Divine?
If there is the will to surrender in the central being, then the psychic can come forward.
It is said that the soul and the Atman are not one and the same; there is a difference. How do you distinguish them?
The Atman is one in all, is not born, does not evolve or change.
The soul is something that comes from the Divine into the evolution and as the psychic being it evolves and assumes different personalities from life to life.
You said, "The Atman is one in all, is not born, does not evolve or change." In that case, is there any difference between the Atman and the Divine?
The Divine is more than the Atman. It is Nature also. It contains everything in Itself.
Does the soul coming from the Divine enter into
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this universe from the very beginning or after the evolution of animal life?
The soul is there from the beginning as a spark of the Divine. It grows and takes form as the psychic being in the course of the evolution.
THE PSYCHIC BEING AFTER DEATH
After death, what happens to the adhar — I mean mind, vital and subtle physical— when the psychic being returns to the psychic plane for rest?
It is dropped off—unless the being has become strongly individualised on the mental plane or both on the mental and vital. Then it keeps its mental and vital sheaths — otherwise they disintegrate and everything essential is drawn back into the psychic.
Why has the psychic being to pass through the other worlds before reaching its own?
Because they are there in between and because so long as the vital and mental formations are there, you cannot go elsewhere than the mental and vital worlds.
While passing through the mental and vital worlds, does not the psychic draw back the substance from its mental and vital beings in order to use it for the next birth?
It does not necessarily take the same substance as before. If it did, there would be no difference between
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the past life and the new one.
Does the psychic really take rest in its plane as we do here in the physical world when tired?
It is a different kind of rest.
When does it return to the earth again?
Whenever it is due.
After death, when the vital retires to its vital plane, what does it do there till the psychic calls it back for the next life on the earth?
For most people the vital dissolves after a time as it is not sufficiently formed to be immortal. The soul descending makes a new vital formation suitable for the new life.
Could the vital of a worldly man whose vitality was very strong, like Napoleon's, be immortal, or only that of him who was far advanced in Yoga?
Only if it is consciously developed and connected with the psychic being.
It is said that when one has left this world one enjoys or suffers according to one's Karma. In which world is this done?
In whatever worlds you pass through — but it is doubtful whether the statement is more than very partially true.
But which part of us suffers or enjoys when our physical body is no more there?
The vital can suffer, or enjoy in the vital world for a time.
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