Gifts of Grace

Introduction

The aim of this introduction is twofold. First, it is to highlight some of the salient ideas contained in each of the five sections of the book, thus providing a partial overview of the book. Secondly, it is to explain and clarify some of the concepts and ideas which might present some difficulty to the understanding. Interspersed throughout the introduction the reader will find some words within quotation marks followed by a number in parentheses. These words are quoted from passages in the book, the number in parentheses indicating the serial number of the passage from which the words have been quoted.

1. Aspiration for Progress

Progress - Law of Life

From a spiritual viewpoint, there are very few highly significant differences between an animal and a human being. One of the most important differences is that whereas the animal is satisfied to be what it is; the human being is "unlike the animal, aware of imperfection and limitation and feels that there is something to be attained beyond what he now is ¹ This "urge towards self-exceeding"² is at the basis of all aspiration for progress. Because of man's innate urge towards self-exceeding, progress is the "law of his life" (1). "The moment one is satisfied and no longer aspires, one begins to die" (2).

Source of Aspiration

The seat and source of all aspiration, whether it is for outer or inner progress, is the psychic being, our innermost and true self. It is that part of our being which evolves from life to life. Earthly existence is meant for the progress of the psychic being towards its own self-discovery. Every experience helps the psychic being to

1. Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, SABCL Vol. 19, p. 843.
2. Ibid.

xvii

make some progress, for "in an evolving world everything is necessarily a help to progress" (10).

Two Kinds of Progress in the Development of Abilities

In striving for self-perfection, two types of progress may be distinguished - progress in the further development of one's present abilities, and progress in the development of new abilities which are presently dormant. A very small minority of human beings strive for the latter type of progress, though everyone has an undreamt of potential. "There is a genius within every one of us - we don't know it" (12). The genius is in the psychic being.

Progress beyond Peace

In the past, spiritual aspiration has generally aimed at the attainment of peace through liberation from ego and desire, including the desire for progress. But in Sri Aurobindo's evolutionary view, the attainment of individual liberation is only the initial aim of a spiritual life. The true aim of spirituality is to make oneself an instrument for the progressive manifestation of the Divine upon the earth in an endless process of the evolution of consciousness. So the aspiration for progress must not cease with the liberation from ego and personal desires, and the consequent attainment of spiritual peace. As the Mother states:

There are teachings which say that one must have no desire at all; they are the ones that aim at a complete withdrawal from life in order to enter into the immobility of the Spirit, the absence of all activity, all movement, all form, all external reality. To attain that one must have no desire at all, that is to say, one must completely leave behind all will for progress; progress itself becomes something unreal and external. But if in your conception of Yoga you keep the idea of progress, and if you admit that the whole universe follows a progression, then what you have to do is to shift the objective of desire; instead of turning it towards things that are external, artificial, superficial and egoistical, you must join it as a force of

xviii

realisation to the aspiration directed to the truth. ³

Such an evolutionary view of spirituality, which goes beyond individual liberation, visualizes "a new aspect of the divine intervention in life, a new form of intervention of the divine forces in existence, a new aspect of spiritual realization" (26).

Progress of Nature and Progress through Sadhana

As stated previously, the purpose of life, from a spiritual viewpoint is progressive growth towards self-discovery. In this constantly evolving world, everyone progresses, consciously or unconsciously, towards this spiritual goal. The great majority of human beings "progress with the rhythm of Nature, which means that it can take centuries and centuries and centuries and millenniums to make the slightest bit of progress" (15). Describing this "tardy method of slow and confused growth through the evolution of Nature"⁴ Sri Aurobindo writes:

... the natural evolution is at its best an uncertain growth under cover, partly by the pressure of the environment, partly by a groping education and an ill-lighted purposeful effort, an only partially illumined and half-automatic use of opportunities with many blunders and lapses and relapses; a great portion of it is made up of apparent accidents and circumstances and vicissitudes,- though veiling a secret divine intervention and guidance.⁵

Sadhana or spiritual practice is the conscious and swift way of attaining the spiritual goal. Through sadhana "one can do in a very short time what takes otherwise an interminable time" (16). By means of spiritual practice, "we replace this confused crooked crab-motion [of Nature] by a rapid, conscious and self-directed

3. The Mother, Questions and Answers, CWM Vol. 3, p. 194.
4. Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, SABCL Vol. 20, p. 83.
5. Ibid.

xix

evolution which is planned to carry us, as far as can be, in a straight line towards the goal set before us."⁶ The emergence of mind in the course of evolution marks a crucial step in human progress; the human being "has become awake and aware of himself; there has been made manifest in Mind its will to develop, to grow in knowledge, to deepen the inner and widen the outer existence, to increase the capacities of the nature" (54). Of a still greater significance is the human being's growing urge towards a spiritual life. For the spiritual urge signifies that in the evolution of consciousness, Mind is not the last but only a middle term of the evolution, and that man the mental being is only a transitional being who will be replaced by a spiritual being embodying the principle beyond mind - the Supermind.

2. Will for Progress

Some spiritual paths, such as Adwaita (Non-Dualism) and Buddhism do not speak of Divine Grace, and regard personal effort as the only means for attaining the spiritual goal. From the viewpoint of Sri Aurobindo's yoga, personal effort through the exercise of one's will is indeed indispensable for a long time in the beginning before one is ready to surrender one's will totally and rely entirely on Divine Grace. However, Grace is seen to be present from the very beginning of the path, and personal effort itself is regarded as a gift of Grace.

Source of Will

Mental will is the chief force employed in putting forth personal effort. The true source of will, however, is the psychic being, not the mind. As the Mother remarks, "will is not in the head"

(70). But, generally "it is in the higher part of the mind that this begins to take shape" (69). Thus it is "an intelligent will more or less enlightened which is the first instrument of our psychic

6. Ibid.

xx

being" (63). "What takes the resolution to do yoga is not your body or your vital, not even your mind, it is the higher part of your mind or it is your psychic being" (85).

To exercise the mental will is to act "in conformity with the will and not with the vital impulses and desires" (64). But it is not only the impulses and desires of the vital that need to be controlled by will power; "the control of one's thoughts is as necessary as the control of one's vital desires and passions or the control of the movements of one's body" (89). Controlling thoughts with the power of mental will may sound like trying to cut a knife with its own edge. However, there are two parts of the mind, "the active part which is a factory of thoughts and the quiet masterful part which is at once a Witness and a Will, observing them, judging, rejecting, eliminating, accepting, ordering corrections and changes, the Master in the House of Mind, capable of self-empire " (89).

Willed Progress

A distinction was made earlier between progress of Nature and progress through sadhana. Progress of Nature is "a progress that the Divine brings about in you without your collaboration" (71), whereas progress through sadhana is willed progress through conscious self-effort. The aspiration of the human being for self­ exceeding mentioned previously is naturally accompanied by the will for self-development. The emergence of an aspiration to exceed oneself and the will to develop oneself usher in a new stage in the course of human evolution. As Sri Aurobindo states,

... the appearance of human mind and body on the earth marks a crucial step, a decisive change in the course and process of the evolution; it is not merely a continuation of the old lines. Up till this advent of a developed thinking mind in Matter evolution had been effected, not by the self-aware aspiration, intention, will or seeking of the living being, but subconsciously or subliminally by the automatic operation of Nature. This was so because the evolution began from the Inconscience and the secret Consciousness had not emerged sufficiently from it to operate through the self-aware participating individual will of

xxi

its living creature. But in man the necessary change has been made, - the being has become awake and aware of himself; there has been made manifest in Mind its will to develop, to grow in knowledge, to deepen the inner and widen the outer existence, to increase the capacities of the nature. Man has seen that there can be a higher status of consciousness than his own; the evolutionary oestrus is there in his parts of mind and life, the aspiration to exceed himself is delivered and articulate within him: he has become conscious of a soul, discovered the Self and Spirit. In him, then, the substitution of a conscious for a subconscious evolution has become conceivable and practicable, and it may well be concluded that the aspiration, the urge, the persistent endeavour in him is a sure sign of Nature's will for a higher way to fulfilment, the emergence of a greater status.⁷

Personal Effort and Surrender

Everyone is born with a seed of aspiration and will, but personal effort is needed to develop both.

... aspiration is a thing to be developed, educated, like all activities of the being. One may be born with a very slight aspiration and develop it so much that it becomes very great. One may be born with a very small will and develop it and make it strong.⁸

As stated previously, personal effort is indispensable until one attains the state of total surrender of one's personal will. So long as the lower nature represented by the ego is active, personal effort is necessary. "When one is no longer in his lower consciousness, when one has made a total surrender, then the lower nature is no longer active. But so long as it is active, personal effort is necessary" (105). For a long time there is a double process of self­ effort and a growing surrender. "But a time comes when one feels

7. Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, SABCL Vol. 19, p. 843.
The Mother, Questions and Answers 1950-51, CWM Vol. 4, p. 343.

xxii

the Presence and the force constantly and more and more feels that that is doing everything - so that the worst difficulties can­ not disturb this sense and personal effort is no longer necessary, hardly even possible" (108).

From a deeper point of view, it is always the Divine Force that acts in sadhana, including in what we feel to be our own personal effort. Our personal self, the ego, is only a tool used by universal forces.

"Our sense of personal effort and aspiration comes from the attempt of the egoistic mind to identify itself in a wrong and imperfect way with the workings of the divine Force Enlight­enment brings to us the knowledge that the ego is only an instrument; we begin to perceive and feel that these things are our own in the sense that they belong to our supreme and integral Self, one with the Transcendent, not to the instrumental ego. Our limita­tions and distortions are our contribution to the working; the true power in it is the Divine's" (91).

Both Disidentification and Willed Rejection Necessary

In dealing with defects of the lower nature, such as anger, passion, etc., two things are necessary. First, one must learn to dis­ identify oneself from such movements, and realize that they do not belong to one's true self. They circulate everywhere and belong to nobody but to the universal lower Nature. Mere detachment and disidentification, however, are not enough. One must exercise one's will and reject them in order to close the door for their entry and to prevent their endless recurrence. The right attitude towards them is: Well, they come from below, I do not want them to recur, they are not mine" (98). Both disidentification ("they are not mine") and rejection ("I do not want them to recur") are necessary. Disidentification brings freedom of our inner being; rejection leads eventually to mastery of the outer being.

Sense of Weakness - a Lack of Resolution

Perceiving a defect in one's lower nature already indicates the action of Grace; "the moment you see is the moment when you receive the Grace" (96). To say that one is too weak to overcome

xxiii

a defect is an unconscious excuse. "The Grace is there to give the supreme strength to whoever takes the resolution" ( 100). If one can be perfectly sincere, one can "in one minute get rid of a difficulty which would have harassed you for years. I absolutely assure you of it. That depends only on one thing: that you truly, sincerely, want to get rid of it. And it is the same for everything, from physical illnesses up to the highest mental difficulties" (101).

3. Faith and Trust

Faith, Belief and Trust

Faith is "a feeling in the whole being" (118), whereas belief is an acceptance by the mind only, "something that occurs in the head, that is purely mental" (118).

Faith in the Divine is acceptance of the existence of the Divine. Trust in the Divine means the conviction in the Divine's Wisdom, Love and Omnipotence, and confidence that "all that comes from Him will always be the best for you" (119).

One can have faith and trust in the Divine, or one may have faith and confidence simply in oneself and one's possibilities, "a feeling of surety about the result of one's seeking or endeavour" (118 fn.).

Nature of Faith

"Faith is spontaneous knowledge in the psychic" (123). Faith, whether it is in the Divine, in one's Guru or in oneself is an intuitive and direct knowledge possessed by one's psychic being; it is not knowledge arrived at indirectly through mental inference. Nor is it based on experience. It is "a certitude without any proof" (118). Therefore the reasoning mind looks upon faith as blind. But, as Sri Aurobindo remarks:

The phrase ["blind faith"] has no real meaning. I suppose they mean they will not believe without proof - but the conclusion formed after proof is not faith, it is knowledge or it is a mental opinion. Faith is something which one has before

xxiv

proof or knowledge and it helps you to arrive at knowledge or experience.There is no proof that God exists, but if I have faith in God, then I can arrive at the experience of the Divine.⁹

Hallrnarks of True Faith

True faith - the soul's faith - may be recognized by two of its salient characteristics. First, the faith of the soul or the central being is persistent; it may be eclipsed for a while by the doubts of the mind or the depressions of the vital being, but it reappears when the mental or vital clouds are dispersed.

Secondly, since true faith is an intuitive perception of the soul, it does not depend on mental proofs and is unshaken by lack of proofs.

For its [the soul's] knowledge is not mental, based on experience or proved true. It does not believe after proofs are given: faith is the movement of the soul whose knowledge is spontaneous and direct. Even if the whole world denies and brings forward a thousand proofs to the contrary, still it knows by an inner knowledge, a direct perception that can stand against everything, a perception by identity.¹⁰

Preserving and Increasing One's Faith

Though everyone is endowed with faith to some degree, personal effort is indispensable for preserving and increasing one's faith. "One must watch over one's faith as one watches over the birth of something infinitely precious, and protect it very carefully from everything that can impair it" (164).

4. Difficulties and Suffering

Two broad categories of difficulties may be distinguished: inner or psychological difficulties due to the imperfections of our

9. Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga, SABCL Vol. 23, p. 572.
10. The Mother, Questions and Answers, CWM Vol. 3, p. 152.

xxv

lower consciousness (physical, vital, mental), and outer difficulties which are related to circumstances and relationships with people, and illness of the body.

The imperfections of the lower nature are very much the same in everybody, for they are inherent in the universal lower Nature (Prakriti). It is only one's openness and one's awareness of them that differ in different persons. Those who do not aspire for inner change and progress tend to remain unconscious of the defects of the lower nature. Though the inner difficulties are there in every­body's lower nature, they are hidden from one's view. When one takes up spiritual practice, one becomes more and more conscious of them - a sign of Grace. As Sri Aurobindo writes to a disciple: "For when one begins to be conscious in the way you have begun and something from within raises up all that was hidden, it means that the Mother's grace is on your nature and her force is working and your inner being is aiding the Mother's force to get rid of all these things. So you must not be sorrowful or discouraged or fear anything but look steadily at all that comes out and have the will that it should go completely and forever. With the Mother's force working and the psychic being supporting the force, all can be done and all will surely be done" (196).

Spiritual practice does not create the inner difficulties; it only makes one conscious of what is already there. As a result of sadhana, "circumstances so happen that the occasion comes for the defect to rise until it is thrown out of the being. If one can take the coming of these circumstances clairvoyantly as a call and an opportunity for conquering the defect, then one can progress very quickly" (199).

A most important thing in dealing with difficulties is one's attitude towards them, "The same thing, identically the same, if we take it as a gift of God, as a divine grace, as the result of the full Harmony, helps us to become more conscious, stronger, more true, while if we take it - exactly the very same circumstance - as a blow from fate, as a bad force wanting to affect us, this constricts us, weighs us down and takes away from us all consciousness and strength and harmony" (171). Here are some of the most valuable

xxvi

insights of yoga which are helpful in adopting right attitudes towards difficulties.

Our Life Circumstances Are Exactly What We Need for Our Growth

"Everyone has a life appropriate to his total development, everyone has experiences which help him in his total development, and everyone has difficulties which help him in his total realization" (174).

Therefore, from a spiritual viewpoint, it is asinine to complain about life's difficulties; "in the unseen providence of things our greatest difficulties are our best opportunities." ¹¹

"Difficulties are sent to us exclusively to make the realisation more perfect" (177).

"Be absolutely convinced that everything that happens, happens in order to give us precisely the lesson we needed, and if we are sincere in the 'sadhana', the lesson should be accepted with joy and gratitude" (179).

"Be grateful for all ordeals, they are the shortest way to the Divine" (194).

Our Own Inner Being Calls Forth the Outer Difficulties

Our real self within "which aspires for another life but doesn't yet know how to live that other life, and which pushes from inside in order to get the conditions necessary for this other life... takes its support on outside obstacles in order to strengthen itself in its will to progress; and so, if you look at it from within, you can even say that it is you yourself who create the difficulties to help you to go forward" (188).

The Magnitude of One's Inner Difficulties Indicates the Magnitude of One's Mission

Every human being has a certain mission in terms of an inner

11. Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, SABCL Vol. 20, p. 7.

xxvii

victory to be won and a realization to be attained. The nature of one's inner difficulties indicates the nature of the victory one is meant to gain. The particular inner difficulty one faces "is the door to which he will attain God in his own individual manner: it is his particular path towards the Divine Realisation.

"There is also the fact that if somebody has a hundred difficulties it means he will have a tremendous realisation - provided, of course, there are in him patience and endurance and he keeps the aspiring flame of Agni burning against those defects" (175).

The Inner Shadow and the Light Within Are Equal

A little known fact of yogic psychology is that "one always carries in oneself the opposite of the virtue one has to realise... Always you will see that within you the shadow and the light are equal: you have an ability, you have also the negation of this ability. But if you discover a very black hole, a thick shadow, be sure there is somewhere in you a great light" (205).

" ... when you see a very black shadow somewhere, very black, something that's truly painful, you know, you can be sure that you have in you the possibility of the corresponding light."¹²

"It is up to you to know how to use the one to realise the other" (205).

Difficulties and the Power to Overcome Them Go Together

"One is aware of one's difficulties only insofar as one can change them and at the moment when one can make the change" (198).

"Our ordeals never exceed our capacity of resistance" (192).

"...the Grace of the Divine is generally proportioned to your difficulties" (175).

The Sense of Impossibility is a Sign of a Sure Future Realisation

Sri Aurobindo has stated: "What I cannot do now is the sign of what I shall do hereafter. The sense of impossibility is the beginning

12. The Mother, Questions and Answers, CWM Vol. 7, p. 420.

xxiii

of all possibilities " (Thoughts and Glimpses, SABCL Vol. 16, p. 378.)

Explaining Sri Aurobindo's paradoxical statement, the Mother says:

"When does something seem impossible to you? - It is when you try to do it. If you had never tried to do it, it would never have seemed impossible to you.

And how is it that you tried to do it?-Because it was somewhere in your consciousness. If it had not been in your consciousness, you would not have tried to do it; and the moment it is in your consciousness, it is quite obvious that it is something you will realise. That alone which is not in your consciousness you cannot realise. It's as simple as that!" (51)

The Psychic Being

A Special Grace

The Mother describes the psychic being as "a special grace given to human beings" (210). It is not given to beings of the vital worlds or to inhabitants of the higher worlds regarded by some as gods or demigods; "all those beings who have never had an earthly existence - gods or demons, invisible beings and powers - do not possess what the Divine has put into man: "the psychic being" (222). The psychic makes man an evolutionary being, unlike the on-evolving vital beings and the gods. As an evolutionary being, man is capable of collaborating in the work of the Divine's progressive manifestation on earth in the infinite process of the evolution of consciousness. "If he fulfils the required condition [surmounting the ego], man is nearer to the Supreme than the gods are" (222).

Source of All Urge for Growth and Perfection

. As stated earlier, all aspiration and will for progress originate in the psychic being. Without the aspiration and will for progress and growth "human beings would be quite dismal, dull, they

xxix

would have an altogether animal life" (236). As the Mother says, "All urge for perfection comes from it, but you are unaware of the source,..."¹³

Soul, Psychic Being and Jivatman

The concepts - soul, psychic being, and Jivatman ¹⁴ - are closely related and need to be distinguished from one another for a better understanding of the three concepts.

The soul is the psychic essence, or the spark of the Divine Consciousness which is present in everything and every being. "The divine spark is one, universal, the same everywhere and in everything, one and infinite, of the same kind in all. You cannot say that it is a being - it is the being, if you like, but not a being" (214). This soul "puts on a progressive individual form which becomes the psychic being" (213) when evolution reaches the human stage. As Sri Aurobindo puts it, "The psychic being is the spark growing into a Fire,... "¹⁵ When the psychic being is "fully formed and wholly awakened" it "becomes the conscious sheath of the soul around which it is formed" (212). Since the soul and the psychic being always co-exist in human beings, and constitute a single entity, the term "soul" and "psychic being" are used interchangeably in referring to the innermost part of the human being.

The Jivatman, like the psychic being, is an individual being, but whereas the psychic being is a terrestrial formation which comes into existence as a result of evolution on earth, the Jivat­ man exists prior to evolution and is unborn, outside the manifestation. The psychic being is a projection of the Jivatman into the manifestation and takes birth on earth, as a delegate of the Divine, "to awaken Matter out of its inertia so that it takes the path back to the Divine" (230). The Jivatman is immutable, and so does not evolve; it is "identified with the Divine, remains identified with

13. The Mother, Questions and Answers, CWM Vol. 3, p. 124.
14. Different conceptions of the Jivatman are found in various schools of Indian spiritual thought. The explanations given here are based on Sri Aurobindo's conception of the Jivatman.
15. Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga, SABCL Vol. 22, p. 278.

xxx

the Divine and does not change" (229). On the other hand, the psychic being, in taking birth on earth, loses its identification with the Divine, becomes identified with the body, the vital, and the mental; it evolves, growing progressively from life to life until it discovers its identity. The Jivatman presides from above "over the different births one after the other, but is itself unborn" (228); the psychic being, on the other hand, supports the evolution of mind, life and body from behind. The Jivatman is the true individual self, an individual centre of the one universal Self, the Atman. However, the psychic being, a projection of the Jivatman, is also often described as one's true self.

The Gita speaks of the Jivatman as a "portion of the Divine", a term which is applied by Sri Aurobindo to the psychic being also.

Influence of the Psychic Being

In the majority of human beings the psychic is embryonic, little developed. "The psychic remains behind and acts only through the mind, vital and physical wherever it can. For this reason the psychic being, except where it is very much developed, has only a small and partial, concealed and mixed or diluted influence on the life of most men" (281). "It is very much veiled by them [mental, vital, and physical parts of the being] and has to act upon them as an influence rather than by its sovereign right of direct action" (228).

"In the ordinary life there's not one person in a million who has a conscious contact with his psychic being, even momentarily. The psychic being may work from within, but so invisibly and unconsciously for the outer being that it is as though it did not exist. And in most cases, the immense majority, almost the totality of cases, it's as though it were asleep, not at all active, in a kind of torpor" (274).

However, the psychic being "penetrates through the most opaque substances and acts even in the unconsciousness" (271). "A certain sensitive feeling for all that is true and good and beautiful, fine and pure and noble, a response to it, a demand for it... is the most usually recognised, the most general and characteristic,

xxxi

though not the sole sign of this influence of the psyche. Of the man who has not this element in him or does not respond at all to this urge, we say that he has no soul."¹⁶

The "small and partial, concealed and mixed or diluted influence" of the psychic being spoken of above becomes more conscious and powerful when, with sadhana, the psychic being awakens and is no longer covered up by the mind and the vital, and comes forward. "By coming forward is meant that it comes from behind the veil, its presence is felt already in the waking daily consciousness, its influence fills, dominates, transforms the mind and vital and their movements, even the physical" (281); "it begins to take hold of the rest of the being, to influence it and change it so that all may become the true expression of the inner soul" (282). Instead of exerting only a small and diluted influence on the outer parts, the psychic begins to dominate, govern and transform the outer being.

Contact with the Psychic Being - Discovery of the Soul

The phrase "contact with the psychic", used by the Mother, generally means discovering, becoming aware of, establishing a union or identification with the psychic being as one's true self. It is also spoken of as awakening of the psychic being.

"When the psychic being awakens, you grow conscious of your own soul; you know yourself. And you no longer commit the mistake of identifying yourself with the mental or with the vital being. You do not mistake them for the soul" (284).

"One is aware of one's soul, feels the psychic to be one's true being, the mind and the rest begin to be only instruments of the inmost within us" (281).

"It is only with the sadhana and a very persistent effort that one succeeds in having a conscious contact with his psychic being. Naturally, it is possible that there are exceptional cases ...

"In almost, almost all cases, a very, very sustained effort is needed to become aware of one's psychic being. Usually it is considered that if one can do it in thirty years one is very lucky -

16. Sri Aurobindo, The Life Divine, SABCL Vol. 19, p. 893.

xxxii

thirty years of sustained effort" (274).

A consciously attained contact with the psychic being in the sense of identification - which comes after a long sadhana - is definitive; that is, it cannot be undone. In other words, once someone is identified with the psychic being, one never loses the identification. But before there is a definitive conscious contact with the psychic being, one can have "momentary contacts"¹⁷ with it which come and go. It is more like coming "under the influence of the psychic even without knowing it...For example, when you find yourself in a very great difficulty or a very great physical danger, and suddenly feel this, this force coming into you, the force of a faith, an absolute trust in the divine Grace which helps you. So it means that there is a conscious contact with one's psychic and it comes to help you - it is a special grace bestowed."¹⁸

Thus a momentary contact with the psychic being is a transient experience, whereas a definite contact with one's psychic is an abiding realisation.

Mission of the Psychic Being

The fundamental mission of the psychic being is to be an instrument of the Divine for the transformation of the outer physical, vital and mental being, so that the outer being can serve as a vehicle for the manifestation of the Divine on earth.

"... every psychic being which is in a body has states of being formed in the present formation. Its work is always to transform these; it is as though this were the part of the universe given to him for his work of transformation. And even if he has a vaster mission than that of his own person, unless he does this work in his person he cannot do the other..." (245).

"Each man has then a mission to fulfil, a role to play in the universe, a part he has been given to learn and take up in the cosmic Purpose, a part which he alone is capable of executing and none other" (241).

But the first step towards the transformation of the outer being

17. The Mother, Questions and Answers 1955, CWM Vol. 7, p. 117.
18. Ibid.

xxxiii

is for the psychic being to discover itself and become one with the Divine. The psychic being, "from the very moment of birth ina physical body... pushes the whole being towards this fulfilment [discovery of one's Divine self]" (244)... It "seeks, seeks, seeks to awaken the consciousness and re-establish the union" (244).

Role of the Psychic: (a) Guiding the Outer Being

Before the self-discovery, when the psychic being is still veiled by and identified with the outer physical, vital and mental con­sciousness, it supports the growth of the outer being from behind, giving it a sense of continuity, and exerting an unconscious influence over it.

Besides exerting an unconscious influence on the outer being, the psychic being also organizes, quite unconsciously for the outer being, its life circumstances so as to push it towards the goal:

"You may know nothing of the existence of a psychic being within you and yet be guided by it" (268).

"It is usually the psychic which guides the being. One knows nothing about it because one is not conscious of it but usually it is that which guides the being" (267).

"Absolutely unconsciously for the individual, most of the time; but it is the psychic which organises his existence" (265).

Role of the Psychic: (b) Unification of the Outer Being

From the viewpoint of Sri Aurobindo's yoga, a most important work for inner growth is the unification of the conflicting parts of the outer being - physical, vital, mental. It is only the psychic being that is capable of accomplishing this work of unification; the different parts of the outer being "can unite only under the psychic influence and action" (247).

"The work of unifying the being consists of:

"(1) becoming aware of one's psychic being.

"(2) putting before the psychic being, as one becomes aware of them, all one's movements, impulses, thoughts and acts of will, so that the psychic being may accept or reject each of these movements, impulses, thoughts or acts of will. Those that are accepted will be kept and carried out; those that are rejected will be driven

xxxiv

out of the consciousness so that they may never come back again.

"It is a long and meticulous work that may take years to be done properly" (249).

This unification of the being by organizing it around the psychic is indispensable if one wants to become a conscious instrument of the Divine.

"You may be moved, pushed into action and used as unconscious instruments by the divine Force, if you have a minimum of goodwill and sincerity. But to become a conscious instrument, capable of identification and conscious, willed movements, you must have this inner organisation; otherwise you will always be running into a chaos somewhere, a confusion somewhere or an obscurity, an unconsciousness somewhere. And naturally your action, even though guided exclusively by the Divine, will not have the perfection of expression it has when one has acquired a conscious organisation around this divine Centre" (277).

"When humanity was first created, the ego was the unifying element. It was around the ego that the different states of being were grouped; but now that the birth of superhumanity is being prepared, the ego has to disappear and give way to the psychic be­ ing, which has slowly been formed by divine intervention in order to manifest the Divine in the human being" (280).

Progress of the Psychic Being

Depending upon the stage of evolution of the psychic being, it “may be like a spark in the darkness of the being or it may be a being of light, conscious, fully formed and independent. There are all the gradations between the two" (235).

As stated previously, the psychic at its origin is only a spark of the Divine. Through progressive experience in successive lives it gradually builds up a conscious personality, and finally becomes "a fully individualised, fully conscious being and master of Itself" (257).

"Each time that the soul takes birth in a new body it comes with the intention of having a new experience which will help it to develop and to perfect its personality. This is how the psychic being is formed from life to life and becomes a completely

xxxv

conscious and independent personality which, once it has arrived at the summit of its development, is free to choose not only the time of its incarnation, but the place, the purpose and the work to be accomplished" (258).

The psychic being "keeps on progressing in an unbroken line, its movement a continuous ascension. All other movements [physical, vital, mental] are broken and discontinuous" (259). "It is just because progress is not constant and perpetual in the physical world that there is a growth, an apogee, a decline and a decomposition. For anything that does not advance, falls back; all that does not progress, regresses" (257).

When the psychic being is fully developed, it becomes master of its destiny. It is free to decide whether to take another birth on earth or not. It can choose to retire and repose in bliss in the psychic world, or it can choose to come back in a body to help in the work of the infinitely progressive manifestation of the Divine on earth.

xxxvi