... comes a time when it becomes very familiar in the life around you. Of course, I must admit that it is a little more difficult to feel it in human beings, because there are all their mental and vital formations which come into the field of perception and disturb it. There is too much of this kind of egoistic asperity which gets mixed with things, so it is more difficult to contact the Delight there.... marvellous harmony. Even what is to the ordinary human consciousness ugly, unpleasant, appears marvellous. Unfortunately, as I said, people, circumstances, all that, with all those mental and vital formations—that disturbs it all the time. Then one is obliged to return to this ignorant, blind perception of things. But otherwise, as soon as all this stops and one can get out of it... everything changes ...
... while writing. Our thoughts and feelings are also forces and can have effects upon others. One has to grow conscious of the movement of these forces and then one can control one’s own mental and vital formations and cease to be affected by those of others. Sri Aurobindo Letters on Yoga - IV: Interactions with Others and the Practice of Yoga ...
... Chapter III Inner Experience and Outer Life Subjective Experience and the Objective Existence Experiences on the mental and vital and subtle physical planes or thought formations and vital formations are often represented as if they were concrete external happenings; true experiences are in the same way distorted by mental and vital accretions and additions. One of the first needs in our Yoga ...
... vital faith there are periods when the knowledge in the psychic gets covered up—but it persists behind the veil. In you the eclipse has been strong and long because, owing to certain mental and vital formations, the assent of the mind and vital got clouded over and could only take negative forms. But there is always the knowledge or intuition in the soul that started you on the way. I have been pressing ...
... error. When this diminished indirect Force descends farther down into the mind and vital, it has still something of the Overmind creative Truth in it, but gets very badly mixed with mental and vital formations that disfigure it and make it half effective only, sometimes ineffective. (1) Part of it [ the descending higher consciousness ] is stored up in the frontal consciousness and remains there ...
... between the waking and dream states ], but there can be a subtle one. Events of the waking state often influence the dream world, provided they have a sufficient repercussion on the mind or the vital. Formations and activities of the dream planes can project something of themselves or of their influence into the waking physical state, though they seldom reproduce themselves with any exactness there. It ...
... keep straight, you will come to a time when the psychic becomes more predominantly active and the Light from above prevails more purely and strongly so that the chance of mental constructions and vital formations mixing with the true experience diminishes. As I have told you, these are not and cannot be the supramental Forces; it is a work of preparation which is only making things ready for a future ...
... to limit oneself, not to bind oneself down to this or that form of the mind and life and its partial preferences and desires. But since man in his present normal nature lives by his mental and vital formations, not in the freedom of his spirit, attachment to them and the desires and preferences they involve is also his normal condition. To accept them is at first inevitable, to get beyond them exceedingly ...
... error. When this diminished indirect force descends further down into the mind and vital, it has still something of the overmind creative Truth in it, but gets very badly mixed with mental and vital formations that disfigure it and make it half effective only, sometimes ineffective. Sri Aurobindo ...
... back cover of the card is not at all what the Mother explained to me. It is totally out of focus and not the Mother's Vision. The explanations underneath this card are, I suppose, mental and vital formations—as if everything is being squashed into one single plan! ...
... right again about the imaginary obstacles. Good Lord! What mountains of them you had piled up on the way— a regular Abyssinia. It is why we are always imprecating against mental constructions and vital formations—because they are the defence-works mind and vital throw up against their capture by the Divine. However, the first thing is to become conscious of all that as you have now become—the secret thing ...
... offending her in any way, of committing the least fault that would displease her; for that means Kali's vengeance. I know, I know very well these entities: they are beings of the vital world, they are vital formations—the forms are given by the human mind and what forms! To think that men worship such terrible and demoniac things! From this standpoint it is good that for a time humanity should come out ...
... offending her in any way, of committing the least fault that would displease her; for that means Kali's vengeance. I know, I know very well these entities: they are beings of the vital world, they are vital formations – the forms are given by the human mind and what forms! To think that men worship such terrible and demoniac things! From this standpoint it is good that for a time humanity should come out ...
... to you their delight. There comes a time when it becomes very familiar in the life around you... it is a little more difficult to feel it in human beings, because there are all their mental and vital formations... even in animals one feels it.... But in plants, in flowers, it is so wonderful! They speak all their joy, they express it... it is a communion with the raison d'être of the universe. ...
... as that which we find in our subjective experience,—for we see that the subconscient physical carries in it a mental psychological content, impressions of past events, habits, fixed mental and vital formations, fixed forms of character, and sends them up by an occult process to the waking consciousness, thus originating or influencing many activities of our nature. On the same basis there would be ...
... comes a time when it becomes very familiar in the life around you. Of course, I must admit that it is a little more difficult to feel it in human beings, because there are all their mental and vital formations which come into the field of perception and disturb ir. There is too much of this kind of egoistic asperity which gets mixed with things, so it is more difficult to contract the Delight there ...
... the waking and the dream states], but there can be a subtle one. Events of the waking state often influence the dream world, provided they have a sufficient repercussion on the mind or the vital. Formations and activities of the dream planes can project something of themselves or of their influence into the waking physical state, though they seldom reproduce themselves with any exactness there ...
... vital faith there are periods when the knowledge in the psychic gets covered up—but it persists behind the veil. In you the eclipse has been strong and long because owing to certain mental and vital formations, the assent of the mind and vital got clouded over and could only take negative forms. But there is always the knowledge or intuition in the soul that started you on the way. I have been pressing ...
... that happen in the vital world are, if it may be so expressed, often half-truths of possibility on that plane; sometimes actual events there, sometimes constructions of the vital mind, sometimes vital formations that want to realize themselves here and may or may not realize themselves, not in the terms in which they are seen but with a difference, unless they are vital records or transcriptions, of physical ...
... while writing. Our thoughts and feelings are also forces and can have effects upon others. One has to grow conscious of the movement of these forces and then one can control one's own mental and vital formations and cease to be affected by those of others. Talking or Thinking about Others Talking about somebody may very well have an effect on him; it often does, for it can be an effective formulation ...
... keep straight, you will come to a time when the psychic becomes more predominantly active and the Light from above prevails more purely and strongly so that the chance of mental constructions and vital formations mixing with the true experience diminishes. As I have told you, these are not yet and cannot be the supramental Forces; it is a work of preparation which is only making things ready for a future ...
... as if there were nothing. Some people here feel that X has been bringing impurity of thought and action into our centre. I give you some examples.... All these are simply self-created vital formations due to the atmosphere of suspicion and dislike which Y 's campaign has created around X . In such an atmosphere it is not truth that manifests but the feelings of the vital that take form in ...
... is to call down first the eternal peace, calm and silence of the Divine into the mind and the vital and physical being. In that peace and silence there is a true possibility that the mental and vital formations will fall to rest and the supramental creation can have free space. The second safeguard is to remain entirely detached even from the most absorbing experiences and observe them without being ...
... right again about the imaginary obstacles. Good Lord! what mountains of them you have piled up on the way—a regular Abyssinia. It is why we always express depreciation of mental constructions and vital formations—because they are the defence works mind and vital throw up against their capture by the Divine. However the first thing is to become conscious of all that as you have now become,—the next thing ...
... consciously self-created forms arise either in meditation or sleep, which correspond to mental thoughts or vital feelings, one's own or those of others, those also are simply mental images or vital formations. The true significant ones are those that come of themselves and correspond to things, states of consciousness or a play of forces that are actual and not determined mainly by one's ideas, will ...
... nonexistent. The following conversation is in regard to one of Mother's commentaries on the Dhammapada: 'Evil' ) I spent a night—a night of battle—when, for some reason or other, a multitude of vital formations of all kinds entered into the room: beings, things, embryos of beings, residues of beings—all kinds of things ... And it was a frightful assault, absolutely disgusting. In this swarming mass ...
... this letter something MORE than I thought. I always thought he was a very mental man with a vital power of attraction—there may be something else.... Page 284 But they are caught in vital formations. P. L. too, I always got a feeling he had to be protected. Did Z say when she intends to leave? End of August. And she'd like to come back next year with Msgr. R., in February I think. ...
... don't know what realisation he has reached. Perhaps it is on the vital plane. That is a plane of possibility or idea or suggestion comes to him with some force, he accepts it. The nature of these vital formations is to present themselves with a force. And when another possibility comes with the same force, Meher Baba accepts that too so that his prophecies go wrong, become contradictory and his planning ...
... persons is: Is there any negative side to the free indulgence of the faculty of subtle vision? The answer is: Yes, all that comes in visions may not be true; some visions may be due to the mental or vital formations of the subject; some others may be introduced by some hostile occult forces and beings. Some visions may be nothing more than alluring falsehoods. Some others may come only with the purpose of ...
... darshan, I saw Sri Aurobindo's light around her like a cloud. Was this a formation of the mind or the vital? Was there a mistake in it? If seeing the Mother's Light is a mistake or a mental or vital formation, then the realisation of the Divine and all spiritual experience can be questioned as a mental or vital formation or mistake and all Yoga becomes impossible. 6 September 1933 While ...
... had to do pranam and so did all the others. Why these wrong pranams and Mother's order? It was evidently a vital formation, as Mother's order could not possibly be for the pranam to be to another, since such a thing is forbidden and would be disastrous. It is the kind of formation X was persistently making that all must approach and realise the Truth through him and he even hoped that one ...
... which even if partially covered cannot disappear altogether. Mostly however the constant recurrence of depression and despair or of doubt and revolt is due to a mental or vital formation which takes hold of the vital mind and makes it run round always in the same circle at the slightest provoking cause or even without cause. It is like an illness to which the body consents from habit and from... abiding and rejection also spontaneous is the psychic conversion. That is to say man usually lives in his vital and the body is its instrument and the mind its counsellor and minister (except for the few mental men who live mostly for the things of the mind, but even they are in subjection to the vital in their ordinary movements). The spiritual conversion begins when the soul begins to insist on a deeper... deeper life and is complete when the psychic becomes the basis or the leader of the consciousness and mind and vital and body are led by it and obey it. Of course if that once happens fully, doubt, depression and despair cannot come any longer, although there may be and are difficulties still. If it is not fully, but still fundamentally accomplished, even then these things either do not come or are brief ...
... the usual movements of the vital formation which is not yourself and they come up to try and prevent the change in you. You have only to refuse to accept these suggestions and put yourself persistently on the side of the Truth in you which will make you free and happy, and all will be well. Melancholy It seems to me from what you have written that it is the old vital restlessness and indulgence... Sadhana on the Level of the Vital Sadhana on the Level of the Vital Vital Temperament Letters on Yoga - IV Chapter II Sorrow and Suffering Joy and Sorrow Joy is a vital feeling, like its opposite, sorrow. There is no real reason why delight should necessarily be followed by sorrow—except that it is the habit of the vital. But that habit can be overcome... wants it is part of the human vital—it is these things that we describe as the insincerity and perverse twist of the vital; it cries out against sorrow and trouble and accuses the Divine and life and everybody else of torturing it, but for the most part the sorrow and the trouble come and remain because the perverse something in the vital wants them! That element in the vital has to be got rid of altogether ...
... interfere in the action of the Power, prevent it from being felt or working fully and diminish the force of the Protection. It was the same thing that made you lose touch for a while—for the adverse vital Formation always makes use of Page 318 these wrong movements to cloud the consciousness. Not only in your inward concentration, but in your outward acts and movements you must take the right... that when occult power is used, without asking Mother, to satisfy one's like or dislike, a clash may occur on the vital plane and some disembodied being there may give a dangerous hit. He said it is not really like this—rather it happens naturally as the result of a play of forces on the vital plane. It is obviously a wholly Asuric thing to do when it is turned to egoistic purposes or against fellow... At 4.30 in the afternoon, while serving vegetables in the Dining Room, I suddenly fell into a very unhappy condition. My consciousness entered into a world of obscurity and uneasiness and wild vital forces. Innumerable hostile suggestions pierced my helpless consciousness. Then the form of X appeared and he threatened me, saying that my fate would be the same as his—I would have to leave the Asram ...
... Or there is the opposite danger that he may become the instrument of some apparently brilliant but ignorant formation, for the intermediate planes are full of little Gods or strong Daityas or smaller beings who want to create, to materialize something or to enforce a mental or vital formation in the earth life and are eager to use or influence or even possess the thought and will of the sadhaka and... and no mystery remains unexplained by the Master. One feels like moving with the author through the land of the Yoga of transformation. The Yoga-Force is applied to life, its various principles and formations. The attitude to be adopted towards sex, money or power, the attitude that should govern us while reading books or while formulating, modifying or maintaining our relation with the society and the ...
... forces if one has studied them scientifically. Magic: these are different kinds of processes which were fixed probably by people who had a certain knowledge, and still more a certain power of vital formation. These things can be learnt without having any special capacity, that is, someone who has no inner power can learn this as he learns chemistry, for example, or mathematics. It is one of the things... if you see the books of Madame David-Neel who has lived in Tibet you will get an idea of their expertness in these things. But also the Tibetan Lamas know something of the laws of occult (mental and vital) energy and how it can be made to act on physical things. That is something which goes beyond mere magic. The direct power of mind-force or life-force upon matter can be extended to an almost illimitable... the temporary materialisation of subtle substance into forms capable of cognition not only by the sight but by material touch or other sense, (3) the handling of material objects by mind-energy or vital force, e.g. making a pencil move and write on paper. All these things are possible and have been done. It must be remembered that Energy is fundamentally one in all the planes, only taking more and ...
... studied them scientifically. Magic: these are different kinds of processes which were fixed probably by people who had a certain knowledge, and Page 261 still more a certain power of vital formation. These things can be learnt without having any special capacity, that is, someone who has no inner power can learn this as he learns chemistry, for example, or mathematics. It is one of the things... the mere mental, vital and physical into the psychic consciousness, then this Yoga can be done..." Why has he said "the inmost soul"? Is there a superficial soul? It is because this inmost soul, that is, the central psychic being, influences the superficial parts of the consciousness (superficial in comparison with it: mental parts, vital parts). The purest mind, the highest vital, the emotive being—the... your discipline and consecration, an ambition is mixed up, that is, an intention to obtain powers, then if they come to you it is almost like a curse. Usually they don't come to you, but something vital which tries to imitate them comes to you with adverse influences which put you entirely under the domination of beings who give you powers simply with the intention of making use of you, using you to ...
... mental and vital formation of me that they love, it is not myself. More and more am I faced with this fact. Everyone has made for himself an image of me in conformity with his needs and desires and it is with this image that he is in contact, it is through this that he receives what few universal forces and still less supramental forces succeed in filtering through all these formations. Unfortunately ...
... the vital being of course, not the psychic being which goes to take rest), he may feel altogether lost, not know what to do and find himself in great distress; then he sees through affinity the light of those who are thinking of him with affection and he rushes there. It happens almost constantly that a vital formation, a part of the vital being of the dead person (or at times the whole vital if it... it is purely mental gymnastics. And if you can enter into the mental formation of a metaphysician and are able to understand and answer him, it is perfect gymnastics! (A mathematician disciple:) The same thing applies to mathematicians, I suppose ? Yes. If at the time of death the vital being is attacked in the vital world by hostile forces or entities, does it not look for a shelter somewhere... 1951 March Questions and Answers (1950-1951) 12 March 1951 In the vital world, forces exist: do mental forms exist in the mental world? Yes, there is a concrete mental world and there are mental forms which do not resemble vital forces but have their own law. There are many, innumerable mental forms. They are almost indestructible; one can only ...
... there is the opposite danger that he may become the instrument of some apparently brilliant but ignorant formation; for these intermediate planes are full of little gods or strong daityas or smaller beings who want to create, to materialize something or to enforce a mental and vital formation in the earth life and are eager to use or influence or even possess the thought and will of the sadhaka and... is easier than for the powers of these zones or hostile powers to imitate the guiding Voice or Image and deceive and mislead the sadhaka or for himself to attribute the creations and formations of his own mind, vital or ego to the Divine. For this intermediate zone is a region of half-truths—and that by itself would not matter, for there is no complete truth below the Supermind; but the half-truth... experiences of a personal character, the rest are either idea-truths, such as pour down into the consciousness from above when one gets into touch with certain planes of being, or strong formations from the larger mental and vital worlds which, when one is directly open to these worlds, rush in and want to use the sadhaka for their fulfilment. These things, when they pour down or come in, present themselves ...
... really meet and coalesce. India's genius has been precisely working in the line of a perfect solution of this supreme problem. Islam comes with a full-fledged spiritual soul and a mental and vital formation commensurable with that inner being and consciousness. It comes with a dynamic spirit, a warrior mood, that aims at conquering the physical world for the Lord, a temperament which Indian spirituality... past. And that is the true genesis of the present conflict. History abounds in instances of racial and cultural immixture. Indeed, all major human groupings of today are invariably composite formations. Excepting, perhaps, some primitive - aboriginal tribes there are no pure races existent. The Briton, the Dane, the Anglo-Saxon, and the Norman have combined to form the British; a Frenchman has... Buddhism. The Buddhistic enlightenment and discipline did not admit the supreme authority of the Vedas; it sought other bases of truth and reality. It was a great denial; and it meant and worked for a vital schism. The denial of the Vedas by itself, perhaps, would not be serious, but it became so, as it was symptomatic of a deeper divergence. Denying the Vedas, the Buddhistic spirit denied life. It was ...
... really meet and coalesce. India's genius has been precisely working in the line of a perfect Solution of this supreme problem. Islam comes with a full-fledged spiritual soul and a mental and vital formation commensurable with that inner being and consciousness. It comes with a dynamic spirit, a warrior mood, that aims at conquering the physical world, for the Lord, a temperament which Indian spirituality... past. And that is the true genesis of the present conflict. History abounds in instances of racial and cultural immixture. Indeed, all major human groupings of today are invariably composite formations. Excepting, perhaps, some primitive aboriginal tribes there are no pure races existent. The Briton, the Dane, the Anglo-Saxon, and the Norman have combined to form the British; a Frenchman has a... Buddhism. The Buddhistic enlightenment and discipline did not admit the supreme authority of the Vedas; it sought other bases of truth and reality. It was a great denial; and it meant and worked for a vital schism. The denial of the Vedas by itself, perhaps, would not be serious, but it became so, as it was symptomatic of a deeper divergence. Denying the Vedas, the Buddhistic spirit denied life. It was ...
... really meet and coalesce. India's genius has been precisely working in the line of a perfect solution of this supreme problem. Islam comes with a full-fledged spiritual soul and a mental and vital formation commensurable with that inner being and consciousness. It comes with a dynamic spirit, a warrior mood, that aims at conquering the physical world for the Lord, a temperament which Indian spirituality... past. And that is the true genesis of the present conflict. History abounds in instances of racial and cultural immixture. Indeed, all major human groupings of today are invariably composite formations. Excepting, perhaps, some primitive aboriginal tribes there are no pure races existent. The Briton, the Dane, the Anglo-Saxon, and the Norman have combined to form the British; a Frenchman has a... Buddhism. The Buddhistic enlightenment and discipline did not admit the supreme authority of the Vedas; it sought other bases of truth and reality. It was a great denial; and it meant and worked for a vital schism. The denial of the Vedas by itself, perhaps, would not be serious, but it became so, as it was symptomatic of a deeper divergence. Denying the Vedas, the Buddhistic spirit denied Page 80 ...
... like that, they live that, for it's necessary to get out from below and this is a way—it's a way, the only way. It was the only way for the vital formation and the vital creation to enter into the material world, into inert matter. An intellectualized vital, a vital of ideas, an 'artist'; it even fringes upon or has the first drops of Poetry—this Poetry which upon its peaks goes beyond the mind and becomes... reputed for his loose morals and the object of numerous 'moralistic' or even so-called 'yogic' criticisms among the 'true disciples' in the Ashram ) He lives in a region which is largely a kind of vital vibration which penetrates the mind and makes use of the imagination (essentially it's the same region most so-called cultured men live in). I don't mean to be severe or critical, but it's a world that... two such examples here, but it's not necessary to name them) ... There are beings who are grave, so serious, so sincere, who find it hypocritical; and when it borders on certain (how shall I put it?) vital excesses, they call it vice. There are others who have lived their entire lives in a yogic or religious discipline, and they see this as an obstacle, illusion, dirtyness ( Mother makes a gesture of ...
... mental, the true vital, the true physical being in oneself. Both realisations are necessary for this Yoga. The "I" or the little ego is constituted by Nature and is at once a mental, vital and physical formation meant to aid in centralising and individualising the outer consciousness and action. When the true being is discovered, the utility of the ego is over and this formation has to disappear—the... here—the ego is simply a mental, vital, physical formation of the mobile consciousness in Nature which is wrongly taken for our true being so long as the psychic is veiled and the consciousness is in the Ignorance. As to the change of nature, the first step is to become conscious Page 97 and separate from the old surface nature. For this rajasic vital nature is a surface creation of... of Prakriti, it is not the true being; however persistent it seems, it is only a temporary combination of vital movements. Behind is the true mental and vital being supported by the psychic—this true being is calm, wide, peaceful. By drawing back and becoming separate one creates the possibility of living in the peace of this inner Purusha no longer identified with the surface Prakriti. Afterwards it ...
... Or there is the opposite danger that he may become the instrument of some apparently brilliant but ignorant formation; for these intermediate planes are full of little Gods or strong Daityas or smaller beings who want to create, to materialise something or to enforce a mental and vital formation in the earth life and are eager to use or influence or even possess the thought and will of the sadhak and... nothing is easier than for the powers of these zones or hostile powers to imitate the guiding Voice or Image and deceive and mislead the sadhak or for himself to attribute the creations and formations of his own mind, vital or ego to the Divine. For this intermediate zone is a region of half-truths --and that by itselfwould not matter, for there is no complete truth below the Supermind; but the half-truth... experiences of a personal character, the rest are either ideatruths, such as pour down into the consciousness from above when one gets into touch with certain planes of being, or strong formations from the larger mental and vital worlds which, when one is directly open to these worlds, rush in and want to use the sadhak for their fulfilment. These things, when they pour down or come in, present themselves ...
... very strong vital formation (which was influencing him too), a sort of... (excuse my saying so, I don't want to harm your friendship or your memory), but it's a sort of drama he was putting on for himself—besides, all those who commit suicide are like that, WITHOUT ONE EXCEPTION. It's a drama that he was putting on for himself and living very powerfully in the vital, and the formation came on you along... dramas of the vital. I am absolutely sure of it, you could swear to me that it's not so, it would make no difference. I am absolutely sure. He was the first... I might say "victim," if you like, the first victim of the drama, but then it came on you, it pounced on you along with the letter. A drama in the vital. And it's a drama in the vital, all these things are dramas in the vital.... Listen, just... again "looks" at the letter ) Are you sure he has committed suicide?... I am not. Do you have his address? Can you find out? Yes, I can. ( Silence ) You are still very sensitive to others' formations. He's a man whom I understand well, I lived with him. He wasn't at all an ordinary man who accepted life like most people who are comfortable in life. No, but he was a "dramatizer." Not ...
... which even if partially covered cannot disappear altogether. Mostly however the constant recurrence of depression and despair or of doubt and revolt is due to a mental or vital formation which takes hold of the vital mind and makes it run round always in the same circle at the slightest provoking cause or even without cause. It is like an illness to which the body consents from habit and from... Yoga ]. Also, your psychic being does not deserve the censure you have bestowed upon it. What prevents it from coming out in its full power is the crust of past habits, formations, active vibrations of the mind-stuff and vital stuff which come from a mind and life which have been more creative and outgoing and expansive than indrawn and introspective. In many who are like this—active men and int... the ordinary vital being has to disappear and be changed into the true vital. The soul in itself contains all possible strength, but most of it is held behind the veil and it is what comes forward in the nature that makes the difference. In some people the psychic element is strong and in others weak; in some people the mind is the strongest part and governs, in others the vital is the strongest ...
... mental and vital formation of me that they love, it is not myself. More and more am I faced with this fact. Everyone has made for himself an image of me in conformity with his needs and desires; and it is with this image that he is in contact, it is through this that he receives what few universal forces and still less supramental forces succeed in filtering through all these formations. Unfortunately... towards it is not to foresee war; any action taking measures in prevision of a possible war is already a step taken towards its outbreak. On the contrary the larger the number of people who have a vital interest in the abolition of war the more effective the chances towards a stable peace until the advent of a new consciousness in man makes of war an impossibility. Sri Aurobindo's Bust by E. Frankel: ...
... three places! ( Laughter ) Page 248 Disciple :It may be only the psychic presence. Sri Aurobindo : That is quite another thing ; it is possible, even thought-formation and psycho-vital formation is possible. Disciple : Vivekananda came to Shashi Maharaj after leaving his body and told him "Shashi ! I have spat out my body", Sri Aurobindo : That is quite possible... what people require is Page 251 some kind of vital emotion—they do not remi thought. People get tired of listening to thoughts Disciple : Is there no thought in oratory ? Is it only an art'? Sri Aurobindo : Not so ; but even if there is thought you have to dilute it very much and throw it into the emotional vital. Disciple : But they say that Surendra Nath was Burke and... The scientist tried and the magician tried to save the girl. The magician failed. Then the scientist tried; he found himself baffled by the opponents as they (the dasyus, hostile vital powers) were not struck down by the blows of the sword or of anything. The opponents were going to a king's capital. Then they fled and the girl was taken away. The scientist was a geologist who had ...
... world. Something more than that would be necessary. For this is like the assassin who is guillotined: when his head is cut off, his spirit remains behind and is projected outside him. It is a vital formation and it goes and takes shelter in one of the benevolent spectators, who suddenly feels a criminal instinct in himself. There are many men like that, specially very young criminals who when questioned... and light—it becomes once more what it was. Hasn't it become that again? But I have just said a minute ago that when it became inconscience or darkness, it produced innumerable formations—emanations, formations, creations. And its conversion does not mean that all the rest follow. They obey that same law of freedom, freedom of choice. They may be converted or not. There are those who are converted... What are these "invisible enemies of the Divine"? They are precisely those four persons who have naturally put forth innumerable emanations, which have again put forth others, which have made formations. And so there are millions and millions and millions of them, and it is these who have formed between themselves a certain habit and have the logic to preserve it and persist in not wanting any other ...
... life. 85 — Sri Aurobindo * It is true again that it is difficult for man's mind to distinguish entirely the soul or self or any spiritual element in him from the mental and vital formation in which it makes its appearance; but that is only so long as the emergence is not complete. In the animal mind is not quite distinct from its own life-matrix and life-matter; its movements are... my opinion"; it demands that the Truth cast itself in the mind's own forms. The vital being also insists on the Truth to throw itself into its own movement of force. The vital being pulls at the Higher Power and pulls and pulls at the vital being of the Guru. Both of them (the mental and the vital) have got an arrière pensée (mental reservation) in their surrender. But the psychic... ction or vital sadness or physical depression. If the psychic being is strong, it makes itself felt on the mental or the vital being, and forces them — compels them — to change. But if it is weak, the other parts take advantage of it and use the psychic sadness to their own advantage. In some cases the psychic being comes up to the surface and upsets the mental or the vital being and ...
... It is a zone of formations, mental, vital, subtle physical, and whatever one forms or is formed by the forces of these worlds in us becomes for the sadhak for a time the truth—unless he is guided and listens to his guide. Afterwards if he gets through he discovers what it was and passes on into the subtle truth of things. It is a borderland where all the worlds meet, mental, vital, subtle physical... Or there is the opposite danger that he may become the instrument of some apparently brilliant but ignorant formation; for these intermediate planes are full of little Gods or strong Daityas or smaller beings who want to create, to materialise something or to enforce a mental and vital formation in the earth life and are eager to use or influence or even possess the thought and will of the sadhak and... experiences of a personal character, the rest are either idea-truths, such as pour down into the consciousness from above when one gets into touch with certain planes of being, or strong formations from the larger mental and vital worlds which, when one is directly open to these worlds, rush in and want to use the sadhak for their fulfilment. These things, when they pour down or come in, present themselves ...
... rise higher to be able to accept it, to be unaffected by it. But that thing I saw yesterday, that bubbly formation of joie de vivre, I saw clearly that it's one of the greatest obstacles—one of the greatest obstacles: a vital joy that knows only itself, that knows nothing other than its own vital joy and is PERFECTLY content. I saw it was a great obstacle, because... it already contained a sort of ... an enlightened faith, but he has faith. All right. Things are fine and he does very well. So they came yesterday to receive my blessings. Then they went. And they left behind in the room... a vital formation, very bubbly, absolutely ignorant, very bubbly with a joie de vivre, a joie de Page 358 vivre so blissfully ignorant of all possible difficulties, all possible miseries, and not only... along with her—but that's nothing! Nothing compared to That. Durga's power... yes, it's like milk and water in comparison. And there is absolutely nothing vital about it—now I find vital power quite crude, almost repugnant. There's nothing vital about it: it's something from on high. It always comes with a golden Vibration, very strong, and so massive!... But it comes only when the situation is ...
... 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... 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... 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 ...
... falsehood. How can this be? It is because they go higher and higher in the same plane of consciousness as before and do not rise beyond — e.g. higher and higher in the realm of vital mental formations — not higher beyond mind into the planes that lead to the full supramental. Only today a suggestion from outside advised me to ask the Mother whether the knowledge that comes... mind and vital unless the physical is prepared, — for there is such a thing as the mental and vital physical and mind and vital cannot be said to be perfectly prepared until these are ready. Why cannot the Supramental be brought down stage by stage — that is, first into the mind and the vital till the physical is ready? It cannot be brought down to the mind and vital without... will not be Supermind there, but something else, — so also with the vital. All that can manifest in the mind separately is a partly supramentalised Overmind. If the supramental can stand in the mind and vital, then it must stand in the physical also. If it does not stand in the physical, it cannot stand in the mind and vital also; it will be something else, not the supramental. A ...
... experience is full of vital visions, formations, experiences of all kinds, but there is no mental clarity or order, neither do they rise above the mind. It is only the minority of men who live in the mind or in the psychic or try to live on the spiritual plane. Sri Aurobindo Letters on Yoga - IV: The Nature of the Vital In the ordinary life, people accept the vital movements, anger, desire... there is a physical vital—a vital turned entirely upon physical things, full of desires and greeds and seekings for pleasure on the physical plane. Sri Aurobindo Letters on Yoga - I: The Vital Being and Vital Consciousness The physical vital is the being of small desires and greeds etc.—the vital physical is the nervous being; they are closely connected together. The vital physical governs... the lower vital or a part of the physical vital and then be astonished to find that something intangible but apparently invincible still resists—it is the material vital with so much of the rest as it can influence by its resistance. Sri Aurobindo Letters on Yoga - I: The Vital Being and Vital Consciousness The nervous part of the being is a portion of the vital—it is the vital physical, ...
... falsehood. How can this be? It is because they go higher and higher in the same plane of consciousness as before and do not rise beyond — e.g. higher and higher in the realm of vital-mental formations — not higher beyond mind into the planes that lead to the full supramental. Before or while rising to the higher spiritual ranges, often we imagine that the ego has been... put her Force on some sadhak because he wanted to change his vital. Well, I too wish intensely to change my vital and my ego. They will naturally refuse change as is their right. But what does it matter? My soul and mind are in earnest about it and that should be enough for the beginning. It is not the right of the vital and ego to refuse, it is only their habit. ... suppressed in the vital. When the inertia rose and the energy of will receded, it began to try to come in again. I had thought that at least the rajasic ego had been eliminated! Do you mean to say that you never had any rajasic element in you? There is not a human being who has not got it in him so long as he is not divinised in his vital. What were all the vital suggestions ...
... there is the opposite danger that he may become the instrument of some apparently brilliant but ignorant formation; for these inter- mediate planes are full of little Gods or strong Daityas or smaller beings who want to create, to materialise something or to enforce a mental and vital formation in the earth-life and are eager to use or influence or even possess the thought and will of the sadhak and... powers of these zones or hostile powers to Page 353 imitate the guiding Voice or Image and deceive and mislead the sadhak or for himself to attribute the creations and formations of his own mind, vital or ego to the Divine... "The sadhak thinks that he is no longer in the old small consciousness at all, because he feels in contact with something larger and more powerful, and yet... sadhak12 has now opened his consciousness, - not as before getting glimpses of them and some influences, but directly, receiving their full impact, - send a host of ideas, impulses, suggestions, formations of all kinds, often the most opposite to each other, inconsistent or incompatible, but presented in such a way as to slur over their insufficiencies and differences, with great force, plausibility ...
... There are formations that help and formations that hamper; the latter have to be dismissed and dissolved, not to be allowed to repeat themselves. The Mother told you that to explain the origin of this tendency and the necessity of getting rid of it— Page 545 there was no hint of any insuperable difficulty, quite the contrary. For most people [ when they die ] the vital dissolves after... naturally a psychic being. It is only other types like the vital beings that have not, and that is precisely the reason why they want to possess men and enjoy physical life without being themselves born here, for so they escape the psychic law of evolution and spiritual progress Page 547 and change. But these formations [ the vital fragments of a dead person ] are different, they are things... 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. The physical always dissolves and in each new life one gets a new physical formation. To preserve the same physical would mean physical immortality. Not as they are. 2 What remains and to what degree depends on the development in each case. Of course ...
... but the soul-formation in the natural being—is little evolved, insufficiently developed, so insufficiently formed that it could not abide except by dependence upon the uninterrupted continuance of this life's mental, vital and physical individuality: unable as yet to persist in itself, dis card its past mind-formation and life-formation and build after a useful interval new formations, it would be... limited and dwarfed, however engrossed and encased in the physical and vital consciousness and unable or unwilling to detach itself from its lower formations. Yet we may suppose that there is a downward attachment so strong as to compel the being to hasten at once to a resumption of the physical life because his natural formation is not really fit for anything else or at home on any higher plane. Or... temporary mental, vital, physical formation which the being, the real Person, the psychic entity, puts forward on the surface,—it is not the self in its abiding reality. In each return to earth the Person, the Purusha, makes a new formation, builds a new personal quantum suitable for a new experience, for a new growth of its being. When it passes from its body, it keeps still the same vital and mental form ...
... Be careful about vital movements and formations—when you allow them, you are on a dangerous slope. If you want the Divine and the inner life, the old vital moorings must be cut. It is certainly the abrupt and decisive breaking that is the easiest and best way for these things—vital habits. People are here to change what is wrong in their nature so that they may do an effective... and their experience is full of vital visions, formations, experiences of all kinds, but there is no mental clarity or order, neither do they rise above the mind. It is only the minority of men who live in the mind or in the psychic or try to live on the spiritual plane. Of course most men live in their physical mind and vital, except a few saints and a rather larger number of intellectuals. That... the Level of the Vital Sadhana on the Level of the Vital The Vital Being and Sadhana Letters on Yoga - IV Chapter I The Nature of the Vital Living in the Vital Man is a mental being and cannot come from the vital, although part of him may live on the vital plane or rather in connection with it. Most men in fact live much in the vital and therefore when ...
... that the mind or the vital does it? The Chitta is the consciousness out of which all is formed, but the formation is made by the mind or vital or other force — which are, as it were, the instruments of the Chitta for self-expression. When the Chitta sends things to the mind and the vital for formation, is it they that are responsible for the formation made and not at all... gives them for formation to the vital and the mind and all is transmitted to the Buddhi, but also it receives thoughts from the Buddhi and turns these into desires and sensations and impulses. You say "The Chitta receives these things, gives them for formation to the vital and mind and all is transmitted to the Buddhi". Does it mean that the Chitta does not give formation to anything but... all the Chitta? There is something in the Chitta that either lends itself or subtly determines the formation. What does your word "subtly" mean here? Not openly or precisely or in such a way that you can say — the Chitta has done this or that and the vital the rest. Has not the Chitta to cease catching influences at random from outside? Yes, ...
... once, either within themselves or in the universe. For this identification is the indispensable basis of our Yoga; it is its starting-point. 17 July 1932 It is their own mental and vital formation of me that they love, not myself. More and more I am confronted with this fact. Each one has made his own image of me for himself in conformity with his needs and desires, and it is with this image... image that he is in relation, through that he receives the little amount of universal forces and the still smaller amount of supramental forces that manage to filter through all these formations. Unfortunately, they cling to my physical presence, otherwise I could withdraw into my inner solitude and do my work quietly and freely from there; but this physical presence is a symbol for them and that is... little gratefulness and some kind of affection! 5 June 1949 I did not answer because their minds are terribly restless, they do not know how to make use of the force and they spoil my formations. But you need not tell them that―send them only blessings. 13 May 1955 You must understand one thing. Before giving an answer to a question, I look at all the sides of the problem present ...
... knowledge is impeded by the fact that there are many elements in us, many formations which present themselves as soul elements and can be mistaken for the psyche. In the early Greek and some other traditions about the after-life, the descriptions given show very clearly that what was then mistaken for the soul was a subconscious formation, a subphysical impression-mould or shadow-form of the being or else... initiate more clearly recognisable intimations and formations of them on the surface. The soul in us, the psychic principle, has already begun to take secret form; it puts forward and develops a soul personality, a distinct psychic being to represent it. This psychic being remains still behind the veil in our subliminal part, like the true mental, the true vital or the true or subtle physical being within... preside over their action; owing to this inexperience we can easily mistake something of the inner mind or vital self for the psyche. For as Being is one yet multiple, so also the same law prevails in ourselves and our members; the spirit, the Purusha is one but it adapts itself to the formations of Nature. Over each grade of our being a power of the Spirit presides; we have within us and discover when ...
... contact with it becomes painful; there is a great difficulty in adapting myself to it and it takes a long time before I can overcome this uneasiness.' - Jun 11 'It is their own mental and vital formation of me that they love, not myself.... Unfortunately, they cling to this physical presence...; in fact they have very little contact with what my body truly is or with the tremendous accumulation... national language and English only as an international link language. - May 22 Sees 'the possibility of a tre-men-dous success'. There is 'the Will that is coming down and then there are all these formations that get in and delay its executions - I would like my atmosphere to be... an altogether limpid transmitter... letting things pass without deformation, without obstruction.' - Jul On the Bangladesh... ath Chakravarti with the advice, 'Take Krishna as the symbol of the immanent Divine, the Divine within you.' And, 'in a month the whole work was done.' 1896-1907 Period of cultivation of the vital being and aesthetic consciousness. Comes in contact with leading artists of the period including Rodin and Matisse. Meets Emile Zola. Six of her paintings are exhibited at the Salon de la Société ...
... forms of ignorance, — physical, vital, mental, — which are presented to it by the Ignorant Prakriti. Hence, the individual in the Ignorance has three poises of the Purusha corresponding to three currents of the formations of Prakriti. In the physical formation of Prakriti, the individual takes the poise of the physical Purusha (annamaya purusa), in the vital formation of Prakriti, the individual takes... unity, even while there is varying play of diversity. In our lower experience of human consciousness, the individual soul is found in the complex formation of body, life and mind. The body, life and mind are formations of material energy of Prakriti, vital energy of Prakriti and Page 115 mental energy of Prakriti; corresponding to these three levels of Prakriti, there are three poises... takes the poise of the vital Purusha (prānamaya purusa), and in the mental formation of Prakriti in the human complex, the individual takes the poise of the mental Purusha (manomaya purusa). But these assumptions of the Purusha corresponding to gradual formations of forms of Prakriti have behind them the consent of the Purusha, and the capital point of importance is that the Purusha has the freedom ...
... mental and vital formation of me that they love, it is not myself. More and more am I faced with this fact. Everyone has made for himself an image of me in conformity with his needs and desires, and it is with this image that he is in contact, it is through this that he receives what few universal forces and still less supramental forces succeed in filtering through all these formations. Unfortunately... down along with us into the physical consciousness. Many have followed – some immediately without sufficient preparation in the mind and vital, some holding on to the vital and mind and living still between the three, some totally but with a prepared mind and vital. The total descent into the physical is a very troublesome affair – it means a long and trying pressure of difficulties, for the physical... had written to him: ‘All this about the Mother’s smile and her gravity is simply a trick of the vital. Very often I notice people talk of the Mother’s being grave, stern, displeased, angry at Pranam when there has been nothing of the kind – they may have attributed to her something created by their own vital imagination. Apart from that the Mother’s smiling or not smiling has nothing to do with the sadhak’s ...
... of half-effects of the psychic pressure on the mental and vital parts, a formation mixed with mental aspiration and vital desires, is mistaken for the soul, just as the separative ego is taken for the self, although the self in its true being is universal as well as individual in its essence,—or just as a mixture of mental aspiration and vital enthusiasm and ardour uplifted by some kind of strong or... all but a subjective mental formation. But this objection is based on a misunderstanding of the nature of spiritual knowledge. Spiritual truth is a truth of the spirit, not a truth of the intellect, not a mathematical theorem or a logical formula. It is a truth of the Infinite, one in an infinite diversity, and it can assume an infinite variety of aspects and formations: in the spiritual evolution... with the utilisation of such contacts as he can get or construct with what is beyond him to help or serve his mental ideas or moral ideals or his vital and physical interests; the true turn to some spiritual change has not come. The first true formations take the shape of a spiritualisation of our natural activities, a permeating influence on them or a direction: there is a preparatory influence or ...
... mind involved in the vital, so that it is naturally there that such things would gravitate for satisfaction. (Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga, pp. 445-46) "...these formations [vital fragments of a dead person]... are things that do not leave the earth and... simply attach themselves to some human rebirth... which has some affinity and therefore does not object to or resist their inclusion." (Ibid... temporary mental, vital, physical formation which the being, the real Person, the psychic entity, puts forward on the surface, - it is not the self in its abiding reality. In each return to earth the Person, the Purusha, makes a new formation, builds a new personal quantum suitable for a new experience, for a new growth of its being. When it passes from its body, it keeps still the same vital and mental form... (Ibid.) In such cases there would be immediate rebirth for the individual. "For the soul personality, as it develops, must get sufficient power over its own nature-formation and a sufficient self-expressive mental and vital individuality to persist without the Page 155 support of the material body, as well as to overcome any excessive detaining attachment to the physical plane ...
... enslaved to the vital force and its desires and passions, and it is these he seeks to satisfy through the mind: but when he interests himself strongly in mental things, he can become the mental adventurer, the opener of the way to new mind-formations or the fighter for an idea, the sensitive type of artist, the dynamic poet of life or the prophet or champion of a cause. The vital mind is kinetic... Letters on Yoga, p. 329 The Vital Mind There is a part of the nature which I have called the vital mind; the function of this mind is not to think and reason, to perceive, consider and find out or value things, for that is the function of the thinking mind proper, buddhi, — but to plan or dream or imagine what can be done. It makes formations for the future which the will can... but in this mental formation there is no power for progress or only for a material progress. It is our first mental status, but the mental being cannot remain always at this lowest rung of the human evolutionary ladder. Above physical mind and deeper within than physical sensation, there is what we may call an intelligence of the life-mind, dynamic, vital.... The vital man... is the man ...
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