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M O N T H LY A R C H I V E S : A P R I L 2 0 1 5

The Difficulties of the Path of the

Integral Yoga
Posted on April 30, 2015

The integral Yoga has as one of its large goals the taking up and transformation
of the entire life of the individual and the world. Sri Aurobindo points out that the
seeker must have a clear sight as to what the implications of this are. There can
be no cutting of the knot of the problem of life, the messy, difficult and
obstructing energies and distractions that plague the seeker. The yogic
disciplines based on knowledge may try to minimize the attention on the needs,
desires and impulsions of the life-energy, to develop a one-pointed fix on the
Eternal as the ultimate way and goal. Religions have also tended to place
salvation in some other world or heaven after death, through preparation and
devotion in this life, albeit coloured by compromises with the life-energy along
the way.
A way of pure Knowledge is comparatively straightforward and easy to the
tread of the seeker in spite of our mortal limitations and the pitfalls of the
Ignorance; a way of pure Love, although it has its stumbling-blocks and its
sufferings and trials, can in comparison be easy as the winging of a bird through
the free azure. For Knowledge and Love are pure in their essence and become
mixed and embarrassed, corrupted and degraded only when they enter into the

ambiguous movement of the life-forces and are seized by them for the outward
lifes crude movements and obstinately inferior motives. Alone of these powers
Life or at least a certain predominant Will-in-life has the appearance of
something impure, accursed or fallen in its very essence.
Whether we perceive the difficulty as a form of darkness or inertia, fixated solely
on physical gratification or survival; or as a form of grasping for the stimulation
and satisfaction of the desires of the life-force, the opportunities for distraction,
flagging efforts or outright self-deception are enormous. Even when we align the
life-force with higher aims set by the highest emotional and mental drives of the
Nature, it is easily misled, diverted or obscured under the burden of the desiremind and its gross or subtle insistence on its own satisfaction in opposition to
the higher principles.
All these forces the spiritual seeker grows aware of in himself and finds all
around him and has to struggle and combat incessantly to be rid of their grip
and dislodge the long-entrenched mastery they have exercised over his own
being as over the environing human existence. The difficulty is great; for their
hold is so strong, so apparently invincible that it justifies the disdainful dictum
which compares human nature to a dogs tail,for, straighten it never so much
by force of ethics, religion, reason or any other redemptive effort, it returns in
the end always to the crooked curl of Nature.
All labour to straighten out this native crookedness strikes the struggling will as
a futility; a flight, a withdrawal to happy Heaven or peaceful dissolution easily
finds credit as the only wisdom and to find a way not to be born again gets
established as the only remedy for the dull bondage or the poor shoddy delirium
or the blinded and precarious happiness and achievement of earthly existence.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Part One: The Yoga of Divine Works,
Chapter 6, The Ascent of the Sacrifice-2, The Works of LoveThe Works of Life,
pp. 159-162
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Revealing the Divinity in the Manifested

World of Forms
Posted on April 29, 2015

The central issue for a yoga of works is to transform the action in the outer
world into a divine activity. The normal life we experience and see around us
seems to be hostile to and antithetical to a Divine life. Many spiritual disciplines
have therefore counseled a complete and radical break with the life of the world,
so that the seeker may focus on his spiritual essential truth, on the Eternal, on
the Absolute. For some, the world represents a provisional ground, filled with
illusory objects of desire that distract and cloud the spiritual essence of life.
While it may be accepted to some degree provisionally, eventually the seeker
must abandon that life and focus on what is real and eternal.
Sri Aurobindos focus on what he terms reality omnipresent leads him to
conclude that eventually, the yogic aspiration must grapple with and take up the
field of life, unravel the mystery and riddle of its apparent opposition to the
Truth, and bring about a Divine transformation of the actual life in the world, by
revealing its true status as a Divine manifestation and as he states poetically in
his epic work Savitri: A Legend and a SymbolMatter shall reveal the Spirits
face.
Yet it is precisely these activities that are claimed for a spiritual conquest and
divine transformation by the integral Yoga. Abandoned altogether by the more
ascetic disciplines, accepted by others only as a field of temporary ordeal or a
momentary, superficial and ambiguous play of the concealed spirit, this
existence is fully embraced and welcomed by the integral seeker as a field of
fulfilment, a field for divine works, a field of the total self-discovery of the
concealed and indwelling Spirit. A discovery of the Divinity in oneself is his first
object, but a total discovery too of the Divinity in the world behind the apparent
denial offered by its scheme and figures and, last, a total discovery of the
dynamism of some transcendent Eternal; for by its descent this world and self
will be empowered to break their disguising envelopes and become divine in
revealing form and manifesting process as they now are secretly in their hidden
essence.

Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Part One: The Yoga of Divine Works,
Chapter 6, The Ascent of the Sacrifice-2, The Works of LoveThe Works of Life,
pg. 159
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The Power of Love Supramentalised

Posted on April 28, 2015

Sri Aurobindos systematic approach to the development of consciousness and

its impact on the Divine manifestation finally allows us to fit together all the
puzzle pieces of the spiritual quest that have, in the past, either been
overlooked or over-emphasized, or mis-placed. The need for the psychic being,
the divine flame in the deepest heart of man, has already been described at
length. It gains its ultimate power to transform life when it is accompanied by
the change in standpoint from the human to the divine standpoint. Sri Aurobindo
has defined various steps along the way, including the important aspect of what
he terms the supramental consciousness due to its power which clearly
exceeds the mental level active in humanity today.
A primary characteristic of the supramental consciousness is the ability to
simultaneously in awareness, without conflict, hold both the sense of Oneness

and the recognition of diversity in the manifestation. The ultimate force of love
and devotion occurs when it is yoked to this supramental consciousness:
There in the supramental Gnosis is the fulfilment, the culminating height, the
all-embracing extent of the inner adoration, the profound and integral union, the
flaming wings of Love upbearing the power and joy of a supreme Knowledge. For
supramental love brings an active ecstasy that surpasses the void passive
peace and stillness which is the heaven of the liberated Mind and does not
betray the deeper greater calm which is the beginning of the supramental
silence. The unity of a love which is able to include in itself all differences
without being diminished or abrogated by their present limitations and apparent
dissonances is raised to its full potentiality on the supramental level. For there
an intense oneness with all creatures founded on a profound oneness of the soul
with the Divine can harmonise with a play of relations that only make the
oneness more perfect and absolute. The power of Love supramentalised can
take hold of all living relations without hesitation or danger and turn them
Godwards delivered from their crude, mixed and petty human settings and
sublimated into the happy material of a divine life.
This is possible due to the nature of the supramental consciousness itself: it
can perpetuate the play of differences without forfeiting or in the least
diminishing either the divine union or the infinite oneness. For a
supramentalised consciousness it would be utterly possible to embrace all
contacts with men and the world in a purified flame-force and with a
transfigured significance, because the soul would then perceive always as the
object of all emotion and all seeking for love or beauty the One Eternal and
could spiritually use a wide and liberated life-urge to meet and joni with that
One Divine in all things and all creatures.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Part One: The Yoga of Divine Works,
Chapter 6, The Ascent of the Sacrifice-2, The Works of LoveThe Works of Life,
pp. 158-159
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The Emergence of the Psychic Being and

the Transformation of Life
Posted on April 27, 2015

The first hints or promptings that arise within the individual from the psychic
being are generally relatively weak and easily overcome by the insistence of the
minds narrow vision and stubborn attachments, the vital beings aggressive
desires and the physical beings heaviness and darkness. Over time, as the
seeker becomes more attentive to the quiet voice of the soul, it becomes
stronger, comes forward more effectively and links with the being and force of
the Divine, of whose nature it partakes. It is this joining of the Divine spark
within with the Divine Force above and around that creates the opportunity for
the psychic being to exercise real power over the lower nature of mind-life-body.
Sri Aurobindo discusses this dynamic: And yet the leading of the inmost psychic
being is not found sufficient until it has succeeded in raising itself out of this
mass of inferior Nature to the highest spiritual levels and the divine spark and
flame descended here have rejoined themselves to their original fiery Ether. For
there is there no longer a spiritual consciousness still imperfect and half-lost to
itself in the thick sheaths of human mind, life and body, but the full spiritual
consciousness in its purity, freedom and intense wideness.
The pure and undiluted force of Knowledge, Power, Love, Harmony and Beauty,
which abides in these hiher spiritual realms, can then be welcomed to replace
the distorted and weakened forms that pass for these things in the ordinary
human experience. Thus for the individual consciousness a Force is manifested
which can deal sovereignly in it with the diminutions and degradations of the
values of the Ignorance. At last it begins to be possible to bring down into life
the immense reality and intense concreteness of the love and joy that are of the
Eternal. Or at any rate it will be possible for our spiritual consciousness to raise
itself out of the mind into the supramental Light and Force and Vastness; there
in the light and potency of the supramental Gnosis are the splendour and joy of

a power of divine self-expression and self-organisation which could rescue and

re-create the world of the Ignorance into a figure of the Truth of the Spirit.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Part One: The Yoga of Divine Works,
Chapter 6, The Ascent of the Sacrifice-2, The Works of LoveThe Works of Life,
pp. 157-158
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The Essential Role of the Psychic Being in

the Transformation of Life Through
Divine Love
Posted on April 26, 2015

As long as we rely primarily on the powers of mind, emotions, vital energy and
the physical existence, our interpretation and our response to things remains
limited, clouded and misguided in various ways. These are powers that have
their initial basis in the Ignorance and partake of the nature of ignorance. Even
the high ideals and flights of passionate devotion or dedicated action, if they
rely on these powers, tend to be mixed in their intention and their result, subject
to the force of desire, and mitigated in their power of effectuation. There are

also reactions from these parts of our being that tend to oppose the Light, Force
and Truth of the higher Divine Love when it descends into us, and either
obstructs, or tries to redirect that energy into fulfillment of the lower natures
desires and ambitions.
Sri Aurobindo describes the result: Instead of a Divine Love creator of a new
heaven and a new earth of Truth and Light, they would hold it here prisoner as a
tremendous sanction and glorifying force of sublimation to gild the mud of the
old earth and colour with its rose and sapphire the old turbid unreal skies of
sentimentalising vital imagination and mental idealised chimera. if that
falsification is permitted, the higher Light and Power and Bliss withdraw, there is
a fall back to a lower status; or else the realisation remains tied to an insecure
half-way and mixture or is covered and even submerged by an inferior exaltation
that is not the true Ananda. It is for this reason that the Divine Love which is at
the heart of all creation and the most powerful of all redeeming and creative
forces has yet been the least frontally present in earthly life, the least
successfully redemptive, the least creative.
Even the slightest touch of this power for the normal human nature leads to
misuse: what little could be seized has been corrupted at once into a vital
pietistic ardour, a defenceless religious or ethical sentimentalism, a sensuous or
even sensual erotic mysticism of the roseate coloured mind or passionately
turbid life-impulse and with these simulations compensated its inability to house
the Mystic Flame that could rebuild the world with its tongues of sacrifice.
This brings us to the central and critical role of the psychic being: It is only the
inmost psychic being unveiled and emerging in its full power that can lead the
pilgrim sacrifice unscathed through these ambushes and pitfalls; at each
moment it catches, exposes, repels the minds and the lifes falsehoods, seizes
hold on the truth of the Divine Love and Ananda and separates it from the
excitement of the minds ardours and the blind enthusiasm of the misleading
life-force. But all things that are true at their core in mind and life and the
physical being it extricates and takes with it in the journey till they stand on the
heights, new in spirit and sublime in figure.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Part One: The Yoga of Divine Works,
Chapter 6, The Ascent of the Sacrifice-2, The Works of LoveThe Works of Life,
pp. 155-157
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Only Divine Love Can Bring About World

Harmony and Universal Oneness
Posted on April 25, 2015

The dream of human unity, the brotherhood of man, a world of harmony,

utopia, paradise, the city of God, has occupied humanity, in one form or
another, for millenia. Numerous attempts have been made to create
communities, civilisations, or various other forms of human groupings to realise
this goal. Much thought has gone into the shape of such a society and how it
should be governed, what guiding principles should be followed and what the
central organising theme should be. As yet, however, all such attempts have
fallen short of the goal. Sri Aurobindo makes it clear that as long as the
organizing principle is based on the mind, it cannot actually achieve the final
result sought.
It is the divine love which so emerges that, extended in inward feeling to the
Divine in man and all creatures in an active universal equality, will be more
potent for the perfectability of life and a more real instrument than the
ineffective mental ideal of brotherhood can ever be. It is this poured out into
acts that could alone create a harmony in the world and a true unity between all
its creatures; all else strives in vain towards that end so long as Divine Love has
not disclosed itself as the heart of the delivered manifestation in terrestrial
Nature.
To achieve the outflowering of Divine Love, it is essential that the seeker bring
the psychic being forward through devotion and adoration, expressed not only
inwardly in spirit and sense, but also outwardly through the offering of all
actions as an act of worship. A psychic fire within must be lit into which all is

thrown with the Divine Name upon it. In that fire all the emotions are compelled
to cast off their grosser elements and those that are undivine perversions are
burned away and the others discard their insufficiencies, till a spirit of largest
love and a stainless divine delight arises out of the flame and smoke and
frankincense.
It is the inner offering of the hearts adoration, the soul of it in the symbol, the
spirit of it in the act, that is the very life of the sacrifice. If the offering is to be
complete and universal, then a turning of all our emotions to the Divine is
imperative.
The long aspiration and goal of the spiritual quest of humanity can and will be
achieved through this method.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Part One: The Yoga of Divine Works,
Chapter 6, The Ascent of the Sacrifice-2, The Works of LoveThe Works of Life,
pg. 155
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The Spirit of Divine Love In the

Integral Yoga
Posted on April 24, 2015

The complete and powerful transformation from the human standpoint to the
divine standpoint, and the impact thereby on the outer life in the world, is most
effectively brought about by the central action of devotion, love and adoration in
concrete form in the outer world. The yogic paths that are centered in the mind
of knowledge, or the dedication of the power of works, can become dry and
abstracted from life, or the performance of a stoic duty. When, however, each
action takes on the nature of an act of consecration, there is a noticeable
change in the sadhana. It becomes less of a struggle and can take on more the
aspect of a joyful self-giving.
Sri Aurobindo describes this: In itself the adoration in the act is a great and
complete and powerful sacrifice that tends by its self-multiplication to reach the
discovery of the One and make the radiation of the Divine possible. For devotion
by its embodiment in acts not only makes its own way broad and full and
dynamic, but brings at once into the harder way of works in the world the
divinely passionate element of joy and love which is often absent in its
beginning when it is only the austere spiritual will that follows in a struggling
uplifting tension the steep ascent, and the heart is still asleep or bound to
silence. If the spirit of divine love can enter, the hardness of the way diminishes,
the tension is lightened, there is a sweetness and joy even in the core of
difficulty and struggle.
All life turned into this cult, all actions done in the love of the Divine and in the
love of the world and its creatures seen and felt as the Divine manifested in
many disguises become by that very fact part of an integral Yoga.
Sri Aurobindo, The Synthesis of Yoga, Part One: The Yoga of Divine Works,
Chapter 6, The Ascent of the Sacrifice-2, The Works of LoveThe Works of Life,
pp. 154-155
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Yoga, yoga | 1Reply