Daily Questions

Of course there is a sweet and sunlit path. In fact they advocate this sunlit path for all. But very few are able to walk upon it. It requires absolute faith and complete surrender as well as an increasing sincerity. If one has that and keeps to it through whatever ups and downs yet may come, then one is well on the royal road to the Divine. But wanting yoga so that one has no outer difficulties indicates a mixture in motive. To seek the Divine only to save oneself from difficulties is an inferior form of bhakti. One can take that route but it means the time taken will be long. Besides, as such, one cannot avoid certain difficulties in life. They arise from the very nature of life and our attachments and desires. And these things bring a certain degree of suffering regardless of path or no path. The difference however is that those sincerely turned towards the Divine go through them in a relatively unaffected way while others often get submerged by them.

Astrology is not a scam but an ill-understood Science and hence some of the astrologers may well be taking advantage of the dubious space and passing off as genuine ones. In any case it is not an accurate Science especially in terms of its predictive value as the workings of destiny are quite complex and the signs of the stars are only a rough notation.

Q: I went to Aurobindo Ghosh being unhappy with God and you made him a God too. Please leave him a human being. Man cannot understand God, he can only understand man. So I request you to let Aurobindo Ghosh remain a human being and do not take away his discoveries and teachings from us by making him a God or make a philosophy out of it.

ALOKDA: Your letter reminds me of my dear friend (much elder and among the most well-read) late Professor CN Sharma who would say, God want us to become like him over the centuries, man in his haste quickly wants to make Him human. That probably comforts some as then there is nothing much to do or be. And it is perfectly fine. Nobody has any problem if someone wants to take Sri Aurobindo as yet another human being whose teachings inspire. Yet the greater truth stands always as the guiding light as revealed in Savitri.

‘This transfiguration is earth’s due to heaven:
A mutual debt binds man to the Supreme:
His nature we must put on as he put ours;
We are sons of God and must be even as he:
His human portion, we must grow divine.
Our life is a paradox with God for key.’

As to philosophy I agree. Sri Aurobindo did not want to be in the rank of philosophers anyways. Besides to call a Yogi philosopher or thinker is to indeed reduce him in stature.

Having said that I wonder which God are you trying to run away from? If there is a God, then He would be by definition Omnipresent and hence we can’t run away from Him how much we may dislike Him. And if there is no God then there is nobody to run away from. Most likely it is a God of your mind’s making, an image built through all that you heard or understood of Him. In that case, perhaps it may be better to try and understand Him and for that who can tell you better than Sri Aurobindo himself.

Q: Nowadays it seems that quite many people are involved in same sex relationship. Why it is happening, and are people committing a sin and incur a bad karma?

ALOKDA: Sin, guilt, are human inventions. As to karma, a man forcing himself upon his unwilling wife is worse than a man engaging in mutually agreed same gender sex. Karma is about motive and intention, the state of consciousness rather than the act alone.

Gays and lesbians have always existed. But by giving it excessive importance one way or the other we distort as well as create confusion in young impressionable minds. This is partly the reason for its increase. Anything to which we pay excess attention tends to increase.

Secondly Nature has entered an experimentation mode to create a new type. It is reacting to the pressure of the New Consciousness that would eventually build a gender free body. In ignorance the lower nature is trying all kinds of mechanisms to break certain old patterns and habits so that at some point the new begins to take its place.

Q: Participation in Sri Aurobindo Centres and Study Groups can be challenging, with different degrees of chaos, conflicts and property disputes affecting the work. This can be affecting state of consciousness and disturb personal sadhana. What should we do in such a case? Should we leave that group work and concentrate on personal progress and enjoy some peace, or is there is a way to manage both things?

ALOKDA: Dear A., what I have gathered from Sri Aurobindo and the Mother’s writings is that one can progress much faster through works. It has been my experience too while working at centers in Patiala and Bangalore. Works are challenging since they bring out much in us that remains otherwise hidden. All the silent spots where ego and its cohorts reside are laid bare when we take up the path of works. Besides it makes our nature supple and ready to receive the Divine in the dynamic parts of nature. Of course I am specifically referring here working for the Mother as a center is meant to be engaged in.

It is in fact the fastest means for progress though it is best if we do works and service/sewa rather than with the idea of personal progress. The wish for personal progress itself becomes a hindrance since it brings in the ego elements and the sense of a personal gain in lieu of the work one is doing. Works are a means of self-giving to the Divine and must be an act of joy and love and surrender without bothering about what one may get or not get.

However one has to see whether one has the real calling for it. It needs time and a degree of commitment that is not easy for human nature. Yet if one can undertake it, it can be one of the royal entries into the path of Integral Yoga.

Love
alok

Q: Considering that man is in perpetual action, it appears to be difficult to keep repeating any verbal formula. Or is just the attitude of doing everything for Her sake? And how is one to do the act of calling Mother if we want to establish Her presence in our Heart?

ALOKDA: Remembering and offering all to the Mother means:
– 1. Shifting the motive of action from selfish personal gains and satisfaction of desires, ego and ambitions to work becoming a means to serve the Mother and fulfill Her Will. Initially this Will is not known so one simply dedicates the action inwardly to Her with an aspiration for light and beauty and perfection in the action which is a means to serve Her now. It also means non-attachment to the results even though one has put in one’s best efforts.
– 2. A few moments of inner concentration before starting anything from morning waking up onwards to dedicate the activity to Her praying for Her to use you as Her instrument. Similar thing after the action with gratitude.
– 3. Forming the habit (this comes with practice and perseverance) of calling Her inwardly by simply repeating Her Name in your heart while doing the work outside. It will Initially lead to a frequent forgetting. Later a division is created between an inner consciousness that remembers Her and an outer that is engaged in work.

As a result of persistence a time comes when the inner state is full of Her and it is Her Presence that begins to flow in all one does.

Q: I was upset about the Ashrams decision to stop the messages. For all of us who haven’t been around before 1973, there is no reason to be deprived of this instrument for staying connected to The Mother. As we evolve each word of theirs exudes different meaning to all of us, and these Darshan Messages are our lifeline – what is the benefit of stopping them?

ALOKDA: Dear G., there are many devotees around the globe who feel the same way. These darshan messages were like the subtle binding cord that linked the inner core of the Ashram with the world that has grown around Sri Aurobindo and the Mother as the centre. They were like rays of the central sun reaching out far and wide to the larger Ashram linking it together in links of golden thread.

However just as the tree turns inwards during Autumn and the sun seems to be distant so too institutions go through phases of expansion and contraction. Right now, from the year 2019 the earth and humanity and nations and many of its institutions are going through this phase of contraction. It gives an opportunity to turn within and reinvent itself to adapt to the changing world. At the same time many groups are actually reinventing themselves and coming up with fresh possibilities through a creative surge within.

I suppose it is one such phase of contraction that the Ashram is going through. It will however make humanity across the world less dependent upon the Ashram administration and authorities and more in direct contact with the Mother and Sri Aurobindo whose Presence vibrates at the Samadhi releasing forces of transformation. That is the great lesson we are here to learn that She is in us and in all creatures and our task is to become more and more conscious of Her living Presence.

Dear A., there are two main types of experiences that a sadhak has in the course of his spiritual journey.

The first and more common are subjective in nature and include states of consciousness such as feeling peace, wideness, joy, growth of aspiration, surge of devotion and faith, urge for progress, to surrender oneself to the Divine. Further along this line one can have flashes of intuition, inspiration, revelatory insight, feeling of oneness, bliss, infinity, cosmic consciousness leading to an enlargement of our being into others and taking of others into oneself, the sense of the Divine Presence within and in all. These eventually lead us to a growing identification with the Divine, knowing oneself as the psychic being, a change of consciousness leading to the growth of divine qualities and divine nature. As you can see this is what spiritual life is largely about with the change and reversal of consciousness being the main thing since it leads to the progressive transmutation of the human nature into the Divine. As a result of this one can develop certain powers spontaneously such as of intuitive knowledge, power of expression of higher truths, healing powers, and various other such possibilities depending upon our constitution and spiritual destiny.

There are other experiences that can be considered as objective since they are as if projected outside the limits of our being. They include visions and voices, subtle taste, touches, subtle hearing, subtle smells, conscious entry into other planes, seeing of lights and colours, going out of the body consciously, seeing the Divine everywhere, knowing the thoughts of others etc. There are a number of occult powers that one can encounter here too.

What is important is to understand that having visions, hearing voices, development of occult powers are not necessarily the sign of spiritual progress and they can often mislead the sadhak. The true signs of spiritual progress are threefold:

Psychic experiences leading to a growth of bhakti, love, faith, the urge to serve the Divine, to give oneself to the Divine, feeling oneself as the child of the Divine Mother or a portion, a part and parcel of the Divine, an inner certitude of immortality.

Spiritual experiences such a feeling of wideness and oneness, experience of the Divine Presence within, of oneness with all beings, knowing the One Self, the descent of Peace, Joy, Knowledge, opening to inspiration and intuition, feeling the Divine Presence in all and all in the Divine, all as the Divine.
Supramental experiences leading to a complete shift and transformation of nature within and without, becoming conscious of infinity and eternity, absolute certitude of a total all-comprehensive knowledge free from any possibilities of error, a Love that is all-powerful and all-inclusive in itself, a bliss and peace that are unvarying and undiminished, a state of continuous identification with the Divine in oneself and in all. Eventually a radical transformation of our mind, heart, life and body itself in its entire functioning.

The coming and going of experiences does not indicate that we are doing good or bad things. These are human notions. They depend upon a certain opening and receptivity of the consciousness to the Divine. This receptivity and opening are prepared through aspiration, sincerity, concentration, faith, surrender. These things take time to develop. One has to walk with a lot of patience and perseverance. However, yoga is not done for having experiences but for a change of consciousness from the human to the Divine. The change comes readily as the ego-centricity is diminished, the restless cry and clamour of desires stilled, and the consciousness is turned towards the Mother in a state of bhakti and surrender, concentrated more and more upon Her than upon oneself.

Affectionately,
Alok da

Q: Is it true that humans have not evolved physically since the missing link period which is two hundred thousand years ago?

ALOKDA: Our present human species has taken nearly nine sub-steps to emerge out of the first humanoid spanning over 2 million years. It looks long by our measure of time span especially when compared with one human life time. But when we see that it took nearly 6 million years to emerge for man to emerge from the Ape, a hundred million years for the reptiles to emerge from the amphibians, another nearly 60 million years for the dinosaur to shrink into a bird then we shall see the grand time scale through which Nature works. We are not even going into the time when Earth cooled enough for solid material forms to emerge and then the first life forms nearly 5 billion years back. So 2 hundred thousand years count for little when we look at the magnitude of Nature’s movements.

Now coming closer, humans have in fact never stopped evolving. It is through these micro-evolutions that the first African ancestor evolved into different varieties of humanity. We have grown taller and the brain has shrunk but it’s neuronal complexity has increased. The jaws receded and there are reports to suggest that the brain especially is continuing to evolve. At the chromosomal level, last hundred years has seen a shrinking of the Y chromosome and possibly a new sex-determinant gene in the offing. We have to also take into account the fact that human evolution brings new dimensions into play, unlike the animals. Psychologically and socially human evolution is uncontested. At present we also see the first signs of an imminent spiritual evolution. Most importantly human beings are the only species capable of conscious self-evolution at different levels.

What does all this indicate? That we have stopped evolving or we are preparing for a new leap? It is anybody’s guess. But leaving aside all this it is illogical to assume that the evolutionary process in Nature that has been working over billions of years will suddenly come to an abrupt halt, especially with such a half-finished creature called man! Any which way we look at it, evolution beyond human seems the most natural inevitable thing to happen. We may debate about the time, the process and the intent of Nature and God behind it but this much is obvious that we are destined to go further, – whether to a blank port in the Unknown or to acquire a new mind and body in the city of God is something that time will tell.