Dealing with Fear (2)

Fear is the most pernicious obstacle in our advance towards the Future. It takes many forms and can manifest at different levels of our being. It prevents us from moving towards the future and almost paralyses us in the area of perceived danger. In fact, it colours our perception so much that we may begin to perceive threat where there is none. What is worse is that it acts like a bad will and often attracts the very thing that we fear.

What then is the remedy? One simple way is to have trust and faith in the Divine. If that is there as a gift then it is the best antidote. But it is a gift that one receives from the Grace. But if it is difficult to have faith in the Grace, it is easier for us to have faith in something that can represent to us the sense of protection and security. That is the purpose of certain objects that people sometimes carry with them. These objects may be actually charged in a special way so as to activate beneficial forces that throw a ring of protection around the person carrying it. Or else they may be effective just because one somehow has a certain kind of faith in them. Either ways they seem to work as long as the faith remains.

Among such objects are the Blessing Packets one receives from the ashram which are mainly dried up flowers offered to Sri Aurobindo and the Mother. Some people also like to wear rings or chains to help them feel safe. Regardless of the actual efficacy of such objects (which of course is there) there are any number of examples that it helped people go through various situations and even acute crisis by giving them a concrete support to keep their faith and this faith worked, in fact worked miracles. So this is one practical advice that I would give you to keep a blessing packet of the Mother or something of Her with you in all situations. Some just keep a little picture of Her and it works.

Another way is to use a mantra which one associates with Protection and in which one has faith in. If one gets into the habit of regularly reciting this mantra then it works best since one has a rapport with its sound and the words. Of course, a mantra works best if is arises naturally from within and if one has a spontaneous inner connection with the mantra and knows its significance and says it with feeling. Each one must find one’s own mantra or else the mantra can be given by a Guru who charges it with a special significance. Alternatively, there are certain universal mantras that one can use and which are effective simply because of centuries and millenniums of practice and the faith invested in it. A simplest of such mantras is the syllable OM.

Some prefer to read a passage or so from one of the powerful mantric works of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, especially Savitri and the Mother (notably the 3rd chapter).

Perhaps the best advice is to practice inner Remembrance of the Divine Mother. This remembrance or calling of the Mother can be done best by simply taking Her Name, calling Her as Maa or Mother. Those who practice doing Japa of Her Name easily cross many hurdles and it is the easiest and most accessible of all means ever available to man of getting rid of fear as it works often instantaneously.

These are some of the means that can be suggested , but course, it is best not to try them as a formula but out of a simple trust that the mantra or the object or the Name is our personal hotline connection with the Divine who is everywhere and in everything, and that with the Divine Grace there is truly nothing to fear.

To each his way and his method but the most effective method is to form a real and direct relation with the Divine through faith, bhakti, consecration, service and surrender. Through this we slowly grow in the likeness of the Divine who is free from all fear. Since the Divine is everywhere, our contemplation puts us in dynamic contact with the Divine Presence in all things and then even the slightest of things, the smallest of means becomes an occasion for the revelation of the divine and His Protection that we find everywhere and at every moment.