Nirodbaran

Correspondence with Sri Aurobindo

Second Series

3. Matters Medical

Medical Notes

A descent cannot possibly produce nausea and vomiting etc. There can, if one pulls down  too much force, be produced a headache or giddiness; both of these go if one keeps quiet a little, ceases pulling and assimilates. A descent cannot produce blood pressure, madness or apoplexy or heart failure or any other illness.

Illness does not rise up by the descent of the Force; nor hereditary taint nor madness. They come up of themselves, as in X's case who never had even the smallest grain of a descent or a Force anywhere. It is only after he went off his centre that we are putting Force (not as a descent, but as an agent) to keep him as straight and as sound as possible.

In the case of an illness, how do you then decide whether it is the recrudescence of an old illness or the action of a dark force or even some experience? From the description supplied to you?

Yes, certainly – just as you go by the symptoms of a case as seen by you and as related by the patient.

I thought that it is not possible to have spiritual experiences, especially major ones, without your previously having knowledge about it.

Previously? My God, we would have to spend all our time prevising the sadhaks' experiences. Do you think Mother has nothing else to do? As for myself, I never previse anything, I only vise and revise. All that Mother prevised was that there was  something not right in Y, one part of him at odds with his aspiration. That might lead to trouble. That is why entre nous I want him to find out what part of him did not want the descent.

What I gather from Y's letter is that he felt great intensity of descent (much greater than he had before) and got into a panic (because of the indescribable sensation) and thought he might be going mad like Z (Z's madness was not the result of a descent), so nervous that he upset his stomach and possibly his circulation also. That is the only possible explanation if it is not an attack of illness over which it is for the doctors to pronounce, not me.

There are sensations that are due to descent and not troublesome or dangerous at all, there are others that are physical. But the description is necessary in order to distinguish.

The difficulty is that he has got the fear and the association in his mind of the descent with the disturbance.

You wrote to X: “before there can be a resumption of the sadhana”. What exactly did you mean in connection with his trouble?

I meant by sadhana the positive side (descent etc.). What I indicated was that there was a part of the being which was afraid of the descent, didn't want it and by its fear got this trouble. This must be found out and put right before calling any descent again.

He complained of nausea.

Well, that's a physical ailment, not a yogic phenomenon.

Cannot the illness be due to the action of a dark force?

Not through the descent, but through the fear a dark Force might strike in. That is what it is trying with many people.

Seeing some of these “upsets” I feel pulled down. I ask “Well, my friend, whither, whither are you going? What awaits you?”

Perhaps the parātpara puruṣa beyond even the Purushottama.... But why this pulled downness? You are not pulling down Purushottama or any other gentlemen from the upper storey, are you? It is strain and want of rest, I suppose. Sleep, sleep! Read Mark Twain or write humorous stories. Then you will be quite chirpy and even M won't feel heavy to you.

18.10.1936