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Sketches
by the Mother
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What
is the Integral Yoga ?
There
are many Yogas, many spiritual disciplines, paths towards liberation and
perfection, Godward ways of the spirit. Each has its separate aim, its
peculiar approach to the One Reality, its separate method, its helpful
philosophy and its practice. The integral Yoga takes up all of them in
their essence and tries to arrive at a unification (in essence, not in
detail) of all these aims, methods, approaches; it stands for an all-embracing
philosophy and practice.
SRI AUROBINDO
The integral Yoga is so called because it aims at a harmonised totality
of spiritual realisation and experience. Its aim is integral experience
of the Divine Reality, what the Gita describes in the words samagram
mam, "the whole Me" of the Divine Being. Its method is an
integral opening of the whole consciousness, mind, heart, life, will,
body to that Reality, to the Divine Existence, Consciousness, Beatitude,
to its being and its integral transformation of the whole nature.
SRI AUROBINDO
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The
Object of the Yoga
The
yoga we practice is not for ourselves alone, but for the Divine; its aim
is to work out the will of the Divine in the world, to effect a' spiritual
transformation and to bring down a divine nature and a divine life into
the mental, vital and physical nature and life of humanity. Its object
is not personal Mukti, although Mukti is a necessary condition of the
yoga, but the liberation and transformation of the human being. It is
not personal Ananda, but the bringing down of the divine Ananda upon the
earth.
SRI
AUROBINDO
The object of the yoga is to enter into and be possessed by the Divine
Presence and Consciousness, to love the Divine for the Divine's sake alone,
to be tuned in our nature into the nature of the Divine, and in our will
and works and life "' to be the instrument of the Divine.
SRI AUROBINDO
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The
Call to the Yoga
The
goal of yoga is always hard to reach, but this one is more difficult than
any other, and it is only for those who have the call, the capacity, the
willingness to face everything and every risk, even the risk of failure,
and the will to progress towards an entire selflessness, desirelessness
and surrender.
SRI AUROBINDO
27 January 1928
This
yoga implies not only the realisation of God, but an entire consecration
and change of the inner and outer life till it is fit to manifest a divine
consciousness and become part of a divine work. This means an inner discipline
far more exacting and difficult than mere ethical and physical austerities.
One must not enter on this path, far vaster and more arduous than most
ways of yoga, unless one is sure of the psychic call and of one's readiness
to go through to the end.
SRI AUROBINDO
6 April 1928
By readiness, I did not mean capacity but willingness. If there is the
will within to face all difficulties and go through, no matter how long
it takes, then the path can be taken.
SRI AUROBINDO
22 February 1936
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No Set Method
The way of yoga must be a living thing, not a mental principle or a set
method to be stuck to against all necessary variations.
SRI AUROBINDO
The general principle of self-consecration and self-giving is the same
for all in this yoga, but each has his own way of consecration and self-giving.
The way that X takes is good for X, just as the way that you take is the
right one for you, because it is in consonance with your nature. If there
were not this plasticity and variety, if all had to be cut in
the same pattern, yoga would be a rigid mental machinery, not a living
power.
SRI
AUROBINDO
The sadhana of this yoga does not proceed through any set mental teaching
or prescribed forms of meditation, Mantras or others, but by aspiration,
by a self-concentration inwards or upwards, by self-opening to an Influence,
to the Divine Power above us and its workings, to the Divine Presence
in the heart and by the rejection of all that is foreign to these things.
It is only by faith, aspiration and surrender that this self -opening
can come.
SRI AUROBINDO
11 May 1931
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Self
- Opening
The object of the self-opening is to allow the force of the Divine to
flow in bringing light, peace, Ananda, etc. and to do the work of transformation.
When the being so receives the Divine Shakti and it works in him, produces
its results (whether he is entirely conscious of the process or not,)
then he is said to be open.
SRI
AUROBINDO
In this yoga all depends on whether one can open to the Influence or not.
If there is a sincerity in the aspiration and a patient will to arrive
at the higher consciousness in spite of all obstacles, then the opening
in one form or another is sure to come. But it may take a long or short
time according to
the prepared or unprepared condition of the mind, heart and body; so if
one has not the necessary patience, the effort may be abandoned owing
to the difficulty of the beginning. There is no method in this yoga except
to concentrate, preferably in the heart, and call the presence and power
of the Mother to take up the being and by the workings of her force transform
the consciousness; one can concentrate also in the head or between the
eyebrows, but for many this is a too difficult opening. When the mind
falls quiet and the concentration becomes strong and the aspiration intense,
then there is a beginning of experience. The more the faith, the more
rapid the result is likely to be. For the rest one must not depend on
one's own efforts only, but succeed in establishing a contact with the
Divine and a receptivity to the Mother's Power and Presence.
SRI AUROBINDO
30 November 1934
There are two ways of doing Yoga, one by knowledge and one's own efforts,
the other by reliance on the Mother. In the last way one has to
offer one's mind and heart and all to the Mother for her Force to work
on it, call her in all difficulties, have faith and bhakti. At first it
takes time, often a long time, for the consciousness to be prepared in
this way and during that time many difficulties can come up, but if one
perseveres a time comes when all is ready, the Mother's Force opens the
consciousness fully to the Divine, then all that must develop develops
within, spiritual experience comes and with it the knowledge and union
with the Divine.
SRI AUROBINDO
Keep yourself open to the Mother, remember her always and let her Force
work in you, rejecting all other influences -that is the rule for yoga.
SRI AUROBINDO
By remaining psychically open to the Mother, all that is necessary for
work or Sadhana develops progressively, that is one of the chief secrets,
the central secret of the Sadhana.
SRI AUROBINDO
13 February 1933
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Surrender
There is not much spiritual meaning in keeping open to the Mother if you
withhold your surrender. Self-giving or surrender is demanded of those
who practise this Yoga, because without such a progressive surrender of
the being it is quite impossible to get anywhere near the goal. To keep
open means to call in her Force to work in you, and if you do not surrender
to it, it amounts to not allowing the Force to work in you at all or only
on condition that it will work in the way you want and not in its own
way which is the way of the Divine Truth.
SRI
AUROBINDO
Surrender is giving oneself to the Divine -to give everything one is or
has to the Divine and regard nothing as one's own, to obey only the Divine
will and no other, to live for the Divine and not for the ego.
SRI AUROBINDO
6 June 1933
If one wanted the Divine, the Divine
himself would take up the purifying of the heart and develop the sadhana
and give the necessary experiences; it can and does happen in that way
if one has trust and confidence in the Divine and the will to surrender.
For such a taking up involves one's putting oneself in the hands of the
Divine rather than relying on one's own efforts alone and this implies
one's putting one's trust and confidence in the Divine and a progressive
self- giving. It is in fact the principle of sadhana that I myself followed
and it is the central process of yoga as I envisage it.
The core of the
inner surrender is trust and confidence in the Divine. One takes the attitude:
"I want the Divine and nothing else. I want to give myself entirely
to him and since my soul wants that, it cannot be but that I shall meet
and realise him. I ask nothing but that and his action in me to bring
me to him, his action secret or open, veiled or manifest. I do not insist
on my own time and way; let him do all in his own time and way; I shall
believe in him, accept his will, aspire steadily for his light and presence
and joy, go through all difficulties and delays, relying on him and never
giving up. Let my mind be quiet and trust him and let him open it to his
light; let ,my vital be quiet and ' turn to him alone and let him open
It to his calm and Joy.
All for him and myself for him. Whatever
happens.. I will keep to this aspiration and self-giving and go on in
perfect reliance that it will be done."
SRI
AUROBINDO
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Faith
Faith is a general word -shraddha -the soul's belief in the Divine's
existence, wisdom, power, love and grace.
SRI AUROBINDO
The fundamental faith in yoga is this, inherent in the soul, that the
Divine exists and the Divine is the one thing to be followed after -nothing
else in life is worth having in comparison with that. So long as a man
has that faith, he is marked for the spiritual life and I will say that,
even if his nature is full of obstacles and crammed with denials and difficulties,
and even if he has many years of struggle, he is marked out for success
in the spiritual life.
SRI AUROBINDO
25 June 1932
One must say, "Since I want only the Divine, my success is sure,
I have only to walk forward in all confidence and His own Hand will be
there secretly leading me to Him by His own way and at His own time."
That is what you must keep as your constant mantra. Anything else one
may doubt but that he who desires only the Divine shall reach the Divine
is a certitude and more certain than two and two make four. That is the
faith every sadhak must have at the bottom of his heart, supporting him
through every stumble and blow and ordeal. It is only false ideas still
casting their shadows on your mind that prevent you from having it. Push
them aside and the back of the difficulty will be broken.
SRI AUROBINDO
29 April 1934
The
experience you had of the power of the Name and the protection is that
of everyone who has used it with the same faith and reliance. To those
who call from the heart for the protection, it cannot fail. Do not allow
any outward circumstance to shake the faith in you; for nothing gives
greater strength than this faith to go through and arrive at the goal.
Knowledge and Tapasya, whatever their force, have a less sustaining power
-faith is the strongest staff for the journey.
SRI AUROBINDO
8
October 1936
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Sincerity
To be entirely sincere means to desire the divine Truth only, to surrender
yourself more and more to the Divine Mother, to reject all personal demand
and desire other than this one aspiration, to offer every action of life
to the Divine and do it as the work given without bringing in the ego.
This is the basis of the divine life.
SRI AUROBINDO
30 October 1930
Sincerity means more than mere honesty. It means that you
mean what you say, feel what you profess, are earnest in your will. As
the sadhak aspires to be an instrument of the Divine and one with the
Divine, sincerity in him means that he is really in earnest in his aspiration
and refuses all other will or impulse except the Divine's.
SRI AUROBINDO
Strength, if it is spiritual, is a power for spiritual realisation; a
greater power is sincerity; the greatest power of all is Grace. I have
said times without number that if a man is sincere, he will go through
in spite of long delay and overwhelming difficulties. I have repeatedly
spoken of the Divine Grace. I have referred any number of times
to the line of the Gita:
"I will deliver thee from all sin and evil, do not grieve."
SRI
AUROBINDO
May 1931
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