|
......spirituality
is not a high intellectuality, not idealism, not an ethical turn
of mind or moral purity and austerity, not religiosity or an ardent
and exalted emotional fervour, not even a compound of all these
excellent things; a mental belief, creed or faith, an emotional
aspiration, a regulation of conduct according to a religious or
ethical formula are not spiritual achievement and experience.
These things are of considerable value to mind and life; they
are of value to the spiritual evolution itself as preparatory
movements disciplining, purifying or giving a suitable form to
the nature; but they still belong to the mental evolution,—the
beginning of a spiritual realisation, experience, change is not
yet there.
Spirituality
is in its essence an awakening to the inner reality of our being,
to a spirit, self, soul which is other than our mind, life and
body, an inner aspiration to know, to feel, to be that, to enter
into contact with the greater Reality beyond and pervading the
universe which inhabits also our own being, to be in communion
with It and union with It, and a turning, a conversion, a transformation
of our whole being as a result of the aspiration, the contact,
the union, a growth or waking into a new becoming or new being,
a new self, a new nature.
Sri
Aurobindo
The Life Divine
|