Spiritual Development Through Action of the Divine Force Rather Than Through Purely Personal Effort

We are wrapped up in the ego-consciousness from the moment we take birth. The entire societal structure, as well as the weight of millennia of evolutionary development to create an entity that could develop the powers of the vital and mental being as a self-aware and seemingly independent being, works to build up the ego consciousness. As we build our relationships, with our famiy, our friends, our co-workers, and as we undergo education and socialization, we get tied ever-tighter to the sense that we are a separate being, with free will and the ability to make our own decisions about our life.
If we examine this sense more closely, we quickly find that much of what we consider to be the action of ‘free will’ is easily seen to be determined, caused or manipulated through forces and beings working on us and through us; yet most people never take the examination to this level and thus feel empowered as independent beings.
When a seeker takes up spiritual sadhana, this well-established ego-consciousness does not simply disappear. It continues as we believe we can succeed in the spiritual practice by our own efforts and overcome the limitations and difficulties similarly by effort. Eventually the seeker begins to understand that it is not so simple!
When the Guna of Rajas is predominant, the seeker believes through the exercise of strength of will and effort he will accomplish; he may believe he is specially suited, has a background or innate capacity for this, or that efforts in his past lives have prepared him for the realisation in the current life. When this does not work out as anticipated, he may fall back into the Guna of Tamas and feel despondent, depressed or otherwise incapable or a failure. When the Guna of Sattwa is in front, he may begin to gain a recognition of the inter-relationships and long evolutionary background he has to deal with. Of course, the feeling of pride or vanity can enter into the response of any of the Gunas in the unique way that a particular Guna responds to situations.
Eventually, it becomes clear that the ego-consciousness is an illusory construct set up for a particular evolutionary purpose, but not suited to carry out the next phase of the evolutionary process. The seeker begins to appreciate that the fiction of a self-made success cannot stand in front of millions of years of habitual and instinctual behavior or even just the social construction of his personality in the present lifetime. The evolution is not of the individual, but of the earth-consciousness and it is the Divine Force that actually carries out the development, working through the nexus and framework provided by the individual seeker, but not under the separate control of that individual.
This shift of standpoint, from the ego-standpoint to the divine standpoint implies that the individual should not focus his efforts entirely on suppression or conce
about defects, which abound in everyone born into the earth-consciousness, but rather he should work on tuning his consciousness to the spiritual forces that are then capable of carrying out the spiritual sadhana and effectuating the needed changes and transformations. Whenever the focus drifts away from the focus on higher forces, the seeker can gently, but persistently, refocus and open his receptivity.
Sri Aurobindo writes: “It does not matter what defects you may have in your nature. The one thing that matters is your keeping yourself open to the Force. Nobody can transform himself by his own unaided efforts; it is only the Divine Force that can transform him. If you keep yourself open, all the rest will be done for you.”
“Hardly anyone is strong enough to overcome by his own unaided aspiration and will the forces of the lower nature; even those who do it get only a certain kind of control, but not a complete mastery. Will and aspiration are needed to bring down the aid of the Divine Force and to keep the being on its side in its dealing with the lower powers. The Divine Force fulfilling the spiritual will and the heart’s psychic aspiration can alone bring about the conquest.”
Sri Aurobindo, Bases of Yoga, Chapter 2, Faith — Aspiration — Surrender, pg. 25