The Difference Between Suppression and Removal of a Vital Reaction, Part 1

As long as we set our standpoint in the exte
al surface consciousness, we do not have the leverage nor the tools to easily remove an embedded reaction. We tend to take steps to suppress rather than expunge the unwanted energy. This may take the form of an ascetic denial, or an avoidance of interaction with anything that might trigger the reaction, such as escape to the cave, the monastery, the forest or the desert. Or it may take more severe forms such as physical self-torture or extreme forms of fasting, etc. Another aspect of suppression is the attempt to regulate things in other people that one struggles with internally, and thus, shift the focus onto creating rules, laws, regulations or moral controls of some sort to enforce one’s own issues onto others who may not necessarily follow the same ideas, principles or guidelines for their lives. One way or the other, however, suppression leaves the seeds of the reaction in place and subject to bursting out when, and if, an opportunity arises. The reaction actually can be greater due to the suppression when it does erupt. When enforced upon others, it tends to create smoldering resentments and eventual rebellion.

Through the technique of the separate of the witness-consciousness from the exte
al nature and the resultant non-attachment, the observing consciousness can begin to control these reactions, first, by shifting the attention and focus to the higher energies and sources that are the objective of the seeker, and second, through this status of non-attachment, refusing to accept or admit the energy that is trying to take control of the nature.

A disciple asks: “Mother, last time you said that often there is in us a dark element… which makes us commit stupidities. So you said that when one is conscious of this element, it must be pulled out. But does pulling it out mean… For example, when one is conscious that this element comes to make us do stupid things, then, if by an effort of will one abstains from doing it, can one say that one has pulled it out?…

The Mother responds: “One has sat upon it.”

“Then, how to pull it out?

“For that, first of all, you must become conscious of it, you see, put it right in front of you, and cut the links which attach it to your consciousness. It is a work of inner psychology, you know.”

“One can see, when one studies oneself very attentively… you see that one day you are very generous… generous in your feelings, generous in your sensations, generous in your thoughts and even in material things; that is, you understand the faults of others, their intentions, weaknesses, even nasty movements. You see all this, and you are full of good feelings, of generosity. You tell yourself, ‘Well… everyone does the best he can!’ — like that.”

“Another day — or perhaps the very next minute — you will notice in yourself a kind of dryness, fixity, something that is bitter, that judges severely, that goes as far as bearing a grudge, has rancour, would like the evil-doer punished, that almost has a feeling of vengeance; just the very opposite of the former! One day someone harms you and you say, ‘Doesn’t matter! He did not know’… or ‘He couldn’t do otherwise’ … or ‘That’s his nature’… or ‘He could not understand!’ The next day — or perhaps an hour later — you say, ‘He must be punished! He must pay for it! He must be made to feel that he has done wrong!’ — with a kind of rage; and you want to take things, you want to keep them for yourself, you have all the feelings of jealousy, envy, narrowness, you see, just the very opposite of the other feeling.”

“This is the dark side. And so, the moment one sees it, if one looks at it and doesn’t say, ‘It is I’, if one says, ‘No, it is my shadow, it is the being I must throw out of myself’, one puts on it the light of the other part, one tries to bring them face to face; and with the knowledge and light of the other, one doesn’t try so much to convince — because that is very difficult — but one compels it to remain quiet… first to stand farther away, then one flings it very far away so that it can no longer return — putting a great light on it. There are instances in which it is possible to change, but this is very rare. There are instances in which one can put upon this being — or this shadow — put upon it such an intense light that it transforms it, and it changes into what is the truth of your being.”

“But this is a rare thing…. It can be done, but it is rare. Usually, the best thing is to say, ‘No this is not I! I don’t want it! I have nothing to do with this movement, it doesn’t exist for me, it is something contrary to my nature!’ And so, by dint of insisting and driving it away, finally one separates oneself from it>’

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Looking from Within, Chapter 4, Ordeals and Difficulties, pp.83-85