The Power of Rejection in Gaining Mastery Over the Nature

Operant conditioning is a phenomenon identified in Western psychology by B.F. Skinner. His experiments showed that by the results of carrying out specific actions, they can either be encouraged, through positive reinforcement, or discouraged through negative reinforcement. One of the principles he elicited in his experiments was the impact of the reinforcement over time. Experiments showed that by removing any positive reinforcement, certain behaviours would weaken and fade out over time. Consistent reinforcement led to patterns, habits and embedded actions. Occasional reinforcement, however, also continued the pattern as an expectation built up that ‘next time’ the positive reinforcement could come. This principle works in gambling with what are known as “one-armed bandits”, slot machines. People get small winnings occasionally which leads them to continue putting their money into the machine. The longer they play, and the more small winnings they get along the way, the more they expect a major jackpot to occur. Of course, the machinery is set up to make such major jackpots extremely rare, and thus, there is a huge advantage to the machine over the human playing the machine.

If we apply this knowledge to our individual being and our attempt to control and gain mastery over our exte
al nature, we can easily see that the advice provided by the Mother is an accurate portrayal of what it actually takes to succeed in the task. The rejection of attention, the rejection of any manifestation of these forces, is the only way to eliminate them from the nature entirely. Even occasional indulgence leads to a long and arduous process of continuance of the movements that the seeker desires to overcome.

The methods of rejection may include ‘negative’ approaches such as direct refusal, discipline or denial of various sorts; as well as ‘positive’ approaches that turn the attention elsewhere to focus on the positive thoughts, feelings, emotions, etc. that eventually are intended to replace those former movements and activities. Just as Western psychology has discovered, the human instrument can be modified, trained, if you will, to adapt to new conditions and carry out new types of behaviours. Yoga is, as Sri Aurobindo has noted, a form of ‘applied psychology’. While yogic psychology is clearly much more developed and advanced, with understanding based on at least several thousand years’ of efforts, it is useful to note where Western psychology is beginning to recognise these things, particularly for those who are accustomed to seeing things in Western terms.

The Mother writes: “If you do not accept certain movements, then naturally, when they find that they can’t manifest, gradually they diminish in force and stop occurring. If you refuse to express everything that is of a lower kind, little by little the very thing disappears, and the consciousness is emptied of lower things. It is by refusing to give expression — I mean not only in action but also in thought, in feeling. When impulses, thoughts, emotions come, if you refuse to express them, if you push them aside and remain in a state of inner aspiration and calm, then gradually they lose their force and stop coming. So the consciousness is emptied of its lower movements.”

“But for instance, when undesirable thoughts come, if you look at them, observe them, if you take pleasure in following them in their movements, they will never stop coming. It is the same thing when you have undesirable feelings or sensations: if you pay attention to them, concentrate on them or even look at them with a certain indulgence, they will never stop. But if you absolutely refuse to receive and express them, after some time they stop. You must be patient and very persistent.”

“In a great aspiration, if you can put yourself into contact with something higher, some influence of your psychic being or some light from above, and if you can manage to put this in touch with these lower movements, naturally they stop more quickly. But before even being able to draw these things by aspiration, you can already stop those movements from finding expression in you by a very persistent and patient refusal. When thoughts which you do not like come, if you just brush them away and do not pay them any attention at all, after some time they won’t come any longer. But you must do this very persistently and regularly.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Looking from Within, Chapter 5, Attitudes on the Path, pp. 157-158