Vital Vibrations and the Response to Them

We are able to perceive and respond to specific frequency ranges. Anything above, or below the frequency ranges to which we are attuned, does not register with us consciously, although there may be some subtle impact and energetic action that takes place, even so. We see that in the case of the opera singer who can shatter glass when she reaches a certain note and pitch, that the glass vibrated only when that frequency was attained and otherwise, remained stable in its constitution of being a vessel of glass. Sympathetic strings on a sitar are made to vibrate each to a particular frequency thus providing the range of sounds. Similarly, when vital vibrations of fear, desire, greed, compassion, aspiration or pity (any vital vibration) is active, it only raises up activity in those individuals who are tuned and ready to receive and respond to them. It is this secret that underlies the philosophical approach of the stoic, who habituates himself to not respond to vital vibrations that otherwise put other individuals into action.

We can see something similar in the physical body when it comes to the force of illness. When a disease is virulent it not only has its physical action, but it projects through humanity a vibration of fear or panic. The ‘fear effect’ that occurs in a plague or pandemic can cause tremendous disruption to the natural vital envelope protecting the body and thus, actually is part of the process of infection.

An observation of an actual event illustrates this principle. A number of people had gathered in Washington, D.C. in 1971 to protest the US involvement in the war in Vietnam. A demonstration occurred outside the HHS headquarters (Health and Human Services). President Nixon arranged to have the peaceful demonstrators surrounded and arrested. When the police showed up, armed, with billy clubs and helmets and shields and with their motorized transport vehicles, and surrounded the demonstrators, a palpable sense of fear surged through the crowd. One or more people, however, seemed to be able to overcome that fear and they began to chant OM. The crowd quickly took up the chant, and instantly, the fear dissolved and the people were at peace with the situation. They were arrested, driven away and locked up, but did not any longer have the panic reaction with which they first reacted.

The Mother observes: “… when we say that great waves of passion pass through people, and that they are not generated in them but pass through them, it is perfectly true. But if there was someone absolutely immune from all possibility of passion, they could pass by for centuries, he wouldn’t even feel them. He could see them, see them passing, as one sees a storm passing in the sky, but he would feel nothing at all. When the vibrations inside oneself answer the vibrations from outside, it means that they are there; otherwise no vibration can enter.”

“There are examples like this. For instance, a crowd is seized by panic. Well, it is always possible that there are one or two persons who resist the panic, who are not touched, are outside it: they can save the situation. This has happened many a time. The reason why a movement, a vibration, a forceful movement is contagious is because the ground for contagion is there.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, The Hidden Forces of Life, Ch.8 Life — A Mass of Vibrations, pp. 185-186