Will-Power Can Aid the Development of the Physical Body

A woman recounted her experience of living in a small intentional community during her 20’s. The community arranged to get broken bags of cement from a nearby production facility at no charge. She was tasked with driving a van, loading up the 40# bags, and bringing them back to the location where they were unloaded and stored for later use building a wall. She was a petite woman 5’2″ and 108 pounds at the time. She did this work for some months, eventually moving hundreds of sacks. Looking back, she indicated that while she carried out the task, she struggled with it. It led to long-term lower back issues which she continued to experience even 40-45 years later. Despite the repetitive weight lifting she was doing, it did not build up her body, but actually undermined its basic stability long-term.

Efforts made with the conscious will and intention of building up the body, such as occurs in a systematic course of weight-lifting, can bring about strong development of the musculature. In such instances, not only is there the use of will-power to focus the energy, but there is generally, associated with that will, the intentional development of a systematic approach using a discipline developed for that specific purpose.

The Mother notes: “You see, if the matter is considered in its most modern, most exte
al form, how is it that the movements we make almost constantly in our daily life, or which we have to make in our work if it is a physical work, do not help or help very little, almost negligibly, to develop the muscles and to create harmony in the body? These same movements, on the other hand, if they are made consciously, deliberately, with a definite aim, suddenly start helping you to for your muscles and build up your body. There are jobs, for instance, where people have to carry extremely heavy loads, like bags of cement or sacks of corn or coal, and they make a considerable effort; to a certain extent they do it with an acquired facility, but that doesn’t give them harmony of the body, because the don’t do it with the idea of developing their muscles, they do it just ‘like that’. And someone who follows a method, either one he has learnt or one he has worked out for himself, and who makes these very movements with the will to develop his muscle or that, to create a general harmony int he body — he succeeds. Therefore, in the conscious will, there is something which adds considerably to the movement itself. Those who really want to practice physical culture as it is conceived now, everything they do, they do consciously. They walk downstairs consciously, they make the movements of ordinary life consciously, not mechanically. An attentive eye will perhaps notice a little difference but the greatest difference lies in the will they put into it, the consciousness they put into it. Walking to go somewhere and walking as an exercise is not the same thing. It is the conscious will in all these things which is important, it is that which brings about the progress and obtains the result. Therefore, what I mean is that the method one uses has only a relative importance in itself; it is the will to obtain a certain result that is important.”

Sri Aurobindo and the Mother, Powers Within, Chapter V Will-Power, pp. 51-52