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ARTArticleLights and Sounds Can Indicate Opening to Inner or Subtler Planes of ExistenceEverything that exists in the universe has an energy signature or frequency which is manifested by light, colour and sound, whether perceived by our limited sense capabilities or outside their range. As the seeker begins to shift awareness inwards, he is no longer totally reliant on the exte
al sense organs and thus, as openness to other planes or worlds begins to occur, he can start to perceive the energetic signature of forms, forces and beings that operate on these other planes.ARTArticleLiving in the Consciousness of the Ete
al Provides an Answer to Our Hurried and Dissatisfied ExistenceThere is a strong human potential movement that counsels ‘mindfulness’ by living in the present, and not worrying about or identifying with the past, and not imaging or creating images about the future in one’s mind. This movement has an underlying truth associated with it, as dwelling on either the past or the future, without focus on the present, can indeed be both unhealthy and unproductive.ARTArticleLottery in Astrologyyour astrological chart will help you find the best careers for you, the best ways for you to earn money, and to some extent, whether you will have any luck in gambling, and maybe, if you are going to get some inheritance. But no astrologer can guarantee by using astrology that you are DEFINITELY going to win a large amount of money in the Lottery; if an astrologer could do that, most astrologers would be rich themselves; and no astrologer can tell you how large or small an inheritance might be.ARTArticleMajor Subdivisions of the Primary Parts of the BeingThe more one examines the play of awareness and activity internally, the more one begins to recognise the subtle interactions that take place between the various parts of the being. There are not clear borderlines but rather influences and actions that are based primarily in one part of the being, but have characteristics from one of the other parts. As one begins to recognise this level of detail of the internal landscape, there is an increasing power of understanding and modification that comes with it.ARTArticleMaking the Vital Being an Instrument of the Divine ShaktiThe idea of changing the basic way that human beings respond to circumstances is one that has been considered to be a virtually hopeless task. Long human experience has provided the impression that our vital nature is fixed and, while we can perhaps soften it around the edges, it is basically impossible to change. Thus, there are various directions that humanity has explored to overcome the limitations of the vital being.ARTArticleMan: the Being Who WorriesAnxiety arises when we extrapolate from a current circumstance or event to what we anticipate, imagine or speculate will follow. Some of this speculation is logical, following what we know of the method of Nature and the rollout of events through Time, although there is no absolute certainty about the logical result as there are too many unseen and unknown factors which can intervene at any moment. For example, we are driving a short distance on an errand and we expect to arrive in a few minutes’ time with no issues arising.ARTArticleMarriage and Spiritual Life in the Integral YogaIn many religious traditions it is customary to expect the dedicated aspirant to forego not only sexual relations, but also worldly entanglements. In the Catholic religious tradition, nuns are considered to be ‘brides of Christ’ and as such, do not enter into the state of marriage. In the Hindu tradition, there is a phase in the life-cycle that is encouraged as one of leaving behind worldly attachments and taking up ‘life in the forest’, in other words, a dedicated spiritual seeking without involvement with the relations of the world in the normal sense.ARTArticleMental and Vital Formations and Habits of Acceptance Which Create Obstacles for the Soul’s VictoryEvery part of our being has certain habitual patterns of responding to, accepting and dealing with forces and vibrations that enter into them. These habitual patterns for the most part lock in the old ways of seeing and acting, and it takes a change in standpoint from the mental-vital-physical complex to the standpoint of the soul or psychic being, in order for the individual to clearly see what is happening and what is being accepted by them in the normal course. Sri Aurobindo provides the example of illness and the way to deal with it when there is an attack on the physical body.ARTArticleNecessary Elements Required to Understand and Apply Techniques of Psychological HealingWhether one is working with a professional in the field of psychology, or one is working on one’s own internally to resolve disturbances and inner conflicts, attain peace, or achieve balance in one’s life, certain basic knowledge is required. One needs to understand the complex nature of the human personality, with the differing and sometimes conflicting needs, demands, desires and drives associated with each element of the being.ARTArticleObjective and Subjective KnowledgeWe see something with our eyes or hear something with our ears and we believe that we know that it is an exte
al reality, which we all perceive and can agree upon. We put in a separate category those things that we perceive through forms of knowing that do not depend on sense perception, and which are not subject to validation by others automatically.ARTArticleObserving and Controlling One’s SpeechMauna Sadhana, the discipline of silence, can be a very powerful way to gain insight into the impulse to speech and the control of speech. We frequently speak without filtering what we have to say. The idea comes into our mind and before we know it, it is making its way out in the form of speech. In the Ramayana, the demo
Ravana’s brother Kumbhaka
a is granted a boon as a result of a discipline the brothers undertook to gain power and control the world. The gods were conce
ed and they eventually asked goddess Saraswati to sit on the tip of his tongue when he was requested to name his boon.ARTArticleObserving, Understanding and Overcoming the Impact of Negativity and Hostility on the Sensitive Nature of the Refined IndividualRefined and sensitive individuals tend to judge others by their own internal standard. In many cases, this means expecting others to always respond with good will, compassion and honesty. They build up an image of how the world ‘works’ that is based on their inner sense of things, and in many cases, they see the world through a filter that tints things according to their vision. In some cases, they actually deny reality to negative or hostile acts by a conscious decision to not engage and recompense negativity with their own positive view.ARTArticleOccult Powers and the Secret KnowledgeThere are many who seek after various powers, and study occultism and mysticism with the purpose of achieving unique ‘super powers’. Traditional practices of yoga, while acknowledging that certain powers may result from the practices, make it clear that they are not the object and, indeed, should not be developed or used when they arise, as they can lead to distraction and failure to achieve the true object of yoga in the form of liberation and oneness of the Self.ARTArticleOld to New Astrology wayThe parameters of our life would have also not undergone any change over time since it had been developed the same way as the relative position of all the so-called “fixed stars” in the sky has not undergone any change since then. As a matter of fact, their relative position has not undergone any change even since thousands of years nor the time taken by various astrological planets to go around the Sun has ever changed nor the major and minor abscissas of their orbits would have ever changed.ARTArticleOut of Body ExperiencesMost people, embedded in the physical body and its consciousness, find it difficult, if not impossible, to accept or validate the reality of the out of body experience. At the same time, there are countless anecdotes of people who have an out of body experience, or the related ‘near death experience.’ The descriptions by those who have these experiences are remarkably similar, despite coming from a diverse cross-section of humanity and occurring among people who in many cases have no preconception of the possibility of such an experience.ARTArticleOvercoming Desire Without Suppression or IndulgenceThe mental consciousness likes to frame issues in terms of black and white determinations, as ‘either/or’ considerations. So we tend to swing from one extreme to the other. Either we try to indulge ourselves in fulfilling desires, in some cases with the idea that by satisfying the desire we will overcome it, or else we undertake harsh suppression of the desire and utilize all kinds of punishing methods to enforce this suppression. It is rare that we find a way out of the conundrum that both of these methods, by fixating on the energy of the desire, are actually strengthening its hold!ARTArticleOvercoming Tamasic Depression in the Practice of YogaIt is inevitable that as long as the human standpoint remains active, there will be periods of doubt, depression, dissatisfaction, weakness, and self-doubt. The action of the Gunas ensures there will be such periods when the enthusiasm and focus, energy and optimism depart and darkness tries to strangle the spiritual aspiration of the seeker. If the shift to the divine standpoint occurs, such events cannot occur as the seeker is liberated from the small, narrow human egoistic viewpoint which holds these types of conce
s and reactions.ARTArticleOvercoming the Impulse of AngerThere is an illustrative tale in the Mahabharata. The Pandava and Kaurava princes were being instructed by their noted teacher Dronacharya. Today’s lesson was ‘not to become angry’. The 100 Kaurava princes were asked if they had learned the lesson and they all replied in the affirmative. The 4 youngest Pandavas replied similarly. When Dronacharya came to the eldest, Yudhisthira, who was being groomed as the next king of Hastinapur, he received an unexpected reply, namely, that he had not learned the lesson. The next day the scene repeated, with the same result.ARTArticleOvercoming the Impulse to AngerMost people believe that both the impulse of desire and the impulse to anger are both inherent, deeply established reactions that are either completely impossible, or virtually impossible, to overcome and remove from one’s life. They say that one may succeed in controlling outer expressions of anger through various techniques or training, but that the impulse to anger, and the inner reaction that it causes, remains. This can have a variety of effects on the being including negative results in terms of physical health, vital energy and mental balance.ARTArticleOvercoming the Inherent Bias of the Ego-PersonalityPsychological tests and experiments have shown that each individual sees exte
al events from their own perspective and thereby bring their personal biases, albeit unintentionally, to what they observe and how they understand situations. What the senses perceive is enhanced and filled in by the mind, using our store of experience, expectations, etc. to create a ‘picture’ of the event that we then interpret from our unique perspective.ARTArticleOvercoming the Reaction of JealousyJealousy is one of those deeply rooted vital reactions that are not amenable to being “convinced” to change by mental logic. Highly educated, refined individuals are also subject to jealousy when appropriate circumstances arise, and as with other such deeply rooted reactions, the vital overpowers the mental will.ARTArticlePain and Suffering: the Play of the Gunas and the Role of the Vital NatureThere is a part of the vital nature which takes a perverse pleasure in flaunting illnesses, pain and suffering publicly to collect the sympathy of friends and acquaintances. These things become the topic of conversation and extensive gossip. Thus, the vital nature may prolong, accentuate or even call in various forms of suffering in order to carry out a form of ‘self-aggrandisement”.ARTArticlePain ManagementWhen the body is disturbed in its balance, through illness, injury, or other causes, it causes signals to be sent through the nervous system to the brain, broadcasting the perception we perceive as pain. Some people never experience pain, however, due to either a failure of the nervous pathway, or some blocking mechanism within the awareness.ARTArticleParental State of Consciousness at Time of Conception Impacts the Child’s DevelopmentWe tend to blame, accuse and punish a child for wild tendencies, without generally recognising that the child is the product of a number of factors, including samskaras from past lives, environmental influences, diet, pollution, celestial energies, societal expectations and acculturation, genetics, and parental energies which are the first and closest influence on the prenatal state. Once the child is born, all of the other factors take on a larger role, but the entire gestational period, from time of conception, exerts its influence on the developing child.ARTArticlePassivity and Weakness of Will-Power Can Be a Disturbance of the Physical ConsciousnessPeople struggle all the time with the force of desire and how to deal with it in their lives. For the yogic practitioner this becomes an even greater conce
as desire causes countless difficulties in bringing the inner being to a state of peace in which the yogic consciousness can flourish. Stoicism has been tried. Indulgence has been attempted. Some try to control desire by accepting “whatever comes” without question or either attraction or aversion.ARTArticlePeace in the Body’s Cells Can Cure IllnessWhen we conjure up, in our minds, the idea of peace, we tend to give it a form of inaction, a ‘negative’ status. Similarly, peace to our vital nature is the absence of excitement or any form of energetic expression. For the body, we believe peace is a state of quietness that does not ‘do’ anything.ARTArticlePersonal Adversity Famous QuotesAccording to conventional wisdom, any goal is achievable if you work hard. Alas, personal adversity sometimes squashes that promise.
In such cases, all the benefits are through the journey, not the desired goal. Personal adversity frequently stems from things that you can’t control in life.
Hang in there if you’re enduring extraordinary trials in life. On a spiritual level, your soul may be rejoicing at your resiliency.
Below we list famous quotes related to personal adversity.ARTArticlePreparing the Being for the Spiritual QuestThe vital nature of the human being craves the type of excitement that comes with extraordinary experiences. True spiritual progress, however, requires that a balance be maintained between what the human instrument can hold effectively, and how much Force is brought to bear from the higher planes. The story of the unbaked jar not being able to hold the water cascading into it illustrates the issue.ARTArticlePreparing the Body, Vital and Mind for Restful, Conscious SleepWe spend as much as one third of our lifetime asleep. Many questions arise when one reflects on this fact. What happens during sleep? Where does the consciousness go? What does it do? Can we become conscious, or at least more conscious, of that part of our lives? Are there ways to prepare for sleep that help us to optimize the sleep state for the yogic practice?ARTArticlePsychic Love Surpasses Human LoveThe unique dynamics of living in a spiritual or religious community make it especially important to understand the subtle (and sometimes not so subtle) distractions that can arise when the long habitual reactions of the vital nature, as well as the strong cultural pressures, developed over millennia, bring up the sexual tension between individuals. Sri Aurobindo was writing specifically to sadhaks in the Sri Aurobindo Ashram, so he focused on the specific situations that were brought up to him by those members of the Ashram.