Daily Questions

Q: The old consciousness plays old tricks, and knowing about this yoga while still unable to fully follow it quadruples the guilt – what to do?

ALOKDA: Guilt is the result of the action of adverse forces that make our difficulties seem insurmountable as if there was anything really impossible for the Grace. Where human efforts fail, there a new journey begins. It is the journey of Divine Love, of Divine Grace. It is understood and Sri Aurobindo has very clearly said so that no human power or tapasya can accomplish the change envisaged by the Integral Yoga except the Divine Mother and Her illimitable Grace. But one has to endure the process with faith and complete trust in the Divine and to go on rising up a thousand times or more if need be. The journey is never smooth or easy. But every fall leaves us somewhat stronger and wiser and if we keep the will for progress intact then one day we rise never to fall again. Meanwhile each little step, however small and sometimes even however paradoxical it may seem is a step towards the Goal.

Q: Does physical immortality mean imprisonment in a single form? To me this would be a nonsense.

ALOKDA: Physical immortality surely does not mean a fresh imprisonment into one particular form. The supramental being will be free to leave aside the body and switch over to another without any loss of consciousness as happens now following the process of death. In all likelihood it would have found the occult means to create a new body for itself and switch over to it. This is the general drift.

However there is another aspect of physical immortality that we need to understand. Nonsense or not it is only when we are able to not only prolong life at will, to keep the body free from all disease and disintegration and eventually help it to escape from the law of death can we say that there is a complete conquest over all the forces of darkness that right now govern material existence. Once this conquest is established then the rest is a matter of method and means that the New Being will use.

However if the conquest over all the material forces that weave our bodily life are not conquered then whatever process we may use will remain precarious since earthly body will remain susceptible to death. It will be in that case a partial and incomplete victory. Or else we will have to rest content with a partially supramentalised body, like the ethereal body that does not decay in certain tantric traditions notably the chinmaya body that Vaishnavas speak of or the body of Light. That however is different from the supramental body which will the sign of the complete conquest of the Divine over matter using our humanity as a fulcrum.

There are two views about what constitutes a vegetarian diet. One view which is rather extreme excludes not only eggs but also milk because they are regarded as animal product. A further extreme form excludes even tubers and roots since they are regarded as living as they continue to grow giving rise to many more. Obviously, this view takes its stand upon non-injury to any living form. It is more like a moral principle that is often arbitrary and based on a limited understanding of life itself. From the spiritual perspective life is everywhere even in the atoms and stone.

If we take the consciousness perspective which is more complete and based on fundamental truth of creation, then taking eggs and of course milk is perfectly fine, especially since unfertilized eggs are invariably vegetarian.

The importance of sacred Relics of Divine beings and personalities has always been known. Touch is intimately connected to the earth and objects invariably carry the impression (and the vibration) of the person who has used them. It was this truth that was at the basis of many practices in India. The difference between these and the sacred Relics (hair, tooth and nails) is that while the objects used by a divine being carry the stamp because they have been touched or used physically (it is a contact through the body) whereas in the latter it is the body itself carrying the unforgettable stamp of the consciousness of the divine being directly upon the body itself. With Sri Aurobindo it becomes even more special since unlike other Yogis, Sri Aurobindo specifically worked to transform the body by infusing the supramental consciousness into it. This is a singular example in the spiritual history of mankind. Therefore its immense importance cannot be compared to other sacred Relics.

As to the Ashram, it is and will always remain very special because it is not just Sri Aurobindo’s and the Mother’s physical body lying in the Samadhi but even more importantly their taposthali (seat of tapasya) where everything, from their rooms, the walls and floors and the soil and the very air contains something of them soaked in it very tangibly..

By practicing inner quietude, by stepping back from the immediate impulse to act, by asking the ego and desires not to make too much noise, and then turning towards the Divine with a will to receive the right indication one begins to feel a sort of gentle indication in the heart about the thing to be done.

Since this takes time, one should meanwhile act according to the highest light one can summon, generally the buddhi, and offer the action to the Divine with a prayer that may the action and will be attuned to the Divine Will and the results be such as the Divine Wisdom may determine and decide rather than what our ignorant mind wants and likes.

The presence of transience and change are the very law of life in its long and winding evolutionary journey. This perpetual wheel of destiny that carries our lives in a cosmic pool of chance and uncertainty can be very frightening. This is especially so for man who believes that he can control and micro manage all the events and circumstances of his life. There is of course a truth behind this since some events we do seem to control at least apparently which only perpetuates the illusion of control. Or perhaps we can change destiny but for that we need a power far greater than reason. Reason hardly even knows the real causes of whatever happens. It knows some intermediate processes and mastering them believes that it has the key to the ultimate cause. But can we truly change anything except in a limited way until we know the ultimate cause and the secret truth of everything? It is this question that confronts us during our moments of helplessness and stares at us as if seeking an answer. However, this inability to control events does frighten many people who feel helpless before the decree of fate. Still others declare the imperfect nature of earthly life and either pactise with the ways of fate accepting whatever happens with dignity and calm submission to the ways of life or destiny. Some try to find an exit route out of the whole imbroglio. Others simply spend a lifetime fretting and fuming and complaining and grumbling against God and His Will believing that they may be able to do better if they had the power.

But the Divine Will working in the cosmos acts on the basis of a Wisdom that we do not have at present. It is this we must acquire for our hearts to have peace. This Wisdom comes as we learn to become quitter and go deeper within ourselves. It comes also as we learn to surrender before the Divine Will knowing or having faith that the Divine knows better than we do. After it is He and not us who are the original cause and hence it is He whom we must find and become one with to be even able to understand the way creation operates. Who can be better than the Creator Himself to reveal the truth behind things? And if He so wills and finds us ready, He can also impart us the power over circumstances which are a clumsy way of expressing the inner states. If we can shift the inner state then very often the outer circumstances also begin to change and shift.

In other words what we need to learn is the state or inner condition that we must inculcate in the face of difficult and adverse circumstances. These conditions are a set of attitudes that have always been known and emphasized in all spiritual practices with some variations. It is a state of trust in the Divine, a state of spontaneous surrender to His Will, a state of aspiration and prayer, of utter abandon and submission to Him. If we can do this with sincerity then slowly a calm begins to descend upon us and the interventions become more and more frequent in our life. However, it must be noted that these divine interventions are not meant to satisfy our desires and longings but to modify the passage sufficiently so that without changing the ultimate result that is decreed it may take us through a safer and smoother passage towards then eventual fulfillment of our destiny and of others. It tweaks the evolutionary Law so to say. But if we have the rarest of rare privilege to trust and open to Her Grace and Love then not only can the Law be tweaked but completely changed. The inexorable wheel of karma can take a completely different turn taking us through a different door, through a sunlit path towards the Goal.

Here are few lines from Savitri that remind us of these truths. Indeed, one of the best things when one is passing through these moments is to simply open any page of Savitri randomly and read it. The Mother recommended it not only by way of receiving the needed hint and guidance but also the strength to go through what we must and the eventual power to change destiny. But of course, it helps if we have formed a rapport with the book which is much more than a book. It is a living representation, the word-body, of the twin consciousness of Sri Aurobindo and the Mother and there is absolutely nothing in the world comparable to Savitri. So here are a few lines to remind us of the ever-present Help that is always accessible to us under all conditions and circumstances.

Affectionately
Alok da

A magic leverage suddenly is caught
That moves the veiled Ineffable’s timeless will:
A prayer, a master act, a king idea
Can link man’s strength to a transcendent Force.
Then miracle is made the common rule,
One mighty deed can change the course of things;
A lonely thought becomes omnipotent.
All now seems Nature’s massed machinery;
An endless servitude to material rule
And long determination’s rigid chain,
Her firm and changeless habits aping Law,
Her empire of unconscious deft device
Annul the claim of man’s free human will.
He too is a machine amid machines;
A piston brain pumps out the shapes of thought,
A beating heart cuts out emotion’s modes;
An insentient energy fabricates a soul.
Or the figure of the world reveals the signs
Of a tied Chance repeating her old steps
In circles around Matter’s binding-posts.
A random series of inept events
To which reason lends illusive sense, is here,
Or the empiric Life’s instinctive search,
Or a vast ignorant mind’s colossal work.
But wisdom comes, and vision grows within:
Then Nature’s instrument crowns himself her king;
He feels his witnessing self and conscious power;
His soul steps back and sees the Light supreme…..
But many-visaged is the cosmic Soul;
A touch can alter the fixed front of Fate.
A sudden turn can come, a road appear.
A greater Mind may see a greater Truth,
Or we may find when all the rest has failed
Hid in ourselves the key of perfect change.
Ascending from the soil where creep our days,
Earth’s consciousness may marry with the Sun,
Our mortal life ride on the spirit’s wings,
Our finite thoughts commune with the Infinite.

Q: Most people around me find happiness in mechanical repetition of a routine, which appears to me very dull. What are the ways to open an inner door to the joyful, true happiness?

ALOKDA: To start with there are several types of happiness depending upon the level at which we stand in our evolution. There is a kind of happiness that people find in status quo. This is the minimum on the scale and it is akin to staying in our comfort zones. To upgrade their happiness they need to take the challenge of life which means effort. Most human beings prefer to remain fixed in whatever situation life places them in using terms like contentment, duty etc. But behind all this is an inertia to change and find better and more meaningful things. This kind of humanity does not like to think much as thinking will make them uncomfortable and unhappy by challenging their fixed premises which they have inherited rather than thought out for themselves. A lot of people of the previous generations in India were like this, refusing to think and continue doing mechanically whatever little circle of activity that life provides for them.

Then there is another of happiness that is more like an offshoot of this state of tamas and inertia of thought that shuns the real challenges of life. It is found in violent actions upon oneself or others to shake themselves up. Thrill and intense pleasure, however brief is sought after and it ranges from a variety of actions such as fashion, food, sex, drugs, violence, horror etc. The man caught in the lower vital ranges of life has this for his share of ephemeral pleasure which he mistakes for happiness until life one day closes his small, insignificant chapter of life.

But when through evolution taking place across lives the vital force in man expands, he begins to seek happiness in ambitious expansion of his personal empire starting from seeking after name and fame in his small or big circle to conquering and ruling an empire. Here one begins to take challenges and gets a joy in facing and conquering them. Its soberer form is the mountaineer who tries to climb a difficult peak, the sportsman who wants to excel, the business magnet who wants to earn more and more, the explorer and the adventurer.
Then there is also a happiness that comes through emotional satisfaction, through mutual care and affection, through what we call as love, being loved and loving someone.

Beyond this is a happiness to which still a few are privy to. It is the happiness that comes through thought. Here the domain of the thinker begins, people who find a joy in thinking, reflecting, reading, writing, expressing themselves through various forms of art, music, poetry, sciences and crafts. They enjoy reading a good book that provides them a deeper or subtler understanding of life or opens the doors to knowledge and wisdom.

It is only when man has gone through these limited forms of ‘happinesses’, known their relative place and limited utility and yet knows its insufficiency and inability to give us the joy that endures that he turns towards the happiness that is unfading and causeless and independent of all outer circumstances or activity. It is a process of evolution that takes place through quite a few lives. Its penultimate is when we begin to seek within what we were trying to find outside and through outer things but now know for sure that it cannot be found and secured. It is then that we are truly ready for opening the inner door. A mere mechanical process hardly works if it is not supported by a feeling or a conviction or an aspiration and a faith in deeper and higher things that one cannot find within the limited range of experiences offered to us by the bodily life, the restless outgoing vital energy and even the thinking mind. What can we do to hasten this moment? Well go through life consciously. See things and this world with open eyes, the true worth of it all and not what we are conditioned to believe.

Most of us still laboring under this misconception that happiness comes by a good job, money and a partner can do little better than advise us the same. It is not their fault since they hardly know anything else or more. It is we who have to decide whether we believe in these explanations just because the majority believes in them or want to reflect and search the real cause and source of joy in life. Therefore, it is very helpful to snatch some quiet moments daily and reflect upon the questions of life such as why and wherefore of death, on the aim of life, on truth and love and the ways to lead a beautiful and happy life. In addition, one should spend time in the company of books and people who uplift our thoughts and inspire us to go beyond, who awaken us to the need of a greater life, who instill faith and hope in higher things.

Then one day we are ready to take the plunge and the inner door will open without much effort and we discover that unconditional peace and joy that truly surpasses all understanding. Then life truly begins, a new life before which the old one seems as if we were living as half dead people without knowing it. Once the need for this greater life awakens then the means and everything else is given to us. We find the right books, we meet the right people, we start entering a world of experiences before which all the joys of life seem too trifle, artificial and temporary.

It is then that one discovers the God who is beyond religion and thought, the all-pervading Reality, the all-Compassionate Being who is yet all beings, the very Soul of this world and ours, the summit of Perfection to which we secretly aspire, the Love that binds and moves the stars. Religion binds us to one form of thought of God, or at most to one kind of experience of divinity. Spirituality liberates us even from all conceptions of God. It is like understanding mount Everest by watching a film or reading a book and having the actual feel and taste of it by striving to climb it. Religion is a preparation at best and a prison at worst. Spirituality is freedom, eternity, infinity, Love.

Affectionately,
AP

Q: Could you please let me know if it’s possible to spiritually contact a deceased soul? How do I know if the soul is happy or not after death?

ALOKDA: Following death of the body, the soul withdraws into the psychic world shedding one sheath after the other. The first sheath to be shed is the vital sheath which in normal circumstances takes about two weeks to two months. It is during this passage that the departed may still experience joy and grief. But once it passes beyond the vital worlds it is in a glad state. Finally, it passes into the psychic world where it is in a state of peace and joy. By this time all its strings of attachment and memories of those left behind is dissolved. There is no further contact with the world.

If we try to call such a soul it is quite likely that some beings of the vital world may get in touch with us and start fooling us. It is naturally dangerous and hence inadmissible to try contacting the departed soul.

Affectionately
Alok da

Q: Please tell me the essence of Mahakali’s Love

ALOKDA: It is the Love that brooks no obstacle between the soul and the Divine.

It is the Love that leans into the abyss and battles with the forces of darkness to save the seeds of truth and Light buried within the Inconscience.

It is the Love that goes as far as to identify itself with all that is dark and becomes Kali to change the dragon base of time.

Who can bear this intense and mighty Love but he whom Krishna already possesses.