The Ashram Sadhaks

People believe that drawing down of the higher things is not a desirable movement — there should be an effortless descent.

But that is made an excuse for not doing any active sadhana at all — hence a general tamas and inertia in the Ashram, people taking things easily as if they had only to wait and chat and eat and read and sleep and whatever was necessary would descend of itself some day or other. There must be the concentration, the aspiration, the call, the rejection of the lower nature.

That is why the Ashram is what it is. Only those who are taking the Yoga seriously are making any progress.

I am told some sadhaks have misused the descent of the Force. I wonder how such a thing takes place. For it is the Force that has to use us and not vice versa.

They allow something else to use it and them.

In Y’s case, was there any descent of the higher Force which got mixed up or degraded by his lower nature and brought about the madness?

There was no descent of Force at all — such results do not come from a descent of the higher Force — they are attacks from the Asuric vital forces.

It appears that he had a great spiritual ambition which was beyond his powers and he seems to have been indulging in practices such as not sleeping against which he had been warned as well as others (not allowed) which can put one into contact with the vital beings and lead to lunacy.

I am not aware of any “development” of the mental etc. on their own planes; the development takes place on earth. The mental and other planes are not evolutionary. The one who dies here is assisted in his passage to the psychic world and helped in his future evolution towards the Divine.