classes ::: chapter, Questions And Answers 1957-1958, The Mother, Integral Yoga,
children :::
branches :::
see also :::

bookmarks: Instances - Definitions - Quotes - Chapters - Wordnet - Webgen


object:1957-07-17 - Power of conscious will over matter
class:chapter
book class:Questions And Answers 1957-1958
author class:The Mother
subject class:Integral Yoga

Has no one any questions on the text? I have nothing special to tell you this evening, and if you are not curious to know what the new perfections of the body could be

Mother, in the physical education we practise here our aim is a greater and greater control over the body, isnt it? So, as Sri Aurobindo has said in what we read last time, that the Hatha-yoga and Tantric methods give a very great control over the body,1 Why dont we introduce these methods into our system?

These are occult processes for acting on the body the Tantric ones, at any ratewhile the modern methods of development follow the ordinary physical process to give the body all the perfection it is capable of in its present state. I dont quite grasp your question. The processes are completely different.

The basis of all these methods is the power exercised by the conscious will over matter. Usually it is a method which someone has used fairly successfully and set up as a principle of action, which he has taught to others who in turn have continued and perfected it until it has taken a somewhat fixed form of one kind of discipline or another. But the whole basis is the action of the conscious will on the body. The exact form of the method is not of primary importance. In various countries, at various times, one method or another has been used, but always behind it there is a canalised mental power which acts methodically. Of course, some methods try to use a higher power which would in its turn transmit its capacity to the mental power: if a power of a higher order is infused into the mental method, this method naturally becomes more effective and powerful. But essentially all these disciplines depend above all on the person who practises them and the way he uses them. One can, even in the most material, ordinary processes, make use of this altogether external basis to infuse into them powers of a higher order. And all methods, whatever they may be, depend almost exclusively on the person who uses them, on what he puts into them.

You see, if the matter is considered in its most modern, most external form, how is it that the movements we make almost constantly in our everyday 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 form 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 doesnt give them harmony of the body, because they dont 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 this muscle or that, to create a general harmony in his bodyhe succeeds. Therefore, in the conscious will, there is something which adds considerably to the movement itself. Those who really want to practise 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.

The yogi or aspiring yogi who does asanas to obtain a spiritual result or even simply a control over his body, obtains these results because it is with this aim that he does them, whereas I know some people who do exactly the same things but for all sorts of reasons unrelated to spiritual development, and who havent even managed to acquire good health by it! And yet they do exactly the same thing, sometimes they even do it much better than the yogi, but it doesnt give them a stable health because they havent thought about it, havent done it with this purpose in mind. I have asked them myself, I said, But how can you be ill after doing all that?Oh! but I never thought of it, thats not why I do it. This amounts to saying that it is the conscious will which acts on matter, not the material fact.

But you only have to try it, you will understand very well what I mean. For instance, all the movements you make when dressing, taking your bath, tidying your room no matter what; make them consciously, with the will that this muscle should work, that muscle should work. You will see, you will obtain really amazing results.

Going up and down the stairsyou cannot imagine how useful that can be from the point of view of physical culture, if you know how to make use of it. Instead of going up because you are going up and coming down because you are coming down, like any ordinary man, you go up with the consciousness of all the muscles which are working and of making them work harmoniously. You will see. Just try a little, you will see! This means that you can use all the movements of your life for a harmonious development of your body.

You bend down to pick something up, you stretch up to find something right at the top of a cupboard, you open a door, you close it, you have to go round an obstacle, there are a hundred and one things you do constantly and which you can make use of for your physical culture and which will demonstrate to you that it is the consciousness you put into it which produces the effect, a hundred times more than just the material fact of doing it. So, you choose the method you like best, but you can use the whole of your daily life in this way. To think constantly of the harmony of the body, of the beauty of the movements, of not doing anything that is ungraceful and awkward. You can obtain a rhythm of movement and gesture which is very exceptional.

We are going to meditate on all this.

  "Something there is in us or something has to be developed, perhaps a central and still occult part of our being containing forces whose powers in our actual and present make-up are only a fraction of what could be, but if they became complete and dominant would be truly able to bring about with the help of the light and force of the soul and the supramental truth-consciousness the necessary physical transformation and its consequences. This might be found in the system of Chakras revealed by Tantric knowledge and accepted in the systems of Yoga, conscious centres and sources of all the dynamic powers of our being organising their action through the plexuses and arranged in an ascending series from the lowest physical to the highest mind centre and spiritual centre called the thousand-petalled lotus where ascending Nature, the Serpent Power of the Tantrics, meets the Brahman and is liberated into the Divine Being. These centres are closed or half closed within us and have to be opened before their full potentiality can be manifested in our physical nature: but once they are opened and completely active, no limit can easily be set to the development of their potencies and the total transformation to be possible.... But even these changes would still leave a residue of material processes keeping the old way and not amenable to the higher control and, if this could not be changed, the rest of the transformation might itself be checked and incomplete. A total transformation of the body would demand a sufficient change of the most material part of the organism, its constitution, its processes and its set-up of nature."

  The Supramental Manifestation, SABCL, Vol. 16, pp. 34-35

***



questions, comments, suggestions/feedback, take-down requests, contribute, etc
contact me @ integralyogin@gmail.com or
join the integral discord server (chatrooms)
if the page you visited was empty, it may be noted and I will try to fill it out. cheers


OBJECT INSTANCES [0] - TOPICS - AUTHORS - BOOKS - CHAPTERS - CLASSES - SEE ALSO - SIMILAR TITLES

TOPICS
SEE ALSO


AUTH

BOOKS
Questions_And_Answers_1957-1958

IN CHAPTERS TITLE
1957-07-17_-_Power_of_conscious_will_over_matter

IN CHAPTERS CLASSNAME

IN CHAPTERS TEXT
1957-07-17_-_Power_of_conscious_will_over_matter

PRIMARY CLASS

chapter
SIMILAR TITLES

DEFINITIONS



QUOTES [0 / 0 - 0 / 0]


KEYS (10k)


NEW FULL DB (2.4M)


*** NEWFULLDB 2.4M ***


IN CHAPTERS [0/0]









WORDNET


































IN WEBGEN [10000/15]

Wikipedia - Cavern diving -- Diving in the part of a cave where the exit is visible by natural light
Wikipedia - Radiation angle -- Half the vertex angle of the cone of light emitted at the exit face of an optical fiber
Wikipedia - The Exit Door Leads In
Wikipedia - The Exit of Battling Billson -- 1923 short story by P. G. Wodehouse
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1206294.The_Exit_Collection
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/22465489-the-exit-man
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/26203787-a-clue-to-the-exit
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/44422105-near-the-exit
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/44422105.Near_the_Exit_Travels_with_the_Not_So_Grim_Reaper
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6970583-the-exitor
Bow Down to the Exit Sign
Life Between the Exit Signs
Live at the Entry, Dead at the Exit
The Exit List
The Exit Papers


change font "color":
change "background-color":
change "font-family":
change "padding":
change "table font size":
last updated: 2022-02-04 13:13:08
321186 site hits