the Divine Influence

0.09 - Letters to a Young Teacher, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
is what opens us to the Divine Influence and makes us capable
of receiving what it brings us.

0.11 - Letters to a Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
which we do not know) is the first effect of the Divine Influence
on the inconscient.

0.14 - Letters to a Sadhak, #Some Answers From The Mother, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
more receptive to the Divine Influence.
One could say: to widen oneself more and more, to deepen

0 1960-11-12, #Agenda Vol 01, #unset, #Zen
But generally and this is something Theon had told me (Theon was very qualified on the subject of hostile forces and the workings of all that resists the Divine Influence, and he was a great fighteras you might imagine! He himself was an incarnation of an asura, so he knew how to tackle these things!); he was always saying, If you make a VERY SMALL concession or suffer a minor defeat, it gives you the right to a very great victory. Its a very good trick. And I have observed, in practice, that for all things, even for the very little things of everyday life, its trueif you yield on one point (if, even though you see what should be, you yield on a very secondary and unimportant point), it immediately gives you the power to impose your will for something much more important. I mentioned this to Sri Aurobindo and he said that it was true. It is true in the world as it is today, but its not what we want; we want it to change, really change.
He wrote this in a letter, I believe, and he spoke of this system of compensation for example, those who take an illness on themselves in order to have the power to cure; and then theres the symbolic story of Christ dying on the cross to set men free. And Sri Aurobindo said, Thats fine for a certain age, but we must now go beyond that. As he told me (its even one of the first things he told me), We are no longer at the time of Christ when, to be victorious, it was necessary to die.

0 1961-07-07, #Agenda Vol 02, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its like the word purityone could lecture endlessly on the difference between divine purity and what people call purity. Divine purity (at the lowest level) is to admit but one influence the Divine Influence (but this is at the lowest level, and already terribly distorted). Divine purity means that only the Divine existsnothing else. It is perfectly pureonly the Divine exists, nothing other than He.
And so on.

0 1962-07-25, #Agenda Vol 03, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It is the individual consciousness. Aspiration is almost always an expression of the psychic being the part of us thats organized around the divine center, the small divine flame deep within human beings. You see, this divine flame exists inside each human being, and little by little, through all the incarnations and karma and so on, a being takes shape around it, which Thon called the psychic being. And when the psychic being reaches its full development, it becomes a kind of bodily or at any rate individual raiment of the soul. The soul is a portion of the Supreme the jiva is the Supreme in individual form. And since there is only one Supreme, there is only one jiva, but with millions of individual forms. This jiva begins as a divine sparkimmutable, eternal and infinite too (infinite in possibility rather than dimension). And through all the incarnations, whatever has received and responded to the Divine Influence progressively crystallizes around the jiva, which becomes more and more conscious as well as more and more organized. Ultimately it becomes a completely conscious individual being, master of itself and moved exclusively by the divine Will. That is to say, an individual expression of the Supreme. This is what we call the psychic being.
Generally speaking, those who practice yoga have either a fully developed, independent psychic being which has taken birth again to do the Divines work, or else a psychic being in its last incarnation wanting to complete its development and realize itself.

0 1963-02-21, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
A total surrender, an exclusive self-opening to the Divine Influence, a constant and integral choice of the Truth and rejection of the falsehood, these are the only conditions made. But these must be fulfilled entirely, without reserve, without any evasion or presence, simply and sincerely down to the most physical consciousness and its workings.
Sri Aurobindo

0 1963-07-31, #Agenda Vol 04, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And I was told something this morning (I think it was this morning, or in the night, I dont remember); it was said to the body, not to me. The body was told that it would go on till complete purification, and that AT THAT POINT it will have the choice between continuing its work or You see, once it has attained complete purification from the cellular point of view (not what people call physical purity, thats not it), from the point of view of the Divine Influence, which means that each cell will be under the exclusive influence of the Supreme (thats the work under way now), the body was told that that work would be done, and once it was completed, the body ITSELF, entirely under the Supremes influence, would decide whether it wants to continue or be dissolved. It was very interesting, because dissolution means a scattering, but to scatter (thats easy to understand) is a way to SPREAD the consciousness over a very large area. So the cells will be given the choice either to act in that way (gesture of diffusion) or to act in agglomeration (Mother makes a fist).
(silence)

0 1967-02-08, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Each illness represents its own vibratory mode. Each illness has its own vibratory mode; it represents a whole field of vibrations to be corrected. Its the EXACT measure of what in Matter resists the Divine Influence the exact measure, down to the atom.
Oh, how interesting it is, if you knew how interesting. Take coughing, for instance (not in the chest, in the throat). So, the first vibration: an irritation that draws your attention in order to make you cough. It has a certain kind of vibration which we may call pointed, but its not violent: its light, annoying. Its the first little vibration. So with that vibration: awakening of the attention in the surrounding consciousness (of the throat cells); then a refusal to accept the cough, a rejection here (in the throat), which at first almost causes nausea (all this is seen through a microscope, you understand, they are very tiny things). The attention is focused. Then, at that point, there are several possible factors, which are sometimes simultaneous and sometimes one drives away the other; one is anxiety: something goes wrong and there is apprehension at whats going to happen; the other is a will that nothing should be disturbed by the irritation; and then all of a sudden, the faith that the Force is capable of restoring order everywhere immediately (none of this is intellectual: its vibrations).

0 1967-02-15, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Thon, for his part, insisted very much on adverse forces, while Sri Aurobindo didnt talk about them. So when I came here I asked him, But do hostile beings and adverse forces exist? He said to me, Yes, they exist, but in order to master them its easier to regard them as being outside, rather than inside as a part of your nature. He insisted on the One: everything is the One distorted to a greater or lesser extent, even the adverse forces. What we call adverse forces are, at bottom, distortions of consciousness. When those distortions predominate in a being, that is to say, when his nature obeys distorted influences and no longer responds to the Divine Influence, we may call it a hostile being (they do exist, God knows!). But here in India, they have insisted above all on the notion of Oneness. Of course, at the origin of the worlds a separation took place, but its mainly the Tantrics who have insisted on that; they say that in order to re-form Godhead, the two poles must be reunited. All this is words, a manner of speaking that fills the gaps and complements each other. And depending on the individuals, the times and countries, there were manners of speaking more or less pure, some closer than others. But all said and done We could say that the Lord enjoys narrating Himself in all possible ways.
And when you are on the very lowest rung of the ladder of consciousness, those manners of speaking become increasingly concrete, absolute, hard, and exclusive of all that isnt themselves: those are religions. Oh, by the way, it seems the Pope was approached about Auroville and he asked if there would be a Catholic church! They put the question to me. I said, No. No churches, no temples.

0 1967-11-22, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It began when the doctors declared I was seriously ill, that was the beginning.2 Because the entire body was emptied of its habits and forces, and then, slowly, slowly, the cells woke up to a new receptivity and opened directly to the Divine Influence.
Every cell is vibrating.

0 1967-12-20, #Agenda Vol 08, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This is Divine Purity.1 What does Divine Purity mean? It means that the Divine receives the Divine Influence alone! I understand! Or else, the individual receives nothing but the Divine Influencehere, mon petit. (Mother gives the flower)
***

0 1970-08-05, #Agenda Vol 11, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Its an excellent mentor for the body: its perpetually giving it lessons. I dont know if all bodies are like this, but this one feels like a very small child, and it WANTS to be in school, it wants to be shown where it goes wrong and to learn things. And its constantly learning. But what comes from outside This is very interesting: the Consciousness (the Consciousness there [gesture above]) is influenced by nothing; its a witness, it sees, but it doesnt receive. The body still receives vibrations: with some people, when they sit in front of me, suddenly there are pains, things going wrong; but now it knows (naturally it knows its in pain!), but it doesnt put the blame on others: it puts it on itself, it takes it as an indication of the points that arent yet exclusively under the Divine Influence. From that point of view, its very interesting. It knows the gap between the consciousness of the being using it and itself; but it doesnt suffer from it and has perfect humility and modesty. And its not surprised or worried, because its May Your Will be done. That has become an absolute law: May Your Will be done; it doesnt concern me, I am incapable of judging, nor do I try: may Your Will be done. So then, its like this (passive, offered gesture). And when it disappears, when its wholly, completely surrendered and no longer exists by itself, then the Force going through becomes sometimes its awesome. Sometimes one can see, the witness-consciousness can see that there would be really no limits to the possibilities. But its not that yet, far from it. It comes as an example of what can be done. But before it can be spontaneous and natural
(long silence)

0 1971-11-20, #Agenda Vol 12, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Those who want to progress have an exceptional chance; because the transformation begins by opening the consciousness to the working of the new forces; and thus individuals have a unique and marvelous opportunity to open to the Divine Influence.
November 20, 1971

1.04 - The Sacrifice the Triune Path and the Lord of the Sacrifice, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
At first there may have to be a prolonged, often tedious and painful period of preparation and purification of all our being till it is ready and fit for an opening to a greater Truth and Light or to the Divine Influence and Presence. Even when centrally fitted, prepared, open already, it will still be long before all our movements of mind, life and body, all the multiple and conflicting members and elements of our personality consent or, consenting, are able to bear the difficult and exacting process of the transformation. And hardest of all, even if all in us is willing, is the struggle we shall have to carry through against the universal forces attached to the present unstable creation when we seek to make the final supramental conversion and reversal of consciousness by which the Divine Truth must be established in us in its plenitude and not merely what they would more readily permit, an illumined Ignorance.
It is for this that a surrender and submission to That which is beyond us enabling the full and free working of its Power is indispensable. As that self-giving progresses, the work of the sacrifice becomes easier and more powerful and the prevention of the opposing Forces loses much of its strength, impulsion and substance. Two inner changes help most to convert what now seems difficult or impracticable into a thing possible and even sure. There takes place a coming to the front of some secret inmost soul within which was veiled by the restless activity of the mind, by the turbulence of our vital impulses and by the obscurity of the physical consciousness, the three powers which in their confused combination we now call our self. There will come about as a result a less impeded growth of a Divine Presence at the centre with its liberating Light and effective Force and an irradiation of it into all the conscious and subconscious ranges of our nature. These are the two signs, one marking our completed conversion and consecration to the great Quest, the other the final acceptance by the Divine of our sacrifice.

1.05 - Prayer, #Hymn of the Universe, #Pierre Teilhard de Chardin, #Christianity
Glorious Lord Christ: the Divine Influence se-
cretly diffused and active in the depths of matter,

1.18 - The Infrarational Age of the Cycle, #The Human Cycle, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
These stages or periods are much more inevitable in the psychological evolution of mankind than the Stone and other Ages marked out by Science in his instrumental culture, for they depend not on outward means or accidents, but on the very nature of his being. But we must not suppose that they are naturally exclusive and absolute in their nature, or complete in their tendency or fulfilment when they come, or rigidly marked off from each other in their action or their time. For they not only arise out of each other, but may be partially developed in each other and they may come to coexist in different parts of the earth at the same time. But, especially, since man as a whole is always a complex being, even man savage or degenerate, he cannot be any of these things exclusively or absolutely,so long as he has not exceeded himself, has not developed into the superman, has not, that is to say, spiritualised and divinised his whole being. At his animal worst he is still some kind of thinking or reflecting animal: even the infrarational man cannot be utterly infrarational, but must have or tend to have some kind of play more or less evolved or involved of the reason and a more or less crude suprarational element, a more or less disguised working of the spirit. At his lucid mental best, he is still not a pure mental being, a pure intelligence; even the most perfect intellectual is not and cannot be wholly or merely rational,there are vital urgings that he cannot exclude, visits or touches of a light from above that are not less suprarational because he does not recognise their source. No god, but at his highest a human being touched with a ray of the Divine Influence, mans very spirituality, however dominant, must have, while he is still this imperfectly evolved human, its rational and infrarational tendencies and elements. And as with the psychological life of individuals, so must it be with the ages of his communal existence; these may be marked off from each other by the predominant play of one element, its force may overpower the others or take them into itself or make some compromise, but an exclusive play seems to be neither intended nor possible.
Thus an infrarational period of human and social development need not be without its elements, its strong elements of reason and of spirituality. Even the savage, whether he be primitive or degenerate man, has some coherent idea of this world and the beyond, a theory of life and a religion. To us with our more advanced rationality his theory of life may seem incoherent, because we have lost its point of view and its principle of mental associations. But it is still an act of reason, and within its limits he is capable of a sufficient play of thought both ideative and practical, as well as a clear ethical idea and motive, some aesthetic notions and an understood order of society poor and barbarous to our view, but well enough contrived and put together to serve the simplicity of its objects. Or again we may not realise the element of reason in a primitive theory of life or of spirituality in a barbaric religion, because it appears to us to be made up of symbols and forms to which a superstitious value is attached by these undeveloped minds. But this is because the reason at this stage has an imperfect and limited action and the element of spirituality is crude or undeveloped and not yet self-conscious; in order to hold firmly their workings and make them real and concrete to his mind and spirit primitive man has to give them shape in symbols and forms to which he clings with a barbaric awe and reverence, because they alone can embody for him his method of self-guidance in life. For the dominant thing in him is his infrarational life of instinct, vital intuition and impulse, mechanical custom and tradition, and it is that to which the rest of him has to give some kind of primary order and first glimmerings of light. The unrefined reason and unenlightened spirit in him cannot work for their own ends; they are bond-slaves of his infrarational nature.

1.2.01 - The Call and the Capacity, #Letters On Yoga II, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
surrender even to a greater Light and Knowledge, even to the Divine Influence - these are frequent obstacles. But these things are not universal in Westerners, and they are on the other hand present in many Indian sadhaks, and they are, like the difficulties of the typical Indian nature, superstructural formations, not the very grain of the being. They cannot permanently stand in the way of the soul, if the soul's aspiration is strong and firm, if the spiritual aim is the chief thing in the life. They are impediments which the fire within can easily burn away if the will to get rid of them is strong, and which it will surely burn away in the end, - though less easily - even if the outer nature clings long to them and justifies them - provided that central will, that deeper impulse is behind all, real and sincere.
This conclusion of yours about the incapacity of the nonOriental for Indian Yoga is simply born of a too despondently acute sense of your own difficulties, - you have not seen those, equally great, that have long troubled or are still troubling others. Neither to Indian nor to European can the path of Yoga be smooth and easy; their common human nature is there to see to that. To each his own difficulties seem enormous and radical and even incurable by their continuity and persistence and induce long periods of despondency and crises of despair.

1.2.03 - Purity, #Letters On Yoga II, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
It [purity] is more a condition than a substance. Peace helps to purity - since in peace disturbing influences cease and the essence of purity is to respond only to the Divine Influence and not to have an affinity with other movements.
Purity means freedom from soil or mixture. The divine Purity is that in which there is no mixture of the turbid ignorant movements of the lower nature. Ordinarily purity is used to mean (in the common language) freedom from vital passion and impulse.

1951-03-19 - Mental worlds and their beings - Understanding in silence - Psychic world- its characteristics - True experiences and mental formations - twelve senses, #Questions And Answers 1950-1951, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The substance of the psychic world is a substance proper to it, with its own psychic characteristics: a sense of immortality, a complete receptivity to the Divine Influence, an entire submission to this influence by which it is wholly impregnated. It is this exactly which distinguishes the psychic from the other parts of the being. When, for instance, I speak of organising the mind and the vital around the psychic centre, I do not mean that they become psychic; they remain the mind and the vital, but they are organised around the psychic as an army is organised around its leaderit does not become the leader, it obeys him, doesnt it? Well, it is the same thing here; the vital and the mind are organised around the psychic, they receive orders from the psychic and carry them out as well as they can. But their substance does not become psychic substance as a consequence. They can be under the influence of the psychic and assume its nature more or less but not its substance.
You said that our body can become receptive to forces which are concentrated in certain places or in certain countries. But can we have this physical sensation without a preliminary preparation of the consciousness? Or is it truly a spontaneous sensation like heat, cold or goose-flesh, for example?2

1954-02-17 - Experience expressed in different ways - Origin of the psychic being - Progress in sports -Everything is not for the best, #Questions And Answers 1954, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Eh? What? In sports? No, the value of the will depends on your aim. If it is in order to be successful and earn a reputation for yourself and be better than othersall sorts of ideas like that then that becomes something very egoistic, very personal and you wont be able to progressyes, you will make progress but still it wont lead you anywhere. But if you do it with the idea of being open, even in the physical, to the Divine Influence, to be a good instrument and manifest Him, then that is very good. Not clear?
Yes.

1954-05-12 - The Purusha - Surrender - Distinguishing between influences - Perfect sincerity, #Questions And Answers 1954, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
This is not how one should see things. It is not by a perception of this kind of consciousness, not in this way. It comes when one has a sufficiently delicate and refined sensitivity to perceive clearly the value of a vibration; all vibrations that come from external activities, whether mental, vital or physical, or even psychic, have a particular quality, but what comes from the Divine Influence is of an absolutely different nature and quality. In order to be able to distinguish this, one must first of all have felt both; and even when one has felt both, one must be very calm, very attentive, indeed very still within, to be able to distinguish between them and not make a mistake. If your active thought comes in the way, it is finished, you cannot distinguish clearly any longer; you begin to questions. And then you make use of your notions of good and evil to judge whether this comes from the Divine or doesnt come from the Divine. Thats absurd. It is impossible.
Even when one has had this double experience and can make the distinction, there are still precautions to be taken and a check to be kept in order to be sure of not being mistaken. Only when one has flung the door of the psychic wide open, has entered consciously, and had the absolute, total, complete contact with the Divine, when one has the feeling of being born to a new life, when one is another being, does not see anything in the same way any longer, does not feel anything in the same way any more then one knows intimately, profoundly, completely what the divine life is. And even afterwards, if the door closes again, one can keep a precise memory. And it is in this way that it is seen. It is impossible to make a mistake. It is something quite different, there is no comparison, none: one can compare nothing with this. It is unique and absolute. That is why I asked you, Can you make the distinction? For surely if one among you has had the experience, he knows in this way what comes from the Divine, and necessarily if he knows absolutely what comes from the Divine, he knows perforce all that does not. So there I asked you the questions. For I should have been very happy that one among you could tell me with sincerity, I have had the experience and I know. But it is only after this experience that one knows, not before. That is why, if one sincerely wants to progress, one must at each step inquire, be sure from where the influence comes: Who has given me this suggestion? Is it a part of myself? Is it something external? Does this come from the Divine?

1954-07-07 - The inner warrior - Grace and the Falsehood - Opening from below - Surrender and inertia - Exclusive receptivity - Grace and receptivity, #Questions And Answers 1954, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And then again, even when this has been done, there is still the problem of food; as long as our body is compelled to take in foreign matter in order to subsist, it will absorb at the same time a considerable amount of inert and unconscious forces or those having a rather undesirable consciousness, and this alchemy must take place inside the body. We were speaking of the kinds of consciousness absorbed with food, but there is also the Inconscience thats absorbed with foodquite a deal of it. And that is why in many yogas there was the advice to offer to the Divine what one was going to eat before eating it (Mother makes a gesture of offering, hands joined, palms open). It consists in calling the Divine down into the food before eating it. One offers it to Him that is, one puts it in contact with the Divine, so that it may be under the Divine Influence when one eats it. It is very useful, it is very good. If one knows how to do it, it is very useful, it considerably reduces the work of inner transformations which has to be done. But, you see, in the world as it is, we are all interdependent. You cannot take in the air without taking in the vibrations, the countless vibrations produced by all kinds of movements and all kinds of people, and you mustif you want to remain intactyou must constantly act like a filter, as I was saying. That is to say, nothing that is undesirable should be allowed to enter, as when one goes to infected areas, one wears a mask over the face so that the air may be purified before one breathes it in. Well, something similar has to be done. One must have around oneself so intense an atmosphere in a total surrender to the Divine, so intensified around oneself that everything that passes through is automatically filtered. Anyhow, it is very useful in life, for there arewe spoke about this toothere are bad thoughts, bad wills, people who wish you ill, who make formations. There are all kinds of absolutely undesirable things in the atmosphere. And so, if one must always be on the watch, looking around on all sides, one would think only of one thing, how to protect oneself. First of all, it is tiresome, and then, you see, it makes you waste much time. If you are well enveloped in this way, with this light, the light of a perfectly glad, totally sincere surrender, when you are enveloped with that, it serves you as a marvellous filter. Nothing that is altogether undesirable, nothing that has ill-will can pass through. So, automatically, these things return where they came from. If there is a conscious ill-will against you, it comes, but cannot pass; the door is closed, for it is open only to divine things, it is not open to anything else. So it returns very quietly to the source from where it came.
But all these things are One can learn how to do them through a kind of study and science. But they can be done without any study or science provided the aspiration and surrender are absolute and total. If the aspiration and surrender are total, it is done automatically. But you must see to it that they are total; and besides, as I was saying just now, you become very clearly aware of it, for the moment they are not total, you are no longer happy. You feel uneasy, very miserable, dejected, a bit unhappy: Things are not quite pleasant today. They are the same as they were yesterday; yesterday they were marvellous, today they are not pleasing!Why? Because yesterday you were in a perfect state of surrender, more or less perfectand today you arent any more. So, what was so beautiful yesterday is no longer beautiful today. That joy you had within you, that confidence, the assurance that all will be well and the great Work will be accomplished, that certitudeall this, you see, has become veiled, has been replaced by a kind of doubt and, yes, by a discontent: Things are not beautiful, the world is nasty, people are not pleasant. It goes sometimes to this length: The food is not good, yesterday it was excellent. It is the same but today it is not good! This is the barometer! You may immediately tell yourself that an insincerity has crept in somewhere. It is very easy to know, you dont need to be very learned, for, as Sri Aurobindo has said in Elements of Yoga: One knows whether one is happy or unhappy, one knows whether one is content or discontented, one doesnt need to ask oneself, put complicated questions for this, one knows it!Well, it is very simple.

1954-11-03 - Body opening to the Divine - Concentration in the heart - The army of the Divine - The knot of the ego -Streng thening ones will, #Questions And Answers 1954, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
Thats when the physical body opens to the Divine Influence and receives the divine forces.
For example, you see, theres a moment when the divine forces come and penetrate all the cells. To begin with, it is the physical consciousness, the body consciousness which opens first to the influence of the Divine and understands and wants nothing else but this, the divine Presence, the Divine Influence. There are also the bodys feelings, and the very cells of the body, which can open to receive the force. For instance, when at a certain moment one feels a kind of very intense vibrations spreading through the whole body and at that time one feels filled with a strength, an unusual force, a consciousness also, and all things become clear and perceptible, then thats an opening of the body; it is when the body knows, you see, and has succeeded in opening to the influence.
Mother, why is it better to concentrate in the heart?1

1955-07-20 - The Impersonal Divine - Surrender to the Divine brings perfect freedom - The Divine gives Himself - The principle of the inner dimensions - The paths of aspiration and surrender - Linear and spherical paths and realisations, #Questions And Answers 1955, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
By concentrating more and more totally and completely on the Divine. If you aspire with all your ardour, if you want to receive only the Divine Influence, if all the time you pull back towards yourself what is taken, caught by other influences and with your will put it under the Divine Influence, you succeed in doing it. Its a work that cant be done in a day, in a minute; you must be vigilant for a very long time, for years; but one can succeed.
First of all you must will it.

1955-12-14 - Rejection of life as illusion in the old Yogas - Fighting the adverse forces - Universal and individual being - Three stages in Integral Yoga - How to feel the Divine Presence constantly, #Questions And Answers 1955, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
And all that you have wrested from this general semi-consciousness, and have crystallised into a more or less independent being, conscious of itself and having its own qualities, all this is your individual being. And this individual being is full of all the movements of obscurity, unconsciousness, and of the limitations of ordinary life, and thats and thats what you must gradually open to the Divine Influence and bring to the consciousness and understanding of things. Thats what Sri Aurobindo says.
In fact, the first victory is to create an individuality. And then later, the second victory is to give this individuality to the Divine. And the third victory is that the Divine changes your individuality into a divine being.

1960 02 03, #On Thoughts And Aphorisms, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
After consciously identifying itself with the Divine, the entire being even in its external partsmental, vital and physicalundergoes the consequences of this identification, and a change occurs which is sometimes even perceptible in the physical appearance. An influence is at work on the thoughts, the feelings, the sensations and even the actions. Sometimes, in all its movements, the being has a concrete and constant impression of the Divine Presence and its action through the outer instrument. But one cannot say that the physical mind knows God, for the very way of knowing that is characteristic of the mind is foreign to the Divine; one could even say that it is contrary to it. The physical mind itself can receive the Divine Influence and be transformed by it, but so long as it remains the physical mind, it can neither understand nor explain God, much less know Him; for to know God one must be identified with Him and for that the physical mind must cease to be what it is now, and consequently cease to be the physical mind.
The capacity to know God can be achieved in the lower triplicity the mind, the vital and the physicalonly with the supramental transformation, and this comes only just before the ultimate realisation which consists in becoming divine.

1961 05 22?, #On Thoughts And Aphorisms, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
It is like the word purity; one could hold forth interminably on the difference between divine purity and what people call purity. The divine purity, at the lowest, allows no influence other than the Divine Influenceat the lowest. But that is already very much distorted; the divine purity means that there is only the Divine, nothing elseit is perfectly pure, there is only the Divine, there is nothing other than Him.
And so on.

1970 03 15, #On Thoughts And Aphorisms, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The only true salvation for men is to escape from mental domination by opening to the Divine Influence which they will obtain through a total surrender.
15 March 1970

2.2.01 - The Outer Being and the Inner Being, #Letters On Yoga I, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
awaken to the Divine Influence at all - it receives the inner urge
even when it is not aware whence it comes.

2.2.03 - The Psychic Being, #Letters On Yoga I, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
It may be said of the psychic that it is that [the luminous part of our being], because the psychic is in touch with the Divine and a projection of the Divine into the lower nature. But the inner mind, vital and physical are a part of the universal and open to the dualities - only they are wider than the external mind, life and body and can receive more largely and easily the Divine Influence.
The psychic is deep within in the inner heart-centre behind the emotional being. From there it stretches upward to form the psychic mind and below to form the psychic vital and psychic physical, but usually one is aware of these only after the

2.25 - The Higher and the Lower Knowledge, #The Synthesis Of Yoga, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
The method of Yoga in knowledge must always be a turning of the eye inward and, so far as it looks upon outer things, a penetrating of the surface appearances to get at the one eternal reality within them. The lower knowledge is preoccupied with the appearances and workings; it is the first necessity of the higher to get away from them to the Reality of which they are the appearances and the Being and Power of conscious existence of which they are the workings. It does this by three movements each necessary to each other, by each of which the others become complete, -- purification, concentration, identification. The object of purification is to make the whole mental being a clear mirror in which the divine reality can be reflected, a clear vessel and an unobstructing channel into which the divine presence and through which the Divine Influence can be poured, a subtilised stuff which the divine nature can take possession of, new-shape and use to divine issues. For the mental being at present reflects only the confusions created by the mental and physical view of the world, is a channel only for the disorders of the ignorant lower nature arid full of obstructions and impurities which prevent the higher from acting; therefore the whole shape of our being is deformed and imperfect, indocile to the highest influences and turned in its action to ignorant and inferior utilities. It reflects even the world falsely; it is incapable of reflecting the Divine.
Concentration is necessary, first, to turn the whole will and mind from the discursive divagation natural to them, following a dispersed movement of the thoughts, running after many-branching desires, led away in the track of the senses and the outward mental response to phenomena: we have to fix the will and the thought on the eternal and real behind all, and this demands an immense effort, a one-pointed concentration. Secondly, it is necessary in order to break down the veil which is erected by our ordinary mentality between ourselves and the truth; for outer knowledge can be picked up by the way, by ordinary attention and reception, but the inner, hidden and higher truth can only be seized by an absolute concentration of the mind on its object, an absolute concentration of the will to attain it and, once attained, to hold it habitually and securely unite oneself with it. For identification is the condition of complete knowledge and possession; it is the intense result of a habitual purified reflecting of the reality and an entire concentration on it; arid it is necessary in order to break down entirely that division and separation of ourselves from the divine being and the eternal reality which is the normal condition of our unregenerated ignorant mentality.

2.3.03 - Integral Yoga, #Essays Divine And Human, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
A total surrender, an exclusive self-opening to the Divine Influence, a constant and integral choice of the Truth and rejection of the falsehood, these are the only conditions made. But these must be fulfilled entirely, without reserve, without any evasion or pretence, simply and sincerely down to the most physical consciousness and its workings[.]
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2.4.02 - Bhakti, Devotion, Worship, #Letters On Yoga II, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
The very object of Yoga is a change of consciousness it is by getting a new consciousness or by unveiling the hidden consciousness of the true being within and progressively manifesting and perfecting it that one gets first the contact and then the union with the Divine. Ananda and bhakti are part of that deeper consciousness, and it is only when one lives in it and grows in it that ananda and bhakti can be permanent. Till then, one can only get experiences of ananda and bhakti, but not the constant and permanent state. But the state of bhakti and constantly growing surrender does not come to all at an early stage of the sadhana; many, most indeed, have a long journey of purification and tapasya to go through before it opens, and experiences of this kind, at first rare and interspaced, afterwards frequent, are the landmarks of their progress. It depends on certain conditions, which have nothing to do with superior or inferior Yoga capacity, but rather with a predisposition in the heart to open, as you say, to the Sun of the Divine Influence.
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3.2.08 - Bhakti Yoga and Vaishnavism, #Letters On Yoga II, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
As for the hostile forces, it is quite true that to persuade the sadhak to cut off outer contact with us on the plea of solitude and intense sadhana, is a favourite device of theirs and has often led to disaster. It gives them a freer field to bring in their own influence and represent it as the Divine Influence or as our own influence, and it ends often by a revolt and finally the sadhak cuts off the inner relation also or even turns hostile. This has happened fairly often and that is one reason why I have usually discouraged that or any kind of complete solitude. Absence from darshan for a short time if there is good reason for it, but more than that is inadvisable.
The direct approach to Krishna is not safe or easy; it can sometimes be terribly risky, if there is anything in the sadhak that interferes with the clarity and singleness of his attitude. In that case any wrong desire, vanity, pride, sexual impurity, ambition, or any other pronounced weakness may open the way to serious distortion of the sadhana, turning into wrong ways, breakdown or collapse, even to spiritual perdition. Krishnas own influence cannot be a wrong influence, if it is really his, but it is easy to mistake and accept some other influence as his. Especially, he is the Lord of Love and Beauty and Delight, and nothing is easier for men who are always going in the wrong way in search of these things, to bring their wrong ways into their search for him also. That experience must be one of the reasons why the seers insist on the approach through the guru and say that Krishna cannot be attained otherwise. It is the reason why they insist on vairagya, detachment from the ordinary aims and ends of human nature as so necessary. That is also why Krishna does not like to show himself until the field is clear for him! The intervention of some power or influence that represents itself as he, even puts on an imitation of his form or voice would be fatal if accepted; but even his real manifestation might bring about an upset in someone not really ready for it. One must be on guard against these dangers and it is the guru who can interpose himself as a shield against them.

4.02 - Difficulties, #Words Of The Mother II, #The Mother, #Integral Yoga
The difficulties are always due to a resistance, some part or several parts of the being refusing to receive the force, the consciousness and the light put upon them and revolting against the Divine Influence. It is rare that somebody can surrender entirely to the Divines Will without having to face one or another of these difficulties. But to keep steady ones aspiration and to look at oneself with an absolute sincerity are the sure means to overcome all obstacles.
Surely all these troubles come from a resistance somewhere, something that opposes the work of transformation.

4.2.4.04 - The Psychic Fire and Some Inner Visions, #Letters On Yoga III, #Sri Aurobindo, #Integral Yoga
The psychic being is often seen or felt within in the form of a child, - it is perhaps that that you are feeling within you; it is calling for a complete sincerity, but sincerity is used here in the sense of opening to nothing but the Divine Influences and impulses. It does not mean that you have committed any fault, but only that the psychic in you wants you to be completely under its sole government, so that all in you may be for the
Divine only. The feeling of sorrow is probably a response of the vital in you to this demand - thinking that it must have erred; but such a feeling of sorrow is not necessary. The vital can quietly wait for the psychic working to do all that is needed in due time.

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