Sri Aurobindo’s use of the terms ‘soul’ and ‘psychic’ started out with the common usage of the time, but as his work developed, he determined it was best to create a more precise terminology than was commonly in use. In order to appreciate the nuances involved and follow along with the central ... Views: 1
In his poem Savitri, Sri Aurobindo provides imagery to describe the nature and role of the soul, and the significance of the psychic being hidden deep within, carrying our human experience and human life to its eventual fulfillment.
Sri Aurobindo writes: "But since she knows the toil of mind ... Views: 2
There is considerable confusion about the nature of the soul. A sizable portion of humanity denies the existence of the soul, while another segment of humanity reduces its ‘value’ below that of material possessions and outward satisfactions. The ego-personality, bound up in the actions and ... Views: 3
How Srimad Bhagavatam Guides Daily Spiritual Living
In the modern world, people often search for meaning, balance, and inner peace while navigating the pressures of daily life. Many struggle to find guidance that goes beyond temporary solutions and touches the deeper aspects of human ... Views: 4
In various places, Sri Aurobindo has noted that yoga is applied psychology. The practitioner of yoga is confronted by all of the instincts, habits, trained responses and reactions of human nature and is asked to address and change these in order to uplift the human being to the next stage of the ... Views: 4
A question recently arose about how to become aware of the subtle vital envelope that surrounds the physical body and acts to protect it. One can practice quieting the mind, the emotions, the vital energies and the body and just feeling the sensation of the wider body until it becomes vivid and ... Views: 5
When an individual takes up a spiritual path, he has to work through the seemingly fine lines of distinction that the various prescriptions and directions for progress along the path appear to carry. For example, ‘equality’ and ‘equanimity’ are counseled as essential characteristics for ... Views: 6
The spiritual aspirant practicing the integral yoga devotes his efforts to coming into contact with the Divine Force, being receptive to its influence and action, and bringing it down to transform the action of the mind, life and body. Once this force is completely assimilated into the physical ... Views: 6
It is a natural human tendency, and it carries over to those who take up spiritual practice. This tendency sees most things through the mental lens and tries to categorize them as black and white, positive and negative, etc., essentially creating a mental framework of exclusion that looks to ... Views: 7
Most people are not aware of the vital envelope, sometimes called the ‘aura’, that surrounds their physical body. Those who experience this vital envelope are sensitive on the vital plane. They are frequently ridiculed for speaking about the ‘aura’ which they can feel or even observe in ... Views: 8
If we examine how illness comes upon us, and what effects it has, we can identify multiple different contributing factors that can lead to the physical imbalances that we call illness. Many of the symptoms of illness are the result of the physical body actually resisting the effect of the ... Views: 9
Many paths of spiritual practice disregard the needs of the physical body as being irrelevant, distracting, or obstructive to their spiritual development. This has not always been the case. The ancient Greek culture focused on a ‘sound mind in a sound body’ as an ideal. The ancient Vedic ... Views: 9
When the consciousness moves inward, away from the awareness of the external reality, it is frequently interpreted as ‘sleep’ by those who experience it for the first time. The reason they believe it is sleep is due to a lack of communication between that inward state of consciousness and the ... Views: 11
Where does the consciousness go when we are deep asleep? Numerous reports tell us that it can go out to other planes or realms, or down into subconscious levels, or up into superconscious levels. When we awaken from sleep, we generally are unable to describe what we did during sleep or where we ... Views: 12
Giving the body the rest and recuperative time it needs, the spiritual aspirant still has to deal with the effects of what is normally a descent into a more tamasic status that can have its impacts on the waking consciousness. If we wake up tired, groggy or cloudy, we have not only not fully ... Views: 14
In the Bhagavad Gita, Sri Krishna explains to Arjuna: “Verily this Yoga is not for him who eats too much or sleeps too much, even as it is not for him who gives up sleep and food, O Arjuna.” (Bhagavad Gita and Its Message, tr. by Sri Aurobindo, Ch. 6, V. 16) It is interesting to note that one of ... Views: 14
Symbolic dreams are common and in many cases, similar thematic elements show up for most people. These dreams attempt to raise up from the subconscious levels some underlying need, concern, fear, or persistent issue that remains unresolved in the external life. Sigmund Freud, in his work on The ... Views: 14
Once we break out of the limitations set by Western psychologists, such as Freud, in our attempt to understand the nature of dreams, we can explore the much wider and more nuanced potential causes, triggers, images and significances of dreams.
We find it hard to appreciate that there are ... Views: 14
Western psychology has taken a very narrow, and therefore quite inadequate, view of the nature of dreams. There are several primary ways dreams are analyzed in the West. The first is the purely mechanical structuring of dreams as a chaotic processing of ‘undigested’ residues of the observations, ... Views: 15
The physical consciousness is the primary seat of the Guna of Tamas in the being, in general, and thus, when the waking consciousness of the mental and vital levels is in abeyance during sleep, there is a natural tendency for the tamasic energy to come forward for a time. One of the first ... Views: 15
The Greek philosopher Plato, after deep consideration, reached the conclusion that some higher principle was real, which he called ‘Forms” or ‘Ideas’, and that the physical reality we see and experience is the result, not the cause. This concept is in consonance with the Vedic understanding. ... Views: 16
What happens when we sleep? Where does the consciousness go? For most people, sleep is a blank state. We have little awareness of what goes on during sleep, except for times when we are having a dream in a state near enough to the waking state that we actually remember details from the dream. We ... Views: 18
An individual dedicated some years to study and spiritual development. He gathered a small group of young people around him and took on the role of a teacher. He had obviously studied the texts and spent some time practicing them. He gained an aura of charisma for the young people who came under ... Views: 20
There is a theory, current in various spiritual paths, as well as in various attempts to overcome certain unwanted behaviours in the ordinary life, that by purposeful indulgence, through ‘experience’ (anubhava), the individual can overcome the undesired impulse, craving or desire. The idea is ... Views: 21
Freud made a breakthrough for the development of Western psychology that finally recognised that the human being responds to situations and circumstances, not solely on the superficial, transactional level, but also from suppressed, subliminal and subconscient activities that actually have a ... Views: 20
The law of attraction is not a miracle; it is a natural science!
Param Pujya Dada Bhagwan says, “This world is nothing but the result of scientific circumstantial evidence. Whatever one can see through the five senses is a result; it is all vyavasthit (in order).”
For any event that ... Views: 20
A narrow focus of extreme specialisation is a major cause of inaccurate assessment and therefore, inappropriate decisions and action. This is, however, a symptom of our modern-day fixation on mental analysis rather than on an approach that integrates the various parts into a coordinated whole, ... Views: 20
Most people respond to life as it comes to them and react according to the energy that they are able to receive and process in some form or another. They remain immersed in the external personality. They become the fear, the anger, the hunger, the thirst, the craving, the pleasure, the pain, the ... Views: 22
The chakras are subtle energy centers, not physical centers in the body, although they generally correspond to various physical capacities ranged along the external body. They essentially act as vibrational ‘receptors’ and transmitters of energies. When they are closed or very much shut down, ... Views: 23
Every part of the being eventually has to open and become receptive to the higher spiritual forces. This will lead to changes in the way these aspects of the external being respond and function. This is a progressive process over time. If the lower vital parts of the being get a surge of energy ... Views: 22
In the Rig Veda, there is a legend about a cave of the Panis which Sri Aurobindo has explained as a description of how the subconscient captures and holds the higher divine Light and encloses it away in the darkness. The illumined mind and the higher powers of awareness break open this ... Views: 24
As the seeker begins to observe the movements of the external nature closely, he can identify certain repetitive patterns of response, including impulses to stimuli of various sorts, cravings, desires, fears, frustrations, anger, and attraction. All of these are for the most part virtually ... Views: 26
In his play Hamlet, William Shakespeare has the protagonist proclaim “There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”
Particularly in the West, anything that references the possibility of past lives, inherited memories or capacities, or experiences, ... Views: 27
Medical researchers tell us that bacteria that can cause various disease conditions are always present in our environment, to some degree, including within our bodies. Yet for the most part, we do not become ill or remain ill all the time. The bacteria may be in a diffused or weak form, or our ... Views: 26
We are constantly being inundated by forces active in the world. These forces may be physical, such as the radiation from the sun, radioactivity from the earth, the power of wind, waves, gravitational influences, etc. They may also be vital forces that provoke sympathetic vibrations within us ... Views: 26
We see the world from the individual standpoint and place ourselves at the center of it. We believe we originate the thoughts, feelings, emotions and responses we give. This, however, is very much the illusion of the ego-sense.
Consider that for the longest time, human beings believed that ... Views: 25
When we are focused on our external being, we tend not to recognise that forces unseen actually not only impact how and what we perceive, understand, and respond to impressions and pressures, but actually very much define who we believe we are. There are forces that are subconscient to our ... Views: 27
C.G. Jung described what he called the ‘collective unconscious’, a repository of archetypal images and experiences that are universal to humanity. Sigmund Freud explored the subconscious realms of the individual and how they impacted the lives and responses of those individuals. The ... Views: 29
While we tend to believe that our consciousness is centered in the region of the brain, or in some cases, the heart, there is really a much broader framework for consciousness. There are different forms that consciousness takes. These forms vibrate at different frequencies and are then taken up ... Views: 28
The physical consciousness is very much driven by habit, routine and fixed response patterns. We can observe this in our eating routines, our sleep routines, and other habitual actions. The mind and the vital can influence the physical consciousness through programming routines or habits into ... Views: 28
It is essential for the spiritual seeker to maintain his view of the long-term objectives and the time frames of the evolution of consciousness in Nature, in order for him to avoid becoming overly anxious about specific setbacks or delays in completing transforming the external physical ... Views: 30
The natural seat of the Guna of sattwa is in the mental being; rajas in the vital being and tamas in the physical being. This is not to imply that there are not times and situations where one of the othe qualities comes forward in any of these three aspects of our external being; on the ... Views: 30
Vincent van Gogh (March 30, 1853 – July 29, 1890) was a Dutch Post-Impressionist painter who became one of the most influential figures in Western art. Though he produced over 2,000 artworks, including iconic pieces like The Starry Night, Sunflowers, and Irises, he achieved little recognition ... Views: 28
The integral yoga operates on the principle of the Force descending from above and working through the mind, the emotions, the vital and finally into the physical nature. While some action may take place in the sadhana out of a specific order, this is the general case, as the issue of addressing ... Views: 28
There is a proverb that says that changing human nature is like trying to straighten out a dog’s tail. As soon as the hold is taken off of the tail, it reverts to its usual shape. When we reach the level of the material consciousness, we are at the point where the ‘solidity’ of matter makes ... Views: 28
Most people, when asked, attribute consciousness to the mind, and center it in the brain. But consciousness does not stop there and, indeed, there are various types of consciousness associated with different aspects of the being. There is a mental consciousness, an emotional consciousness, a ... Views: 28
In a certain sense, pursuing one of the paths that lead to liberation from human life is actually simpler and less complicated than a path that calls for the total change and transformation of human nature. In the first case, the seeker can choose to disregard the external life and the external ... Views: 29
Physical Austerities, Self-Torture, Fasting and the Mastery of the Sexual Impulse
Posted on January 21, 2026
There is a considerable history within the religious and spiritual traditions of the world, of the use of various forms of self-inflicted physical suffering to restrain the basic sexual ... Views: 27
The waking consciousness takes notice of only a very small fraction of all of the impressions that reach the senses. Not all impressions are direct sense impressions, as some impinge directly on the aura or on the mental substance without involving the 5 external senses. Of those directly noted, ... Views: 30
Students today face many academic challenges. Coursework deadlines, complex topics, and high expectations from teachers can make studies stressful. Many students struggle to manage everything at the same time. To handle this pressure, learners now rely on an online coursework helper for guidance ... Views: 26