Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

Volume 1. 1934

Letter ID: 1185

Sri Aurobindo — Nirodbaran Talukdar

May 14, 1934

I woke up from sleep with a touch of sadness caused by some depressive dreams at night, dreams which have no correspondence in real life. For instance I saw H going to a pub and getting heavily drunk, D running after a girl in a drunken condition. Aren’t these dreams a sufficient cause to awake one to a sadness?

Not unless you believe that they point to something real in the physical life. Why should one be sad for a mere dream?

Am I seeing my own condition in others’ forms?

No. These are dreams on the vital plane. Such dreams may be mere formations in the vital without any actual value, they may point to something in the persons seen which was there in the past, in some cases they indicate possibilities of the future, in others things going on in the present (the last is rare, but does happen), but not always in the forms suggested by the dream. It is such things that happen on the vital plane, very rarely (though that too does happen) on the physical plane. But also they may be merely possibilities conjectured by one’s own vital mind about people. So one must know which it is of these various possibilities before getting sad about dreams! For instance in H’s case it is evidently an impression of something in his nature and habits that you knew to have been there in the past and which you know is not there at present.

I have been thinking whether I would not profit more by spending the time I use for writing in doing meditation instead. Has the writing work any spiritual value?

No present value spiritually – it may have a mental value. It is the same with the work – it has a value of moral training, discipline, obedience, acceptance of work for the Mother. The spiritual value and result come afterwards when the consciousness in the vital opens upward. So with the mental work. It is a preparation. If you cannot yet do it with the true spiritual consciousness, it, the work as well as the mental occupation, must be done with the right mental or vital will in it.

The Mother says in her Prayers and Meditations that experience is willed by the Divine. Am I then to suppose that dearth or abundance of experiences is, in any given case, willed by the Divine?

To say so has no value unless you realise all things as coming from the Divine. One who has realised as the Mother had realised in the midst of terrible sufferings and difficulties that even these came from the Divine and were preparing her for her work can make a spiritual use of such an attitude. For others it may lead to wrong conclusions.