Sri Aurobindo

Letters of Sri Aurobindo

Volume 2. 1936

Letter ID: 1765

Sri Aurobindo — Nirodbaran Talukdar

October 28, 1936

Here is the photo of the two sisters J speaks of. Aruna, one of them, seems to have written to you. Both of them are keen on Yoga.

From Aruna’s letter I couldn’t say that they know very much about what Yoga is!

They seem to be quite healthy soldieresses... We want healthy people, Sir, not marasmics or plethorics!

Health is needed but health is “not enough”. Besides, trust not in appearances. Soldiers and soldieresses sometimes become pathological – nerves, shell-shock etc.

I woke up at 3 a.m. and tried to meditate. No sooner had I sat down than I felt a স্তব্ধতা¹, and the atmosphere around was so quiet that I felt or imagined some presences there. I thought – if at this hour some of these presences catch me, what shall I do? I got very frightened. Were there any presences?

What the deuce did you get afraid for? Supposing any were there, you could have waited at least to see whether they were good presences or bad. If good, no harm; if bad, you have only to tell them to skedaddle. But I expect it was only a feeling of yours. Generally the স্তব্ধতা is either empty of presences and formations or only one Presence is there, that of one’s self or that of the Divine.

Now I am wondering why really I was afraid – thereby losing a beautiful opportunity for gaining something.

Quite so. If one gets afraid, the experience can’t go on.

[After a long report of K’s medical case:] Have women a substance equivalent to men’s seminal fluid which is said to be the basis of physical energy? Our medical science is silent about it.

You really don’t want me to deliver to a doctor a lecture on physiology or genetics? Nonsense!

¹ slabdhatā: stillness.

Back